Well, hello, everyone. Super excited for this panel today. This is actually going to be recorded and then republished on my podcast on cubicle the CEO, and just so you all can be thinking as we're talking this conversation today, the questions I have prepared are really creating a conversation around leadership growth and leadership capacity. Since we're all here to do that, let's start with self intros, if we can just start with you, Ashley, and just a quick 30 seconds, who you are, what organization you're with, and how you're making an impact in the world.
Yes,
Yes, thank you. My name is Ashley Schneider. I founded a nonprofit called ms, run the US. My mom was diagnosed with m s before I was born, and this idea dropped into my mind when I was 24 I had never run a marathon before. I had not raised any money, but m s completely wrecked my childhood, and so I thought to rectify that, I would run from San Francisco to New York to try and raise half a million dollars. This was in 2010 I ran 24 miles a day, six days a week for six months, and I got to New York, and I'd only raised $56,000so everybody was celebrating me and so excited, but I didn't make the impact that I wanted. So I created America's longest relay run. We run across America every year, from Santa Monica to New York. I put together a team of 21 runners. They do a marathon a day for six consecutive days, and individually fund raise $10,000 to be on the team before they hand off the baton to their teammate. Collectively as a team and a community, we've raised over $3.5 million for our mission.
That is absolutely incredible. And I love how your your calmness just understates how just wild it is to even run one marathon, let alone six in a row. And for you, every day for six months. Is that what you said when you originally did it? Yes, I did 24 miles a day, six days a week for six months. That is absolutely incredible. Thank you for sharing Louis
Louis Taylor, CEO and founder of Taylor wealth management, a registered investment advisory firm. I got started in this business about 26 years ago, straight out of college, after I moved back from Guadalajara, Mexico, and I'm a serial entrepreneur. I love business. I love the challenge of taking on complex situations and and seeing them through to a different outcome than many people believe that they can actually have. So I'm really excited to be here I am. I'm really excited to meet you all. I'm really excited to share. And one thing I love about what I do is that as much as I teach and help other people, I only like to work with people who can also change my life. So typically, the people who are in my life, whether the clients or friends, they're people that are having an impact in changing my life too. So thank you for all and I've already got my life changed today from some of you. So thank you for that,
Bobby. Bobby, you're up.
Hi. I'm Bobby Samai. I'm here with my beautiful wife, Christy. I'm the founder and CEO of Ion bottles, long time entrepreneur. I love building brands. My past life, I was a business consultant and director of marketing for an internet provider, and I knew at a young age, I didn't want to keep working for money. I wanted my money to work for me. I wanted to make money while I was sleeping. I had this dream of making money constantly. As a young age, I actually started at 15 a web hosting company, just so I could hear the PayPal cha ching. You know, every night I wake up in the morning, I look at my account, I'll go five bucks, 10 bucks, whatever it is long story short, I said I want to get back to that after the pandemic. I said, I want to build another brand, create something that's going to help people and see it grow to multi millions of dollars, and that's where I on bottles. Now we have shipped over 100,000 bottles from November 2020 to today, over 100,000 bottles have shipped into 22 different countries. So pretty happy.
Hello, everybody. My name is Annie Tevelin. I am a skin care formulator and founder of the brand Skin Owl, long and short, my journey with skin owl began because I had cystic acne. Any hands in the room dealt with that, yeah. So that happened in my 30s, and it hit me like a Mack truck. I was living in Los Angeles for a decade. I was a makeup artist, so luckily, I knew how to conceal it, but I had absolutely no idea how to heal it, and I decided to go back to school. I went to UCLA, and I studied cosmetic chemistry, and I wound up creating a product that you guys, if you were at the VIP night, last night, it's in your bag called the geranium drops, and it healed my skin in 32 days. Long. Story short, I had a Facebook group, and I shared that before and after photo for reference. I auditioned for a proactive commercial, so my skin was just absolute. It was, it was in the trenches. So created the product. And that was the beginning of skin owl. People were reaching out, saying, I need this for my son. I need this for myself. I have adult onset acne that I've never had before. Can I get a bottle of it? I was literally like a pusher woman for skin care, and that was 10 years ago. It is now a global brand. We sell all over the nation, all over the globe. It is a dream come true, and I'm just so happy to be here. This is an honor. Thank you so much.
