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Jenna Piche – First Light Health
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You have found
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Authentic Business Adventures program
that brings you the struggle stories
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and triumphant successes
of business owners across the land.
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Downloadable audio episodes of the podcast
can be found on the podcast link.
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Found at drawincustomers.com. We are
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locally underwritten
by the Bank of Sun Prairie.
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My name is James Kademan, entrepreneur,
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author, speaker, and helpful coach to
small business owners across the country.
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And to today, we’re welcoming,
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preparing to learn from Jenna Piche, the
owner superhero of First Light Health.
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So, Jenna, how are you doing today?
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I’m doing great, James.
Thanks for having me.
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Thanks for being on the show.
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This is great because let’s see here.
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I’ve known you for a long time.
A long time.
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But it wasn’t through.
First Light Health.
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It was through, was it Midwest Family?
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It was through Midwest family.
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We were both in marketing land trying
to run our businesses. Hustling. Hustling,
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networking out there
with the best of them.
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Yeah.
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So tell us before we really dive in here,
what is First Light Health?
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So First Light Health is a women’s
health and focus coaching company.
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All right.
Yeah, very nice.
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So women’s health and then
focus, you mentioned.
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Yes.
So focus.
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Ultimately, what I found is I’ll talk
a little bit more about them later
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today is as I’m talking to working
women who have kids at home.
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One of the biggest struggles we have is
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getting the things done we need to at work
so we can shut off work and show up
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for our families and make
space for our self care.
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All right.
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So to do that,
I help with health coaching,
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but also with the focus piece so they can
get done what they need to the right
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things at work and shut it
off to show up at home.
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All right, so you imagine this was
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a solution to a problem
that you’ve seen yes.
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Maybe personally? Experienced.
Yeah.
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So I’ve always wanted
to be an entrepreneur.
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My dad was a contractor growing up,
so I had always seen the freedom that he
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had had, but I just hadn’t
found the right opportunity.
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And it’s funny how life gives you this
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past, and looking back, you can see it,
but not necessarily as you’re living it.
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Right.
So about a year ago,
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I went back to a marketing firm I
used to work for to manage a team.
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And as I dove in, I was about a week in,
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we had someone quit,
I had to fire somebody.
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And then the next week, unfortunately,
someone had a health crisis.
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So I went from a team of six to three
and found myself, as I was trying to start
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a business on the side,
trying to pick up the slack of those other
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three people and was
just burning myself out.
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Sure.
So one night I’m trudging up the stairs
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at 09:00 after I put the kids to bed, and
I was falling asleep trying to read Dr.
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Seuss something.
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And I sit down at my computer,
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I’m reading all these emails and making
my to do list and thinking I’m going to be
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up until two and then the kids
are going to wake me up at six.
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And we’re just going to keep doing this.
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And I thought, this is not sustainable.
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So I knew something had to change.
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And I had already taken a health
coaching certification.
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I had had some health issues after
having my second kiddo, who’s now three.
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Oh, wow.
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But then I decided, gosh, I really
need to find a better way to focus.
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So I went and got a certification
for productivity.
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It’s called Full Focus.
That’s a thing.
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Yes.
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There’s a company, Full Focus,
who actually does it.
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They have a planner.
And so through that system,
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I now am able to coach folks on getting
the right things done at work,
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how to plan their ideal week,
and really how to work self care in so
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they can focus on all of the aspects of
their life, not just their work identity.
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All right.
Yeah.
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Wow.
So you touched on a lot of stuff there.
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First, I just want to just point out,
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you’re with this company for a week
and you got to fire someone.
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Yeah.
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Welcome, Jenna.
That’s the guy.
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That’s the first thing
we need to get rid of.
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It’s always so interesting because I think
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when you come into a team that you didn’t
hire,
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you probably learn a little bit through
the hiring process about the team.
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But I never want to take
on someone else’s opinions.
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I want to be able to form my own.
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Sure, it’s fair,
but when you come in and you see someone’s
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attitude, I have a lot of capacity
for being able to help someone reach their
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potential and train them
and coach them up right.
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If they have the right attitude.
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But attitude is just something I feel like
if you can’t fix it,
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I can’t have you poisoning
everyone else in the department.
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It really just became one of those things
where the writing was on the wall.
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And as a human, I felt for him because
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he really had some stuff going on in his
life, so I tried to give him some grace,
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but we also had clients to serve
who were paying us money.
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It just becomes a point.
Right.
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So you can wish them luck.
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And also, I think as managers, we forget,
too, that we’re releasing them to a better
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opportunity, even though it’s
hard to see that in the moment.
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Yeah, it’s interesting.
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I can think of, well,
I got to let go of a company.
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Oh, man.
Forever ago.
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I don’t know, let’s call it 1520
years ago or something like that.
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And I remember being so upset
because I was making them money.
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I did the math before and I was making
them cash, and I got fired for attitude,
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which it was totally a justifiable fire
because it was attitude
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I felt like I wasn’t getting in return
all that I was doing.
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And let me back up another story.
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I was working as a mechanic
way previous life, and one of the guys I
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was working with had a conversation
with the manager saying, hey,
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I need a raise because if you give
me more money, I’ll do better work.
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And the manager said,
you got that backwards.
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You do better work, we’ll get you a raise.
Spot on.
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So it was interesting because
I had that in my head.
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And so as I’m working at this place,
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I’m like, I’m doing better work,
but I’m not getting compensated for it.
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And then you just get angry.
Right.
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And then that I was still taking care
of the customers, but at the office
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I was probably a train wreck
or just maybe train wrecks.
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Wrong word.
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I’m sure you were never
a train wreck, James.
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It’s just one of those I was like,
you’re lucky to have me.
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You’re lucky to have me.
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And I knew that the customers were happy,
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but I took for granted the culture
of the actual business.
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I didn’t even know that was the thing.
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So then they let me go and I’m like,
Why would you do that?
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I’m making you crazy money.
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What’s so interesting I think about that,
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though, is that it’s
a total mindset thing.
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Totally.
And we don’t realize that.
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I feel like early in our careers,
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because we’re hustling so much
to prove ourselves, right?
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And then we feel like when we’re proving
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ourselves, well, hey,
they should be paying us more.
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And I think that’s the seed that a lot
of entrepreneurs end up with.
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Right.
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I’m working my butt off
and I’m making you more cash.
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So that’s probably why we all end up
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in business for ourselves anyway
when we have that experience.
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Exactly.
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But I think the mindset thing is a really
interesting one because it’s all about
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the stories that we tell
ourselves about the experience.
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So the experience could be wonderful,
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but if we’re telling ourselves we’re
overworked and underpaid, man,
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it’s really hard to break that cycle
unless you have unless you’re fortunate
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enough to have someone come in and tell
you, hey, look, you’ve got this backwards
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and I’m going to give
you a chance to fix it.
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Yeah, you know, it’s interesting, I guess,
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now that you say that that was never
a conversation that was had there,
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but they were probably just
as oblivious as I was.
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And there’s a lot of places I can think
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of that either business owners that I
know, or even myself
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with my businesses up until
I don’t know who I was talking to,
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where I realized, like, wait,
culture is a thing, right?
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Because I was just under the impression
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that you hire good people,
you’ll have a good culture,
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but just because you’re good people
doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll either
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stay good or that they won’t
bring their baggage, right?
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Wherever they’re going, work included.
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Well, I think that’s interesting because
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I’ve had the privilege of working for
several companies before starting my own.
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And so seeing and experiencing it in many
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different ways is interesting because I’ve
learned that if you’re not deliberate
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about your culture,
it just becomes whatever it is.
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You have one,
but if you’re not really paying attention
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to it and shaping it,
it’s going to be whatever your employees
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say it is and not how you are
actually trying to form it.
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I actually worked for a company that was
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initially based in a Chicago suburb
and they were all really close in it.
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It was a family owned business
and you could tell that, right?
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Everyone knew, everyone’s back story knew
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what you were doing on the weekend
and that was a really cool space.
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But this was even before the pandemic hit,
they started spreading out and realizing
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that we were a software company,
we could do this work anywhere.
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So everyone started moving to some really
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cool places like San Diego
and Denver and Seattle.