Thank you all for the introduction, and today, like I said, our conversation is going to be about leadership capacity. So I wanted to actually hearken all the way back to your younger years, your childhood, and whether it's in childhood, or maybe more recent, what was your first memory of leadership, or the first time you thought of yourself as a leader? I'll start with you, Ashley,
so I would say the first I didn't know that I thought of myself as a leader, but I do remember in childhood being okay set apart, and I think that is a key component of a leader, is you have to be within a group, but you have to be out front, making the way and creating the community around the space that you want to go So little things like, not everybody liked running, and I was okay doing the longer distance as a young girl, the girls weren't on the football field, and I was, you know, elbowing in there. I wanted to play with the boys and do all the things and not be compartmentalized in these different stereotypes that I felt were being projected and are still projected on different genders. And so I think, as in my youth, it was an okayness being set apart. And then in my 20s, I don't think I would have really defined myself specifically as a leader, depending on where I was. When you're starting a business, sometimes you're a leader of one, and I had a real abrasive concept of calling myself a CEO when I was like, I'm really just in the trenches by myself. But as I created a community around running across the country. And the thing was, it was easy to run across the country by myself, but to convince other people that they can do it too and have a community impact gave me the confidence that I actually was a leader, and I could go out front and show people what was there for them if they wanted to take the next step.
You bring up a really interesting point, this concept of self leadership, and I think that's something important that I just want to highlight, both for our listeners as well as everyone here is Who here has thought of leadership in the sense of self, like how you are leading yourself. Just give a quick raise of hands. Okay, I love that. I love to see like half the room having, you know, thought through that. But I feel like that's something that's often missed as we think of leadership only in the capacity of how we relate to others instead of ourselves. So I just wanted to thank you for making that point. Does anyone else have an early memory of leadership at the first time you thought of yourself as a leader that you want to share? You want to share.
I can share something. I love this question so much. I I wouldn't say like without having this question posed, that I would have thought of it this way. But in looking back on my life, I was a very competitive swimmer growing up. And you know, you're in high school, and it's a form of your stature to perform in either academia or sports, and I struggled with both of those things. I was like a solid B student, and I was like a solid B plus swimmer, but I got the coaches award, and I remember feeling like, oh my god, I'm actually being incentivized for being a team player. And I didn't even know that that was something that you could have, you know, it was like SATs. It was just very logistical growing up. And so I think in looking back, it was such a good influence on me, because it meant that being a leader, you didn't have to step on people, you didn't have to be a shark, you didn't have to be something that was unaligned in order to receive praise. And I think it, looking back, it was such an IT has transformed into massive messaging in my business now, which is, just be a good person for the sake of being a good person and be a teammate. And it's, it's paid off. So I'm very grateful to coach Tyler, who's now an investment Baker in New York. So I don't know what he was thinking going from swimming to that, but it worked out at the time.
That's really beautiful. I love seeing how something from early on still impacts the way that you approach leadership today. Anne, all right. Bobby Lewis, did you have anything to add? Or you feel complete there?
I just recall as a young kid, my mom always telling me, if you're not a leader, you're a follower. And I saw the leaders in my life, and they looked like they were doing all the work, and I didn't want to have to do all the work. So I thought that leaving a leader doesn't sound fun. But when I was promoted to a role where I had people under me, and I was young, I was 25 as a director of marketing for an internet provider, and I had people that were working for me, and they were they were looking at me like, why are you telling me what to do? You're 25 so I felt like I'm the young leader. Didn't really know what I was doing, but that role pushing me forward helped me feel like where I'm at today, where I feel like I'm a leader. I'm telling my people that are working for me. I want to help you achieve whatever goals you want to set. Help me get there, and I'll help you.
Yeah, such a good reminder that great leaders create more leaders, right?
Yeah, my perspective is probably a little bit different. Since you're asking the question from a childhood perspective, it doesn't have to be childhood, just that your first memory of seeing yourself as a leader, seeing myself as a leader, correct? Okay, still would take me back to childhood, but some of the best leaders I think I've ever saw were leaders of gangs. And we look at the word leadership, and everybody wants to peanut butter that across a good connotation, leadership is not always good. I watch politicians lead our country off the cliff every day. I watch good CEOs and bad CEOs lead countries or companies into bankruptcy. So leadership is not good or bad, it's just simply a word to me. And so some of the best leaders that I saw growing up just happened to be leaders of gangs, and because of that, they created a sense of family for kids who had no belief system or who were looking to just be loved. And you had leaders that would make them feel loved, make them feel like they were part of a community, and it would continue to grow and grow and grow. And although my value system is not in alignment with gang members and their behavior, some of our best leaders are in spaces that we don't participate in. So my first form of seeing leadership was in my community as a kid. It just wasn't leadership that I wanted to be a part of.
That's a really good perspective. Yeah, the audience is echoing that, absolutely, that aha moment for me hearing you say that, Louis is I've never heard anyone frame leadership that way. But to me, it sounds like the same way that people talk about, you know, the evils, if you will, quote, unquote, of social media when really technology is just a tool, same with money, right? Like, like we were talking about earlier, money is simply a tool, and it is really the the steward of it that gives it meaning, how they utilize it. So that's such a great perspective on leadership. Thank you for sharing that. Okay, so I guess bringing it to more current times, what is a recent breakthrough that you have experienced as a leader in your current organization, and the more specific. You know, I love specifics on this show, so the more specific. Or if you have a an anecdote that you want to attach to it, that would be great.
A recent breakthrough that I had was terrible, because it was a very adversive time. And while I was in it, there was this awareness of the amount of challenges that I was facing, both like personally, professionally, just almost everywhere of my life, it was just hard. And I've I've made big goals, and I know what it feels like to have a big goal be fluid, and they also know what it feels like to have a big goal that is like a boulder you're not moving. And it really made me think a lot about the different seasons that we as individuals cycle through, especially in business and personal development. And in this specific season, I tied it to the actual seasons. And I just realized that I'm from Wisconsin, and we go through a long winter, and it's just part of the deal, right? And so I was in a frost, and I knew it was a frost. And the thing I know about the frost is it melts, and when it melts, it waters new growth, and so I just had to stick and stay long enough to see what the melt was going to look like and be open to the new growth, because the new growth is uncomfortable, because you're really breaking through the shell of the seed that's been planted. So the concept bringing nature towards what I was experiencing really helped me put it in a different perspective and just allow it to happen while focusing on the day to day, things that I could accomplish, to feel like I was moving forward.
I love that analogy of seasons. I know we use that terminology a lot in our businesses, right different seasons. I'm kind of curious, though, as an add on question to that. Sometimes I feel like when we're going through that season, if you will, of not achieving whatever it is that we want to. And sometimes the answer is patience, but other times, we're kind of running ourselves into this same wall, right? And we're trying to make it happen when maybe the best thing to do is actually to stop or to quit, which is something that can feel unpopular, because we were always told, like, you know, quitters are losers, when in reality, we know, sometimes the wisest thing you can do is actually to quit. So I'm curious, from your perspective, as a CEO or as a leader, how do you discern between when is the right time to keep pushing and stay patient versus when to actually let it go.
I make space to be quiet and still with myself, and I listen to what comes up. And I think if you do that long enough, and so my pillars of wellness are movement, meditation and journaling. And if I use those three pillars, I can generally decipher what I need to what's the wrong path that I'm on? I'm not supposed to walk this mountain anymore, and, hey, this is the right mountain, and maybe just not the right time, and you got to take one more step.
Thank you, Bobby. What about you? I'm going to ping pong over to you.
So breakthrough in leadership I've had recently. I mean, I'm a young father. I have three and five year old, and just trying to lead those two is impossible. But when I have employees working for me, and I see what their goals are, I'm looking at what they're trying to achieve, and I'm seeing what they're trying to do for me. When I feel like them, I'm giving them what they need, they're in turn, giving me back exactly what I'm asking. They're listening to me a little bit better. They're putting their alignments with what my alignments are, because we're all trying to go the same direction. If they're trying to grow, I'm trying to grow, if they're trying to achieve a level of success for the business or their personal their job, then my job is to help them. And so my breakthrough recently has been to push through some of that hard that those little conversations have been hard, and to see where I can get their goals met and mine at the same time. So trying to reach that synergy level with the with my employees.
Bobby, could you give an example of that? Like, maybe you don't have to name obviously a specific team member, but maybe just a goal that they had and how you were able to fit that into your company's vision. Because I know for a lot of us in this room who have teams that retention piece and how we can align our team's goals with our own is something that sometimes feels easier said than actually executed. So I'd love to learn about how you've done that.