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And so everyone started to kind of spread
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out, which is cool because then you
have that location freedom, right.
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But I think what the company lost is some
of that culture that close knitness.
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But then when you’re in a remote situation
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that a lot of companies have gone to now
when they’re remote or hybrid,
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you lose that close knit feeling because
you’re not next to each other every day,
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or you don’t have your water cooler
talks or your time in between meetings.
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And we had to be more
deliberate about time.
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We tried to have quarterly offsite
meetings and strategic planning meetings
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and stuff so at least we
could stay connected.
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Yeah, but it’s a lot harder in this remote
world to try to facilitate culture.
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It’s tough.
Yeah, yeah.
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When you see the big tech players that are
like, come on back, we’re going to lay off
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10,000 of you, but the rest of you
have to show up in the office.
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It’s interesting because I’m like,
why are they doing that?
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Right?
There’s a huge money on the line, right?
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I mean, multiples higher than
the company that I have.
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And it’s interesting to watch what they’re
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doing and then see like,
I can totally understand why.
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I totally understand why.
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Well, and I think it’s also interesting
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though, because we all thought that we
were going to go to remote work and this
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is just going to be the new thing,
just the new norm, right?
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In the before times, we never could have
dreamt that that was going to be a norm.
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But a lot of companies are having
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to backpedal and figure that out because
they said, oh yeah, this is fine.
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We’re just going to continue in this way
and then realizing even for mental health,
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for employees who think they want
to work remotely, they suffer.
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So yeah, we’ll see how it develops.
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Over the next five years,
we’ll be a good case study.
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Yeah.
Right.
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Yeah.
Because never been done before.
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Right.
So I imagine there’s productivity,
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there’s culture, there’s just the random
conversations, the water cooler talks,
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when all of a sudden, you invent
the next big thing just by chatting.
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It’s interesting.
Yeah, it is.
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And I think, again,
coming back to the hiring.
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So my sister just finished
her master’s program.
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Proud sister here.
Very excited for her.
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But what she did as part of her thesis was
she did some research to figure out
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the companies who were getting the most
applicants for their open positions.
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What were they doing differently than
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the companies who weren’t
getting any applicants?
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Oh, great question.
And she answered it in that they talked
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about their culture
in their job description.
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And so if we thought we didn’t have
to have a culture before,
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we certainly need to now,
when it’s such a competitive hiring.
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Yeah.
Interesting.
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Yeah.
That is so peculiar,
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because I’m trying to think back
in the day when I was looking for jobs,
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would I have ever even considered thinking
about the culture of the business?
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I don’t know.
Maybe.
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Well, or would I have even known what
kind of culture I would excel in?
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Right.
Or think about your company.
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Now, how would you describe your culture
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in a way that’s actually authentic
unless you lay a vision?
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I have what I believe it is,
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but the challenge is when everyone’s
remote and I have tried, man,
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I feel like sometimes I’m trying
to squeeze a rock, trying to get feedback
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from my crew about,
what do we need to change?
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What do you like?
What do you dislike?
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Just tell me.
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And they’re like, everything’s cool.
Right.
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And I want to be like, no, there’s
always something that you can change.
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Right.
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Even if it’s the color
of the curtains in your room.
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I don’t know, whatever.
Right.
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But it’s such a challenge because I get
like, we’re cool, and maybe they’re cool,
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but it’s so, like, from an entrepreneurial
mindset, everything’s got to be fixed.
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Well, we’re optimizers, right?
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What’s the next 10% better?
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How can we make it a little bit better?
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How can this work more efficiently?
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And, I mean, that’s why I got
into productivity and focus, right.
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How can I just do this 1% better
today and 1% better tomorrow?
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And so I think it’s interesting when we’re
so used to breaking down everything
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that we do to interact other personalities
who maybe don’t operate in that way.
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Right.
[00:12:30]
My husband and I work like this in the
fact that I set goals all the time.
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I’m ready for what’s the next step
I’m going to take to get there.
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Here’s everything I’m
working on this year.
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And it’s not that he’s not a goal setter.
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It’s just that he
knows the vision that he has for his life
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and doesn’t specifically set
them out in the way I do.
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But he’s very much more systems
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and compliance oriented and I’m much
more of an interpersonal driver.
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Sure.
So it’s really interesting when you put
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the, you know,
the personality mix on top of that.
[00:13:02]
So your team maybe not giving you feedback
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is because their personalities
are a little different.
[00:13:07]
Maybe they’re motivated
by different things.
[00:13:09]
And happiness is happiness.
Right.
[00:13:12]
Yeah.
However you define it.
[00:13:13]
Right, exactly.
Yeah.
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It’s interesting.
It’s funny that you say that because I
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guess what I’m thinking about this now
that we’re talking,
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I couldn’t hire me because I
wouldn’t even apply for the job.
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Like I’m just not the person there.
[00:13:30]
So I’m trying to communicate with people,
[00:13:32]
my employees, I guess,
like I would want to be communicated with,
[00:13:36]
but if I wouldn’t hire a person like me
because they wouldn’t even apply,
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I’m trying to communicate
with someone that doesn’t even exist.
[00:13:42]
Well, what do they say?
[00:13:43]
The golden rule is to treat others
the way you want to be treated.
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Treated.
But then so many people have said, no,
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you need to treat them the way
they want to be treated.
[00:13:48]
Right.
[00:13:49]
But the struggle is if you don’t actually
have them take a personality test,
[00:13:52]
how do you ever know how
they want to be treated?
[00:13:54]
You have to spend enough time with them
and try to read between the lines
[00:13:57]
and there’s so much emotional
intelligence involved in that.
[00:14:01]
Or lack.
Or lack, right, exactly.
[00:14:04]
To try to figure that out.
[00:14:06]
It’s such a trial and error game.
[00:14:07]
Totally can’t come right out and say.
[00:14:11]
Because they don’t they may
not even know themselves.
[00:14:13]
Interesting.
Yeah.
[00:14:15]
The productivity.
Tell me about the productivity.
[00:14:17]
Yeah, I have a certification.
[00:14:21]
It’s called a Full Focus Certified Pro.
[00:14:23]
And really I got more interested
in productivity because I was telling you
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about that family run
business I worked for.
[00:14:27]
I worked remote,
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so I live in rural Wisconsin and
we were spread all over the place.
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So I was just given a we’re going to do
marketing for this firm and it was great.
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I got the freedom,
but I also then got to execute and I
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realized that I needed
to develop my own plan.
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Working from home for the
first time was great.
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I was having kids.
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I had the flexibility
to develop my own schedule.
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But I also need to keep myself accountable
because I didn’t have a boss that was
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showing up every day making sure
I was doing what I needed to do.
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And so again, this was pre pandemic when I
was working from home thinking, gosh,
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I need to find a way to keep
myself consistent and accountable.
[00:15:08]
Oh, interesting.
[00:15:09]
You’re solving this
problem before people I.
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Was solving well because
I knew it was my problem.
[00:15:13]
Yeah.
[00:15:13]
So I tried like five or six different
planner systems and how I’d organize
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my day and all these things
because again, I’m an optimizer.
[00:15:20]
Sure.
So finally I found this one
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from Full Focus and it really helped me
think through what are my daily rituals
[00:15:27]
and also helped me think through this
time energy paradox.
[00:15:33]
What about that?
[00:15:34]
I had always thought, and I don’t know,
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maybe this is a young person being naive,
but there’s this hustle fallacy, right,
[00:15:42]
that I need more hours in the day
to get more things done.
[00:15:46]
And if I can’t get enough done,
then I just need more hours in the day.
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That’s all there is to it.
[00:15:50]
Just changes the sun, right?
[00:15:53]
Somehow stretched me 26 from 24, but also
it was, oh, 8 hours isn’t enough.
[00:15:59]
Let me work twelve.
[00:16:00]
Five days isn’t enough.
[00:16:01]
Let me work six or seven.
Right.
[00:16:03]
Sleep fast.
[00:16:05]
Or just sleep when you’re dead, right?
[00:16:06]
That’s what we said when
we were in college.
[00:16:08]
And we know that’s not healthy,
but I needed to find a way to leverage
[00:16:13]
my time in just a more predictable,
productive, but also healthier way.
[00:16:20]
Because trying to push 14 hours
of work is not productive.
[00:16:22]
At some point you’re just wait.
You got to give.
[00:16:25]
So the idea of the time energy paradox is
[00:16:28]
that while time is fixed, your energy
shifts and fluctuates through the day.
[00:16:33]
So I tend to find that I have the most
[00:16:36]
energy in the morning, and about
203:00 I’m going to hit a slump.
[00:16:40]
So I can’t do anything productive
between three and five.
[00:16:43]
All right?
So I know that if I have a couple
[00:16:45]
of projects I need to get done,
my best time is between ten and noon.
[00:16:49]
All right,
[00:16:51]
when you’re tiptop tiptop shape,
maybe I’ve had some caffeine in my system,
[00:16:55]
maybe have some endorphins going
from a morning workout and I get it done.
[00:16:59]
So when I started looking then at my days
[00:17:01]
in that way and saying, okay,
I’m not going to take meetings from ten
[00:17:04]
to noon because that’s my focus time and
that’s what I’m going to get things done.
[00:17:07]
You take the meetings
during the slough off time?
[00:17:10]
Well, right, unless it’s brainstorming
[00:17:13]
and then it’s like, don’t count on me
for any creative thought whatsoever.
[00:17:19]
So that helped me think and like,
okay, when is my best time of day?
[00:17:23]
But then as I started seeing the leaps
and bounds of things I could get done,
[00:17:27]
I thought, gosh,
how can I get more of this?
[00:17:29]
So then I started looking at my week
[00:17:31]
and saying, okay, if I had an ideal week,
what would that look like?
[00:17:35]
And there’s a tool in this
planner system that you can use.
[00:17:38]
So I thought through batching,
[00:17:41]
if I’m going to create content for my
company, I should just do that in a day.
[00:17:46]
I’ll be in the right mindset.
[00:17:48]
I’ll create all of my content
in a day and then I’ll be done.
[00:17:50]
I can schedule it for the rest of the week
and I don’t have to come back there.
[00:17:54]
And then maybe I’ll have another couple
of days where I’ll do client calls
[00:17:58]
and then my brain will be
in that frame of mind.
[00:18:00]
I’ll do those client calls on that day,
and then maybe I have an administrative
[00:18:04]
day or I have a day, I try to get
speaking gigs, things like that.
[00:18:08]
So I tried to batch my work,
and it really helped me think more about
[00:18:14]
being the right frame of mind
for that work that day.
[00:18:17]
Interesting.
[00:18:17]
So you’re not going
through 50 years in a day.
[00:18:20]
We lose so much steam.
[00:18:23]
Depending on what research you look at,
they can say you lose anywhere between 20
[00:18:27]
and 40 minutes of productivity
just by trying to switch tasks.
[00:18:30]
Yeah.
I mean, think about all these people
[00:18:32]
who say, oh, I’m a great multitask, or,
well, are you doing any of those things?
[00:18:35]
Well, it’s interesting you say that,
[00:18:38]
because with the call answering thing,
we’re essentially doing that.
[00:18:42]
Right.
But I’m like, my crew is good at that.
[00:18:46]
But it’s interesting because we just
started that whole patching thing,
[00:18:50]
like last week, two weeks ago,
something like that.
[00:18:53]
Yeah.
[00:18:53]
Trying to schedule stuff like that,
knowing well, I guess we tried before
[00:18:58]
where you try to do like, hey,
just take five minutes to do this one blog
[00:19:02]
or make these few calls or something
like that, instead of doing a block.
[00:19:05]
And when you do a block,
you can get in the zone.
[00:19:07]
Right.
And you can bang them out.
[00:19:09]
You’re way more efficient.
Yeah.
[00:19:11]
And I think you learn you can turn
[00:19:13]
the lessons around from the last call
into the next call more quickly.
[00:19:18]
True.
When you’re doing it.
[00:19:20]
I’m going to do three today,
three tomorrow, whatever.
[00:19:22]
There’s 24 hours in between that.
[00:19:24]
And so how do you learn
and try to build on that?
[00:19:26]
Yeah.
So it’s interesting you say that then,
[00:19:29]
because we think about this idea of,
like, rituals are scripting.
[00:19:32]
Right.
[00:19:32]
So you talked about your team
trying to do some of this batching.
[00:19:36]
I have found that when I script things,
[00:19:39]
and I don’t mean like I’m scripting all
of my calls with my clients or things like
[00:19:43]
that, but more of a I know that if I’m
going to have a discovery call
[00:19:46]
with a potential client, these are
the kinds of questions I’m going to ask.
[00:19:49]
And they’re the kinds of questions I’m
[00:19:50]
going to ask because that helps me
determine whether or not we’re a good fit.
[00:19:54]
Sure.
[00:19:54]
Whether I could help them or
whether they’d be a good client.
[00:19:57]
For me, a system, a checklist.
Yeah.
[00:19:59]
You don’t want to be like, oh.
I forgot to ask them this one thing.
[00:20:03]
Extremely important.
[00:20:04]
Let’s set up our next
meeting before we’re done.
[00:20:06]
Right.
[00:20:07]
But then just this idea of,
like, ritual and routine.
[00:20:11]
So as I again tried to make each day 1%
[00:20:14]
better, I think, well,
what’s my morning routine?
[00:20:16]
How can I be more efficient
to set myself up for a good day?
[00:20:20]
So there’s four rituals
that I try to put in my day.
[00:20:22]
Now.
I have a morning and evening ritual
[00:20:24]
and then a workday startup
and a workday shutdown.
[00:20:28]
Wow.
[00:20:29]
And those two were relatively new
for me when I started this system.
[00:20:33]
Morning routines.
[00:20:33]
You hear about people talking
about those all the time.
[00:20:35]
What can you do in the morning,
get yourself going,
[00:20:37]
everybody’s got an opinion on what
you should be doing, right?
[00:20:39]
Sure.
[00:20:39]
But five cups of coffee or
workout or whatever, right.
[00:20:43]
Or read or whatever you’re going to do.
Sure.
[00:20:45]
So the workday startup ritual, though,
[00:20:47]
I found really interesting because it’s
your way to kind of switch gears
[00:20:50]
from maybe your personal life
to your professional life.
[00:20:53]
And if you’re an entrepreneur,
[00:20:54]
I don’t know that there’s ever
really an on off switch for that.
[00:20:56]
We like to believe, right.
[00:20:58]
We love to believe, we sell ourselves,
[00:21:00]
but if you work for somebody else,
maybe it’s a little easier.
[00:21:02]
And actually, as entrepreneurs,
if we can create boundaries around our
[00:21:06]
work day, we probably
have a better balance.
[00:21:08]
Ideal goal would be that you can,
but you can shut it off.
[00:21:12]
So it’s what we’re all working towards.
Sure.
[00:21:13]
Right.
So this idea of a workday startup is what
[00:21:17]
are you going to do at the beginning
of the day that you really need to check
[00:21:20]
in on before you can
get to meaningful work?
[00:21:22]
So these are administrative things,
[00:21:24]
so for me it includes checking email,
making sure that there’s not some fire I
[00:21:28]
need to put out, answering any
client questions or phone calls.
[00:21:32]
And if I didn’t do my content in advance,
I’m going to make sure I have a social
[00:21:37]
post going out so I can be productive
and serve my community in that way.
[00:21:41]
But some other people might include
[00:21:43]
in here, like answering Slack messages,
returning voicemails.
[00:21:46]
If you get a lot of email in a day,
[00:21:48]
maybe a half hour workday startup routine
isn’t enough, but then it kind of kicks
[00:21:53]
off your day to, okay,
I did all these things,
[00:21:55]
I can put them aside now so I can
actually work on meaningful work.
[00:21:59]
All right, so check some boxes.
Right.
[00:22:00]
This is done.
I accomplish some stuff right off the bat.
[00:22:03]
Well.
And it’s important because because I don’t
[00:22:05]
know if you’re this way with email,
but for me, I can get so distracted
[00:22:08]
by email because I have a list of 20
things I want to get done today.