I take an interest into their personal lives. I want to know more about their families. I want to know about some of their skill sets. They're hiding. They don't even know if they they have these skill sets. So I asked a bunch of questions, learning what their goals are, what their what their skill sets are, where they're finding their other hobby, time spending, and I'm I'm learning how I can help them cultivate to become a better person, employee, for me, as well as for themselves. So if you're looking for a specific it's when I have an employee that was wanting to get a pay raise, and I was looking at what their job was, what they were doing, and I encourage them to expand a little bit on it. They were scared, they felt nervous, didn't know what they were doing. Coached a little bit, give him some confidence, and now that person is running circles around the person I had previously doing that job, because that is where their skill set lies. That's where their growth was, and they just didn't know it
Interesting. So you took that opportunity instead of just saying, Okay, let's see how we can increase your compensation. Instead to see how can we increase your skill set as well, simultaneously, exactly, very smart. Anne you wanted to say, add something,
yeah, I would say, you know, I have a 10 year old business, so it's sometimes interesting that this is a is a newer breakthrough, but that delegation is the key to my freedom. You know, I'm the face of my brand. I created the product. I'm out there helping people. I was from the, you know, ground level, going into the pop ups, going traveling all over the place, like everybody knew that I was the person who could help them with their skin. And I have been married. I have been remarried. I now have a child, and at a certain point it just was like, I can't, I can't be what I was 10 years ago. To everybody, I need to start employing people who I can trust, who are who bring their scope of genius. You know, it's like, I will always know the product technically better than anyone. But to, you know, there's a ceiling on that everybody has their power to sell a product and to be trusted and to build loyalty, and I put a ceiling on what I was willing to give away, because I thought that if I relinquish that control, or didn't give people the Annie experience, that it would be a bad experience. And the reality is that that's couldn't be more inaccurate. It's just a different experience, and it's beautiful in its own way. And as a result, I have been able to spend more time with my family, who's back there on that table, my husband and my child. It's been a gift from the highest gods to be able to say, we're good here, and then walk away, you know, and work on the business, not in the business. And it took me a long time to realize that, because of recovering people pleaser, and now it's more gratifying than ever.
That's awesome. And as a follow up to that, if I put you in the in the hot seat for a second, rapid fire, what is the first thing you ever delegated, and what was the best thing you've ever delegated?
Accounting. I was like, You know what I mean, like when you had to mean 10 years, right? I was like, collecting all the receipts. It was before the digital era, to a certain extent, like I was, I was always under the impression that the IRS was going to come for me because of one form that I forgot to turn in. I don't know if that resonates with anybody, but I'm like, I will be handcuffed in probably two years because I must have missed something. Because math and logistics and accounting isn't it's not a note, it's science. It is not math. So I still, to this day, I'm still waiting for that knock. But the point is, is it became very overwhelming very quickly, right? I am not out here, as you know, a therapist, right? Whose overhead is time. I have a product. I have droppers and bottles and labels and all of these things. And the accounting for it got very overwhelming very quickly. And, you know, sales tax dates were being missed. The My God, the yearly tax returns would come back. And I just was not working smarter. You know, I was working so much harder. It's in my DNA to endure a bit and then be kind of slapped in the face to a point of finding some relief and searching for that. So it was, it was the most valuable person I could say at the beginning is having someone to manage your books, even if it's a friend, and if you have a product or a service, you can always do that for trade. I can't tell you how much skin care I gave away in exchange for somebody doing a little bit of PR or doing a little bit of management, and now those people have been with me for eight years. You know, it's, it's, it was a hard lesson, but when I needed to learn, I love the creativity and stretching your resources at the beginning, when maybe funding and capital is a little tighter. Yes,
Excellent. Louis, did you have something you wanted to add?
add?