[00:22:12]
But it’s so much easier just to go answer
[00:22:13]
my email because you get a dopamine
hit every time you hit send.
[00:22:16]
Like oh, Chuck.
Oh, Chuck.
[00:22:17]
I get all these things done, but I’m
not getting the right things done.
[00:22:21]
Sexy versus accomplishment.
Exactly.
[00:22:23]
All right.
Yes.
[00:22:24]
And so then at the end of the day,
[00:22:26]
there’s a workday shutdown,
which basically just means how can I take
[00:22:29]
care of the things I need to make a list
of the things I need to get done tomorrow
[00:22:33]
so I can actually shut work off and show
up wherever I need to after work.
[00:22:37]
All right.
I get that.
[00:22:38]
There are times when I
tell myself, Walk away.
[00:22:41]
Yes, walk away.
[00:22:43]
And I write down two or three things
that have to be done for the next day so
[00:22:46]
that when I come in my office,
like, oh, those are the priorities.
[00:22:49]
Yeah.
[00:22:49]
You set yourself up
for success the next day.
[00:22:51]
But there’s times that I feel like I have
[00:22:53]
an internal fight where
it’s just like, walk away.
[00:22:56]
James, one more email.
[00:22:59]
Is that internal voice
telling you balance?
[00:23:01]
Yeah, balance.
Oh, my gosh.
[00:23:03]
You’re just like, shut up.
[00:23:05]
Stop telling me to walk
away so I can finish this.
[00:23:07]
But on the flip side, like,
[00:23:09]
the one that’s telling me to walk away,
that’s the smarter side.
[00:23:12]
Right.
You’re not being productive.
[00:23:14]
Right.
[00:23:15]
It’s tough to get out of the chair.
[00:23:17]
I think if you’re on a roll sometimes
as an entrepreneur or anything,
[00:23:20]
if you’re doing something that you love,
it doesn’t feel like work.
[00:23:24]
And I know a lot of it totally that way.
[00:23:26]
Feel like, hey, I don’t want to step away
from this because I enjoy what I’m doing.
[00:23:30]
But we have so many other aspects
of our life than just our work.
[00:23:34]
And while especially we as entrepreneurs
[00:23:36]
kind of identify ourselves as our career
through work to a fold,
[00:23:41]
there are so many other opportunities
in our lives that maybe we minimize too
[00:23:45]
much because we are so focused
on growing a business.
[00:23:48]
Sure.
[00:23:49]
And I think that that’s one of the things
that while some people may lose in their
[00:23:53]
career to grow or in their journey to grow
their own business,
[00:23:57]
I’ve been really intentional about making
sure that my family is in front of me.
[00:24:01]
I have a three and a five
year old at home.
[00:24:03]
All right.
[00:24:03]
And
like I said, my dad was a contractor
[00:24:07]
growing up, so I never wanted to
sideline my family or not have
[00:24:13]
opportunities to go do the things that I
wanted to or go see whatever they were
[00:24:17]
doing because I had this
other stuff going on.
[00:24:20]
Did you see him do that?
[00:24:21]
Yes, but he did more travel.
[00:24:23]
Like, he would travel and set houses
[00:24:25]
and go states and states away to do
these things for weeks at a time.
[00:24:29]
Wow.
Okay.
[00:24:30]
And so he did it when we were young,
[00:24:33]
and then he made different
choices as we got older.
[00:24:35]
But I decided I’m going to go in business
[00:24:37]
so I have the flexibility to actually
see those things for my kids.
[00:24:40]
I don’t want to design a business
I need a vacation from.
[00:24:43]
I’m going to design a business around
having the flexibility to see my kids.
[00:24:47]
Nice.
So when I think about the ideal week,
[00:24:50]
I think about the flexibility that it
gives me to say, you know what?
[00:24:53]
If I want to have client calls on Tuesdays
[00:24:56]
and Thursdays because my kid has wrestling
on Wednesday nights, I need to be able to.
[00:24:59]
Shut down at 03:00.
[00:25:01]
I have the control to do
that because it’s my business.
[00:25:04]
Nice.
Yeah.
[00:25:06]
People are very good at building
their own prisons, right?
[00:25:08]
Very good.
Oh, my gosh.
[00:25:10]
I was talking to someone else in a retail
store,
[00:25:13]
the owner, and it was so interesting
chatting with her, and I’m just thinking,
[00:25:18]
like, when you got in this business,
what were you thinking?
[00:25:22]
Right?
It’s fun retailer.
[00:25:25]
You’re selling your thing.
It’s kind of a dream.
[00:25:27]
I suppose it’d be like me owning a bar.
[00:25:29]
It’s always something that I
thought that’d be cool.
[00:25:31]
But then you talk to bar owners and you’re
[00:25:33]
like, no, it doesn’t
sound like fun at all.
[00:25:36]
Because it’s tough to take a vacation.
Right.
[00:25:39]
Or it’s tough to walk away or
even just go see a kids game.
[00:25:42]
Right.
[00:25:43]
My kid just had a basketball tournament
[00:25:45]
that started at 03:00 on a Friday,
and I was like, no problem.
[00:25:49]
We’ll just make the game.
No big thing, right?
[00:25:51]
And I looked around.
I remember looking around the bleachers,
[00:25:53]
and I’m like, how many people was it
a struggle to get them there,
[00:25:58]
doing whatever it is they had to do
for their work to get there,
[00:26:00]
and how many people are not
here because they couldn’t?
[00:26:03]
And then I realized the second or third
game, coach number two shows up because
[00:26:08]
that guy couldn’t get away
from work right away.
[00:26:10]
And I’m watching I don’t
even know what to do.
[00:26:13]
Right?
But I don’t want to do it well.
[00:26:15]
And I think that there, again,
[00:26:17]
is that idea of, like,
I have to versus I get to yeah.
[00:26:20]
You know, I get to take off
early to go see my kids.
[00:26:24]
One thing, though,
that I’ve always thought was kind
[00:26:27]
of an oversight by schools
is most parents there?
[00:26:31]
There are some families who one parent
[00:26:33]
decides to stay home,
and that works for them.
[00:26:35]
That’s wonderful.
That’s amazing.
[00:26:36]
But if people are working,
[00:26:39]
how can you schedule a kids game for 430
or 05:00 and expect parents to be there?
[00:26:43]
Yeah, but it was just it was somebody
thought it was a good idea, so whatever.
[00:26:49]
Here we go.
[00:26:50]
But no, if I was running that
particular thing, I mean, I’m sure they.
[00:26:56]
Have to get it all in before kids
have to go to bed and all that.
[00:26:59]
Whatever.
It’s just one of those, like, this.
[00:27:02]
Is weird, but you got to go.
You got to go.
[00:27:05]
Yeah, yeah.
Without issue.
[00:27:06]
Exactly.
[00:27:08]
There’s zero thought.
[00:27:10]
It’s just this is happening in a way.
[00:27:11]
We go.
[00:27:12]
But that was intentional because my dad
[00:27:15]
had his own business,
and I learned a ton of what not to do
[00:27:19]
by watching him, and I’m certain that he
didn’t make the mistakes, and well,
[00:27:22]
I guess most people don’t make
the mistakes intentionally.
[00:27:25]
Maybe he didn’t even
view them as mistakes.
[00:27:27]
But he owned a job, and owning the job,
it was a physical job.
[00:27:32]
He was delivering milk and stuff like
that where these are the hours, right?
[00:27:37]
It’s not like, hey,
[00:27:38]
I’m going to see my kids game, and then
I’ll deliver milk after the game is done.
[00:27:42]
Like, you can’t the restaurants
[00:27:43]
and schools that you’re delivering
to are open certain times.
[00:27:46]
Whatever.
This is your window.
[00:27:48]
So that’s the idea of the whole
time freedom thing.
[00:27:51]
Right.
And I think part of why we become
[00:27:52]
entrepreneurs is like, we want to control
our own schedule, to your point.
[00:27:55]
Otherwise, even sometimes when we control
[00:27:57]
our own schedule,
we create our own prison.
[00:27:58]
But totally,
[00:27:59]
I think it’s really interesting because as
we create that time freedom,
[00:28:06]
we’re like, oh, we can
do so much with this.
[00:28:09]
Look at all this time I now
have as an entrepreneur.
[00:28:12]
And then you fill it up with this,
and you fill it up with this,
[00:28:14]
and you say yes to this and all these
things because you think you have all this
[00:28:17]
opportunity all this time to grow your
business, and then you realize quickly
[00:28:22]
that you can’t say yes
to everything, right?
[00:28:24]
Oh, I learned that the hard way.
Oh, my gosh.
[00:28:26]
It has been one of my biggest struggles,
and it’s even to clients so much is
[00:28:34]
I know that they’re not the best fit,
and maybe I’m not the best fit for them.
[00:28:38]
So the other side of my business
is health coaching.
[00:28:41]
Perfect segue yeah, perfect.
[00:28:43]
I say this because ultimately
I’m a helper.
[00:28:47]
I want to help people get
healthier and where they are.
[00:28:50]
And I just had a discovery call
with a client last week where
[00:28:55]
she knew she didn’t have the budget
to work with me for a six month program,
[00:28:59]
but she still had recently
received a diagnosis.
[00:29:02]
She was looking for a second opinion via
[00:29:04]
functional medicine,
and she was kind of at a loss.
[00:29:09]
And so I said, Well, I’ll help you
run some additional lab screenings.
[00:29:12]
I can explain that a little bit, but it’s
not the way I typically do business.
[00:29:16]
And it was a one off, so I said yes
when I knew I should have said no.
[00:29:20]
All right.
But I felt like I was helping.
[00:29:23]
But in the long run,
[00:29:25]
I feel like saying yes to her means
I’m saying no to something else.
[00:29:28]
It could have been a better fit.
Right.
[00:29:31]
And one could probably make a strong
argument, what does she value that, then?
[00:29:38]
So the results, right?
Exactly.
[00:29:40]
Because if this truly was going to help
[00:29:42]
her, does she believe that
that’s to be seen?
[00:29:47]
I guess we’ll find out.
[00:29:48]
But I think that’s a good point.
[00:29:49]
So, coaching and consulting,
[00:29:52]
I feel like the success is
in the repetition and the consistency.
[00:29:55]
Agree.
[00:29:56]
And if you do one session,
it’s education, it’s learning,
[00:30:01]
but there’s no reinforcement,
there’s no accountability.
[00:30:03]
And I think that that’s the struggle,
[00:30:05]
is that they don’t have an opportunity
to ask questions or apply it to their life
[00:30:10]
and then come back and say,
I’m running into this?
[00:30:12]
How do I do this?
[00:30:13]
And so I think that that’s where I
[00:30:17]
struggle, is helping people understand
that this is a health journey.
[00:30:21]
It’s not, we’re going to do a test,
help you get a result,
[00:30:23]
and then you’re ultimately going to change
your life because of this result.
[00:30:26]
Be cool.
They did.
[00:30:27]
But probably it would be great if
[00:30:29]
there were so many things where we got
a result and said, great, let’s move on.
[00:30:34]
Interesting.
[00:30:35]
I’m learning how to play guitar,
and I feel like the education like,
[00:30:39]
I watch a video and I’ll be like,
there’s no way my fingers can go there.
[00:30:44]
Right?
And then the next day,
[00:30:46]
you get a little bit better and a little
bit better and a little bit better.
[00:30:48]
Right.
[00:30:48]
But it’s interesting
that you say that, right?
[00:30:50]
Because if I would have just watched
[00:30:52]
that same video, whatever, one time
and then like, that’s, it can’t do that.
[00:30:56]
I’m good, right?
I can’t or whatever.
[00:30:58]
No way.
Yeah.
[00:31:00]
So I imagine a coaching session.
[00:31:02]
It’s not just one and done.
It’s not.
[00:31:04]
So the health coaching side
[00:31:06]
of my business, first,
I do functional health coaching, okay?
[00:31:09]
And that’s different from conventional.
[00:31:12]
So there’s functional medicine
and conventional medicine.
[00:31:14]
I’d consider the conventional medicine
[00:31:17]
model more of, like,
your disease care, right?
[00:31:19]
You get a diagnosis,
you’re given a treatment plan,
[00:31:21]
which usually includes maybe procedures
or some prescriptions, okay?
[00:31:25]
So, like, you have cancer, you broke.
[00:31:27]
A leg, you have arthritis, you have
autism, whatever it is,
[00:31:32]
you get a diagnosis,
and then you have a plan of care.
[00:31:36]
Okay?
Right.
[00:31:37]
But it usually involves prescription
[00:31:38]
drugs, maybe some procedures,
PT, whatever that might be.
[00:31:43]
The idea of functional medicine is
that we want you to it’s health care.
[00:31:48]
We want you to be involved in your own
[00:31:50]
solution by using alternative
I even hate to say alternative, right?
[00:31:55]
Because I feel like when I say
[00:31:56]
alternative, people think,
like, voodoo crazy medicine.
[00:31:59]
Go look at the rainbow.
Right?
[00:32:01]
But it’s really more of this idea
that the body has an innate ability
[00:32:06]
to heal itself if we provide
the environment in which it can do so.
[00:32:09]
Fair.
Totally fair.
[00:32:10]
And that environment does not include
[00:32:11]
being stressed out all the time,
eating junk foods, not sleeping.
[00:32:16]
So it’s the idea of just teaching you
[00:32:18]
the basics, again,
of life that I feel like we lose when
[00:32:21]
we’re trying to run 120 miles
an hour every day, all day.
[00:32:23]
All right, so is that
well, maybe it’s both.
[00:32:27]
Is it preventative or is it preventative
and caring for if somebody says, hey,
[00:32:33]
I got arthritis, can functional
medicine come into play there?
[00:32:35]
Right?
So while I’d love to say that it’s
[00:32:38]
preventative, there’s probably only 5%
of the people who seek out a functional
[00:32:41]
medicine practitioner who are saying,
I want to optimize my health.
[00:32:44]
I want to live in full vitality.
Right.
[00:32:47]
Unfortunately, it takes an episode for
someone to reach out and find, all right.
[00:32:51]
In order to find a solution,
they want to have a problem, right.
[00:32:53]
Or maybe they maybe they
come at it like I did.
[00:32:56]
I had a family member who was diagnosed
with an arthritis condition and was being
[00:33:01]
thrown prescription after
prescription from a provider,
[00:33:05]
and God bless them, they have five minutes
to spend with people,
[00:33:08]
so they really don’t have an opportunity
to understand everything that’s going on.
[00:33:12]
But if I’m watching this family member,
she’s taking this medication and this
[00:33:15]
medication, and this medication is making
that medication worse,
[00:33:18]
and this is even worse, and it’s like,
well, are we even making the arthritis any
[00:33:21]
better, or are we just making that better
and causing 15 other downstream problems?
[00:33:26]
So I was trying to help her
find an alternative way.
[00:33:29]
Right.
[00:33:30]
There’s got to be something else other
than a pill to solve this, right.
[00:33:34]
So functional medicine’s core is the idea
[00:33:37]
of trying to get down to the root
cause of whatever caused the problem.
[00:33:40]
And the root cause for you
and me might be different.
[00:33:43]
We might both have migraines, right.
[00:33:45]
But there’s a lot of things that can
[00:33:47]
happen on a cellular level
that would make that happen.
[00:33:51]
So for me, for example,
[00:33:53]
after I had my second kiddo,
I started training for a half marathon.
[00:33:58]
Did you really?
[00:33:59]
Well, I did want it after my first,
and I was like, that’s great.
[00:34:01]
I’ll get back in shape,
I’ll get active again.
[00:34:03]
And I did it.
[00:34:04]
I didn’t do as fast as I wanted to,
but I did it nice.
[00:34:06]
So I thought thanks.
[00:34:08]
Well, I did nap at a sonoma,
[00:34:09]
so there was wine at the end,
but we all have different Motivators.
[00:34:14]
Sure.
[00:34:14]
So after my second kid, I thought,
great, we’ll do it again.
[00:34:17]
And then I set up a routine,
I set up a schedule.
[00:34:21]
I was doing my runs, and I just
started losing a bunch of weight.
[00:34:24]
And initially I thought, oh, this is
great, I’m dropping a baby weight.
[00:34:28]
But it didn’t stop.
[00:34:29]
And I got down to a scary weight that I
[00:34:32]
hadn’t seen since high school and thought,
this this just can’t be right.
[00:34:36]
So I went to my doctor and took a couple
of tests, and I was 34 at the time.
[00:34:41]
And she said, I’m going to refer you out
[00:34:44]
to a gastroenterologist, but I think
you have all sorts of colitis.
[00:34:47]
And he said, I’m 34 and I’m going to get
an autoimmune diagnosis and go to go get
[00:34:53]
a procedure, probably
get some prescription.
[00:34:55]
And all the things I said,
I can’t, that’s not my life.
[00:34:58]
I’m not going to be defined by.
[00:35:00]
That like chicken wings too much.
Right.
[00:35:03]
Well, mine was probably wine or whatever,
[00:35:07]
so I said, there’s got
to be another option here.
[00:35:09]
So I went and got a functional
health coach certification.
[00:35:13]
I was lucky enough to then be able to run
some functional lab screenings,
[00:35:19]
which don’t include they’re different
tests than your doctor usually runs.
[00:35:23]
They’re not typically covered
by insurance, but they try to help you
[00:35:26]
uncover health issues before
they become a scary diagnosis.
[00:35:32]
Right, exactly.
[00:35:33]
But we don’t want to wait until they’re
big issues to address them.
[00:35:36]
Right.
Otherwise, we’re going to end up
[00:35:37]
in a disease care model that maybe
we’ll never be able to get out of.
[00:35:41]
Right.
[00:35:41]
So after going through that process,
I was able to run some stool, urine,
[00:35:46]
blood, saliva samples, check out
my hormones, check out my gut health.
[00:35:50]
See?
Really what’s going on?
[00:35:51]
And I was over exercising.
[00:35:53]
I wasn’t eating the right things.
[00:35:55]
My hormones were completely out of whack.
[00:35:57]
I was stressed to the nines all the time
[00:35:59]
and thought, isn’t this just
the way that people operate?
[00:36:03]
And then I learned a different way.
[00:36:06]
Like, no stress management
is actually a good thing.
[00:36:09]
Right.
I shouldn’t be in fight or flight all
[00:36:10]
the time because there
isn’t a lion chasing me.
[00:36:12]
24/7.
Right.
[00:36:14]
And our body wasn’t made
to be in that state.
[00:36:17]
We were supposed to,
after the lion stopped chasing us,
[00:36:20]
take a minute and rest
and recover, but we don’t.
[00:36:23]
And so our body is consistently trying
[00:36:25]
to break down and deal with that stress,
and so all of these things can cascade.
[00:36:29]
So for me, it ended up being
extreme digestive issues.
[00:36:32]
For someone else, it could be headaches,
[00:36:34]
or for someone else,
it could be arthritis.
[00:36:36]
Sure.
[00:36:37]
So it’s just really interesting
how everyone’s body is unique.
[00:36:41]
Yeah.
[00:36:42]
How long does it take to go through
this functional wellness certification?
[00:36:47]
Yeah.
So it’s an on demand program.
[00:36:49]
I have to say I was motivated
because I had my own health issues.
[00:36:52]
So I guess I asked that because you didn’t
[00:36:54]
find a practitioner necessarily,
you’re like, I’m going to get certified.
[00:36:58]
Well, I did find
a functional practitioner.
[00:37:02]
I think that this is an interesting
thing about any provider that you find.
[00:37:07]
She listened to me, ran a test that looked
normal,
[00:37:11]
listened to me, ran another test and said,
I don’t think there’s anything wrong.
[00:37:14]
You have the healthiest
gut I’ve ever seen.
[00:37:16]
But I was still clearly not well.
[00:37:18]
So I think one is, ultimately,
[00:37:22]
you just have to find
a provider that listens to you.
[00:37:24]
All right.
[00:37:25]
Like taking your car to the mechanic
where you hear the noise.
[00:37:27]
The mechanic is like, I don’t hear it.
No problem.
[00:37:30]
Right.
There is totally a problem.
[00:37:31]
Or as a woman going to mechanic that’s
[00:37:33]
just like, there’s nothing wrong here,
or they try to speak you down,
[00:37:38]
like, $2,000 bill because they don’t
think you know what’s going on.
[00:37:42]
There’s two routes.
All right.
[00:37:43]
But ultimately,
I think that it’s important for people
[00:37:47]
to find someone who’s actually going
to listen to what they’re going through.
[00:37:49]
And I think that as we go down these
[00:37:52]
journeys, we want to know,
do you understand what I’m going through?
[00:37:56]
Have you helped other people like me?
[00:37:58]
And is this going to work?
All right?
[00:38:00]
And so that’s what I really try
to help my clients understand.
[00:38:03]
But for me, it was gut health.
[00:38:04]
So for other women,
it may not be that way.
[00:38:07]
So before I started my business,
[00:38:09]
I was like, let me just do
a little bit of research.
[00:38:12]
Let me see if there’s other people
dealing with what I’m dealing with.
[00:38:16]
So I called ten women who I knew had kids
who also had jobs and said, you know,
[00:38:23]
what kind of what kind of health
issues do you deal with?
[00:38:25]
And I thought I was going to strictly go
down gut health and focus in that way.
[00:38:29]
But the theme I heard the most was,
gosh, I’m tired all the time.
[00:38:34]
I can’t stay awake to read books
[00:38:35]
to my kids, or I just I wish I had energy
to stay up at night and watch Netflix
[00:38:40]
with my husband, but I just fall
asleep or I hit an afternoon slump.
[00:38:44]
And so what I heard more and more
from all these working moms is energy.
[00:38:48]
I just don’t have enough energy,
[00:38:49]
and I feel like I’m burning
the candle at both ends.
[00:38:52]
And so what I know as a functional
[00:38:54]
medicine provider is that that
ultimately comes back to the gut.
[00:38:58]
Hippocrates says that all
health begins in the gut.
[00:39:00]
Yeah.
And so it’s interesting because our immune
[00:39:03]
system lives there, but a lot
of people don’t think of it that way.
[00:39:07]
They think, oh,
I don’t have a lot of energy,
[00:39:09]
and then they think,
I need more caffeine for that.
[00:39:13]
Right?
[00:39:14]
But they don’t realize they might actually
have imbalances at a deeper level,
[00:39:19]
but it’s not the way they
talk about the problem.
[00:39:23]
So that was a lesson for me really early,
[00:39:26]
and my business was making sure I was
speaking the same language that my target
[00:39:29]
was speaking, because
I target working moms.
[00:39:32]
So I want to ask you, when you were
reaching out to them, how close were you?
[00:39:36]
Were close friends?
[00:39:38]
Were these just people you knew?
[00:39:39]
So most of them are close friends.
[00:39:41]
I mean, I would get a recommendation
[00:39:42]
to some other folks just to get
up to the number I wanted.
[00:39:44]
So when you asked them, hey,
you got this life, tell me about your if
[00:39:49]
you have any health problems,
did you ever have anyone say, no,
[00:39:54]
everything is good,
that they just would not admit,
[00:39:56]
or you had to probe a little
bit to get them to admit.
[00:39:59]
That there was an issue?
[00:40:00]
People open up a little bit
more the more you talk to them.
[00:40:03]
Right.
So you have to ask him a warm up question.
[00:40:05]
Got you.
But how about them packers?
[00:40:08]
Right?
[00:40:10]
Well, most working bombs will
have time to watch whatever.
[00:40:13]
Absolutely right.
Exactly.
[00:40:15]
Whatever.
[00:40:16]
But I do think that we I
had to warm them up a bit.
[00:40:20]
There were a few that I wasn’t as close
to that would be like, for the most part,
[00:40:24]
my gut health is great, but then
they’d go in this other direction.
[00:40:29]
I find with clients, one, they don’t reach
out to me if they don’t have a problem.
[00:40:33]
Right.
[00:40:34]
Like I said,
5% of us are looking for better health,
[00:40:37]
but otherwise, if we’re not
struggling, we’re not looking.
[00:40:41]
But these women are all working and trying
to chase kids and do the things.
[00:40:45]
So I was surprised there’s
a camaraderie, I think, in it.
[00:40:51]
I feel like any community that you’re
[00:40:53]
a member of, you kind
of get some camaraderie.
[00:40:55]
Totally.
[00:40:57]
Sometimes misery just loves company.
[00:41:01]
So would you have to share your story or
[00:41:03]
did you share your story to kind
of open them up a little?
[00:41:05]
Some of them did know my story,
like, safe Place.
[00:41:08]
Right.
[00:41:10]
There were others where I just said, hey,
[00:41:11]
I’m getting ready to start
a health coach business.
[00:41:13]
I’m really trying to learn what
issues working moms struggle with.
[00:41:16]
All right.
[00:41:17]
I think another thing I’ve struggles
[00:41:20]
with is the vulnerability
of sharing my story openly.
[00:41:23]
Sure.
You know, it took me so I started this
[00:41:25]
business on the side in 2021,
and it took me until the end of 2022 to,
[00:41:32]
like, openly share my story
on Facebook with my close friends.
[00:41:35]
All right.
[00:41:36]
And I knew that that was
a weakness of mine.
[00:41:39]
I mean, I don’t openly
share my life on Facebook.
[00:41:42]
Is it, though?
[00:41:43]
Well, I think that there’s
blessings and curses to it.
[00:41:47]
Sure.
I guess I wouldn’t necessarily consider it
[00:41:49]
a weakness because from my point of view,
I would say, like, is it relevant?
[00:41:54]
Fair.
And a strong argument could be made either
[00:41:56]
direction,
but I guess I understand what you’re
[00:41:59]
saying to the world,
there’s trust and vulnerability.
[00:42:03]
Fair.
Totally fair.
[00:42:04]
So I think that others, to your point,
[00:42:06]
are less likely to open up to me unless
they know that I’ve had a problem.
[00:42:10]
And we don’t want to show others maybe
that weak side of us or what we’ve been
[00:42:15]
struggling with if we know that they
haven’t had to go through it.
[00:42:18]
Make us look less weak.
[00:42:20]
More weak, yeah.
[00:42:22]
I always think of the motivational
speakers where you hear like, oh,
[00:42:26]
I was addicted to drugs or I
was an alcoholic or whatever.
[00:42:30]
The high school I found.
Yeah.
[00:42:32]
And now I’m the motivational speaker,
[00:42:34]
and I’m like, shouldn’t we be listening
to someone who didn’t mess up so bad?
[00:42:37]
Right.
[00:42:38]
But in the end, the gut thing wasn’t
necessarily like that wasn’t a choice.
[00:42:42]
Today I’m going to have a gut problem.
Right.
[00:42:45]
Well, and I think the other piece
of it is we all are well meaning.
[00:42:50]
Yeah.
Right.
[00:42:52]
Well, I like to think that everyone is
[00:42:54]
doing the best that they can
with the information that they have
[00:42:56]
and that we learn something
new and we can shift.
[00:42:59]
But I think that as a mom
learning what I did about my gut health
[00:43:05]
journey, I’d love to go back and tell any
other pregnant mom,
[00:43:08]
these are the things that I would
not do because of my journey.
[00:43:11]
But no one wants to hear that until
they’ve had their own struggle, right?
[00:43:14]
You don’t want to openly give advice
[00:43:16]
to a group of people who are like,
I would never do that.
[00:43:20]
But I’m sitting here saying,
[00:43:22]
oh, I’m breastfeeding so I can eat a whole
sleeve of Oreos and go to culverts every
[00:43:25]
day and have cheese curds and ice
cream because I’m breastfeeding.
[00:43:29]
And look at all these extra calories I’m
burning and treating for a half marathon.
[00:43:33]
But I think I didn’t understand
the quality of the food, right?
[00:43:36]
The calories in the calorie,
there’s good foods that bless your body
[00:43:38]
and fuel it, and there’s other
foods that don’t bless your body.
[00:43:41]
I like that.
Interesting.
[00:43:44]
It’s so funny.
[00:43:45]
It reminds me of when I met
Printer Repair Company.
[00:43:47]
I was looking at Franchising, it okay.
[00:43:50]
And I remember I was going to this company
that their business model was to help you
[00:43:55]
build a franchise and sell it
and all this kind of stuff.
[00:43:58]
And I remember thinking
[00:44:01]
when I first started this business,
would I buy a franchise of this?
[00:44:05]
Like, even though I know what I know,
systems are in place,
[00:44:09]
all this kind of stuff,
would I, as the little punk that started
[00:44:13]
this business in the first place, listen
to a guy that I think knows more than me?
[00:44:18]
I probably wouldn’t.
[00:44:19]
I wouldn’t because I’m
like, I know it all.
[00:44:22]
Or at least I know most of it.
[00:44:24]
And I would never pay someone that.
[00:44:27]
So I always think, I guess to your point
[00:44:30]
there, even though somebody may like, hey,
you know a little bit more than me,
[00:44:33]
but I got this covered, this life, saying
I got it dialed in when they don’t, right?
[00:44:39]
So it’s interesting how some people,
even though, you know,
[00:44:44]
don’t jump off that cliff,
they’re just like, Come on, right?
[00:44:48]
It’s a nice cliff.
[00:44:50]
Well, I think the other struggle here is
[00:44:53]
that as women in particular,
we have a hard time asking for help.
[00:44:57]
And so I think that until we are really in
a spot, it’s really hard to ask for help.
[00:45:03]
So we’re out looking for information.
[00:45:06]
For better or worse,
we find blogs and we find this influencer
[00:45:10]
and that fluencer who said we should try
this diet and we should try this workout
[00:45:14]
routine and all the things when we’re
like, okay, we can figure this out because
[00:45:19]
why can’t I figure out how
to be healthy on my own?
[00:45:21]
This is ridiculous.
People have been doing this for years.
[00:45:23]
And so we don’t ask for help until it’s
[00:45:25]
bad enough that we don’t
find another alternative.
[00:45:27]
That’s another thing I found
[00:45:28]
in my research is that women were saying,
I don’t know what’s credible.
[00:45:32]
There’s so much information out there now
[00:45:34]
in this age that I don’t
know what to believe.
[00:45:37]
Because you read this thing and it says
[00:45:38]
this and you read this over here
and it says the complete opposite.
[00:45:41]
So that’s the other thing that I have
found, is that I need to build trust
[00:45:45]
with folks so they know that I’m
coming from a place of education.
[00:45:51]
Sure.
[00:45:52]
That’s probably the biggest
I would imagine.
[00:45:54]
It is, yeah.
For something on the level that you’re
[00:45:56]
taking care of, because without that,
what do you got?
[00:46:00]
Right.
Interesting.
[00:46:01]
So going to your idea of Franchising,
you mentioned maybe you wouldn’t listen.
[00:46:08]
I think we were talking
about time freedom.
[00:46:11]
One of the things that I realized early
on with my business is that I didn’t want
[00:46:15]
to trade time for money
because I had been great.
[00:46:19]
There are plenty of other situations
where I was making somebody else money.
[00:46:22]
And I think, again, that’s why we as
entrepreneurs get into this business.
[00:46:24]
We don’t want to work hard
for someone else to make that money.
[00:46:26]
Right.
[00:46:27]
But I wanted time freedom, and I thought,
gosh, I could just do one on one coaching,
[00:46:31]
and I’m just trading, you know,
hours time for money.
[00:46:34]
Yeah.
[00:46:35]
So I thought, how can I
scale this in a better way?
[00:46:39]
I mean, it’s just me.
[00:46:40]
Someday maybe I’ll have a team of five,
but right now, it’s just me.
[00:46:42]
Not just you.
Totally.
[00:46:44]
I’m the superhero founder.
Right.
[00:46:47]
But I think that I realized right away
that I was going to need another plan.
[00:46:52]
So I went out and looked,
[00:46:54]
and there are mentors out there,
and I found one that had a kind
[00:47:00]
of a blueprint for how to develop a group
program that would make it more scalable.
[00:47:06]
You could help and coach a group of 15 or
[00:47:09]
20 or however many to get
your multiplier yes, exactly.
[00:47:12]
In an hour instead of just
training one in an hour.
[00:47:16]
So I made that investment early on,
and I’d make it again because it gave me
[00:47:21]
a blueprint that I’m hoping
to use to scale more quickly.
[00:47:25]
All right.
[00:47:27]
But it’s not necessarily a franchise.
[00:47:30]
It’s more of a blueprint for scale.
[00:47:32]
Sure.
They have a system.
[00:47:34]
Right.
They have a system.
[00:47:35]
You leverage the system.
Right.
[00:47:37]
But I’d heard so many people say gosh.
[00:47:40]
What do they say?
[00:47:42]
Something about you want to go far fast.
[00:47:43]
You have to find a community
you want to find.
[00:47:46]
And so I did make that investment.
All right.
[00:47:49]
That’s fair.
It is.
[00:47:50]
It’s fair, and I’m excited about it.
[00:47:52]
So I’ll have to report back on the scale
and how successful that is.
[00:47:56]
So we don’t have a ton of time left.
[00:47:58]
But I want to ask about marketing.
[00:48:00]
Yeah, because you’re
in the marketing world.
[00:48:02]
I was marketing exec for about 15 years.
Yeah.
[00:48:04]
And now you have your own business.
[00:48:05]
So instead of marketing for other people,
you have to market for yourself.
[00:48:08]
Yeah.
[00:48:12]
It’s a struggle.
[00:48:14]
So some people are trying to come up with,
like, a word for their year.
[00:48:17]
They try to come up with a theme.
[00:48:18]
And mine is imperfect action.
[00:48:21]
Imperfect action.
[00:48:22]
Because I’ve been a marketer for 15 years,
[00:48:25]
and I could pick apart my own marketing
for weeks and try to make it perfect.
[00:48:29]
And I’ve just realized you
just need to hit send.
[00:48:32]
You just need to hit publish.
[00:48:33]
I think Seth Godin is one
of the people who push that.
[00:48:35]
Right.
[00:48:35]
You just have to good
enough is good enough.
[00:48:38]
And that has been
a struggle for me as a marketer.
[00:48:39]
Yeah.
[00:48:40]
Good enough beats not
done and perfect, right?
[00:48:41]
Exactly.
[00:48:42]
So imperfect action is my theme
this year, but it is a struggle.
[00:48:46]
All right.
[00:48:48]
What has been some of the response
[00:48:49]
that you’ve gotten or some
of the feedback or clients?
[00:48:53]
Has stuff happened?
Yeah, absolutely.
[00:48:56]
So my initial client was
an arthritis client.
[00:48:59]
We worked through inflammation is
really at the core of arthritis.
[00:49:02]
So we worked through nutrition,
[00:49:04]
trying to get in some more joyful movement
not crazy movement,
[00:49:07]
some targeted supplementation
to bring down that inflammation.
[00:49:11]
And she’s on fewer medications.
[00:49:13]
She’s moving around better.
[00:49:15]
She’s not quite to where she wants to be
yet, but she’s still working through it.
[00:49:18]
I think she recognizes it’s a journey,
[00:49:20]
which is extremely helpful for those
who think it’s a one and done.
[00:49:25]
I’m starting my first group program here
[00:49:27]
in a couple of weeks in February,
so if anyone’s interested, there will be.
[00:49:32]
I’m calling the Living Light Reset,
[00:49:34]
so we focus on nutrition. Okay.
[00:49:36]
And focus, as well as diet,
joyful movement, and stress management.
[00:49:41]
Tell me about joyful movement.
Yeah.
[00:49:43]
So rather than trying to do cardio all
the time, which can really throw your
[00:49:47]
hormones out of whack, it’s just finding
movement that you move your body.
[00:49:52]
All right.
So, for me, I try to do yoga twice a week,
[00:49:56]
lift weights twice a week,
because it’s really good for longevity,
[00:49:59]
making sure that you can functionally
sit in a chair and get out of it.
[00:50:02]
And I still love to run,
but I only do it twice a week.
[00:50:05]
For others, they like swimming or playing
[00:50:08]
basketball or whatever it is,
but ultimately, it’s something that you
[00:50:10]
enjoy that you will continue
doing that isn’t a slog.
[00:50:13]
Like, I have to go run 5 miles today.
All right.
[00:50:16]
That’s so interesting.
Yeah.
[00:50:17]
I talk with people about running.
[00:50:18]
I love running, it’s so chill.
[00:50:22]
I do it early in the morning.
[00:50:23]
No one else is around.
[00:50:24]
It frees up my mind.
Yeah.
[00:50:26]
I consider it meditative.
Absolutely.
[00:50:29]
And it’s so interesting when I’m not well,
[00:50:30]
I talk to people,
and they’re just like, running,
[00:50:32]
oh, my gosh.
[00:50:33]
And from my point of view, I’m like,
[00:50:35]
we have only a few ways
to actually be mobile.
[00:50:38]
Like, you can walk,
you can run, you can crawl.
[00:50:41]
I don’t crawl a whole lot.
[00:50:44]
You’re a few decades past that.
Yeah.
[00:50:46]
It’s interesting that
people just rule that
[00:50:48]
mode of transportation out.
But it’s ultimately what you enjoy.
[00:50:51]
Right.
[00:50:51]
So if you enjoy running,
then that’s the great thing for you.
[00:50:54]
But if someone else doesn’t enjoy.
[00:50:55]
It, then you don’t have to run,
just move your body.
[00:50:58]
Fair joyful movement.
Cool.
[00:51:01]
Well, Jenna, thank you so
much for being on the show.
[00:51:02]
Pleasure to be here.
[00:51:03]
Tell me website you can find me
on Instagram at FirstLightHealth.
[00:51:08]
All right.
[00:51:08]
And is there a phone number
or just head to Instagram.
[00:51:11]
Head to instagram.
That’s the best way to reach me.
[00:51:13]
Got you.
Cool.
[00:51:14]
That’s the new world were in, right?
Exactly.
[00:51:17]
It’s all good.
[00:51:18]
And the group thing,
can they find that on Instagram?
[00:51:21]
Yes, you can find it.
And we’re starting in February.
[00:51:23]
All right, so that’s coming up.
[00:51:25]
Coming up mid January now.
Rock and roll.
[00:51:27]
Yeah, we are.
This has been
[00:51:28]
Authentic Business Adventures,
the business program that brings
[00:51:32]
struggle stories and triumphant successes of business owners across
[00:51:34]
the land we’re locally underwritten
by the Bank of Sun Prairie.
[00:51:37]
If you’re watching and listening to this
[00:51:38]
on the web, which you probably are,
you could do us a huge favor.
[00:51:41]
Give it the big old thumbs up,
[00:51:42]
hit that subscribe button, and of course,
comment below and let us know about
[00:51:46]
the challenges that you may
be facing in your life
[00:51:49]
trying to do it all and stay healthy and I
suppose alive. There’s that a little bit.
[00:51:55]
My name is James Kademan
and Authentic Business Adventures has
[00:51:57]
brought you by Calls on Call,
offering call answering and receptionist
[00:52:01]
services to service businesses
across the country, on the web at
[00:52:04]
callsoncall.com. As well as
the Bold Business Book,
[00:52:08]
a book for the entrepreneur in all of us,
available wherever fine books are sold.
[00:52:12]
What else we got here?
[00:52:14]
We’d like to thank you are
[00:52:16]
wonderful listeners as well as our guest,
Jenna Piche, First Light Health.
[00:52:21]
And tell us again where we can
[00:52:22]
find you. At Instagram,
FirstLightHealth.
[00:52:25]
First Light Health.
[00:52:26]
And that’s first spelled out? Correct.
[00:52:28]
Cool.
Rock and roll.
[00:52:29]
Past episodes can be found
morning, noon, night.
[00:52:31]
Podcast link found at drawincustomers.com.
Thank you for listening.
[00:52:34]
We’ll see you next week.
I want you to stay awesome.
[00:52:36]
And if you do nothing else,
enjoy your business.