I think for me, being a financial guy, letting go of my own finances is a big leap for me, and I felt very, very comfortable turning that over to CJ. And you know, I never had the confidence in other people to be able to do the work that I'm able to do. And so because I trust in CJ, because I have worked with CJ for 13 years and before, because I had enough data on him, it made me feel comfortable turning it over. And I would love to tell you that I'm comfortable now. I'm not. I'm not, and he has to coach me off the ledge routinely, weekly, daily. And that's This is not an exaggeration. He will affirm this to, hey, just let me have it. Just let me handle it. We were just talking about this at lunch. Is, is that the struggle is, I have a hard time thinking that I would allow someone to run my train off the tracks. I knew what it took for me to get this train where it is, but I also emotionally struggle with just letting it go. So I have emotions too, right? And I have to coach my own we were talking about this, so that's been difficult for me, being a finance guy, to turn it over to another guy who's probably more talented than I, but because I know that it's helped,
I can totally relate. For me, for example, a skill set that I feel like is my strength is writing, and so sometimes that is the hardest piece to delegate, is the piece where you feel like it's really your zone of genius, but such an important lesson and reminder that there are those who can do it even better than we can. So shout out to you. CJ. All right, who in your inner circle? This is something that you know is a perfect build off of what Carmen was talking about earlier with finding the gaps in your inner circle and filling them with the right people. So who in your inner circle has made a profound impact on your leadership growth, and how did you create that relationship? What was the genesis of that?
I'll start because he's in the room. What if I just said someone other than my husband? How funny would that be? It's my husband. I would like him to raise his hand. His name is Micah. Next to him is my son, Monty. I I know it's very cliched for a woman to say my husband. Sometimes it feels a little cringe to be like it's it feels a little co dependent for me because of who I am to say that, but I want to say that as unbiased as I possibly can, because I have a way of talking myself into something that is out of my best interest. So what do I mean by that? I say something I feel like it's not hitting or maybe the person's being quiet. Now I feel like I need to say more, and by the end of those five minutes, I've spiraled myself into something where I'm like, well, whatever you think you should pay me, you know what I mean, as opposed to standing my guard. And my husband is someone who taught me because I kind of needed re parenting in that way, because both of my parents are people pleasers, my husband has a way of articulating himself in a way where not many people need. Need to like when he says, No, it's heard and there's a line in the sand, and he's not aggressive, and he's not passive. He's a very assertive so he says what needs to be said, and he's very clear about it, but he says it with kindness. And I have, I have always, I've watched you do it, and it's just a wild thing to be able to be like, Well, why does he what? How does that work? And it's because he said it's less is more. You know what? I mean, you're delivering the absolute truths, and you're just letting them sit, and you're letting other people emotionally manage themselves, around your truth, around your boundary. And it's been a beautiful thing. And obviously, for any all of us in business or who are growing something, it has been a massive lesson, and it's been a wonderful advantage to be able to just say, let it lie, and just make it social and just walk away from it, you know, verbally, and don't feel like you need to pick up the pieces for what people don't understand. And I mean that with love, I would never do that in a form of mistreatment, but I do it in a way where this has to go this way in order for there to be success, and you have a beautiful way of just saying what needs to be said. And it has been a wonderful you have been a mentor to me and a friend
that's
that's very sweet. I love that, and such a great reminder that to be clear is to be kind, right? Sometimes we think we have to over explain ourselves because of our own insecurities or projections of how we think we would react in a situation when in reality, that may not be everyone's thought process. So thank you, Anne.
Well, I'd say the best thing that I ever did was hire a coach. I hired a coach about four years ago, and it really helped me develop as a man, and I always was under and operating under the the premise that my results should speak for themselves. So because I was good at what I did, and I'm good at what I do, I think that those results, I put them up against anyone. And so I would just say, you should be happy, because look at the result, right? But I had flaws, and I had blind spots, and I wasn't aware of the way that my character was being perceived. And so the most important thing that I have is my character brand. And so four years ago, I started working on the man that I wanted to be in, the character that I wanted to be in the perception that I wanted people to have of me. And that was a really, really long haul, and it's still a long haul, but I know what I want my brand to be. I stay true to it, and I don't allow people around me that will take me off the path of the character brand that I want to have. And so that was a different realization for me. And so it also changed who I work with and how I work with them. And so I would say that was probably the most instrumental commitment and investment that I made. Was an investment back into myself. I love that. And is there a specific, you know, I believe in? And what do you call it, crowd sourcing and pooling our knowledge? So what's an important lesson, maybe on character building that your coach taught you, that you want to impart on everyone else? I would say, be open to being challenged. I wasn't challenged very often.
What was something he challenged he or she challenged you on?
Oh, everything
What stands out the most.
Well, I would say the biggest thing that he he challenged me on is he always would tell me that your words, actions and responses, are not in alignment. And so we call that our war. And so anytime that we go through something, if my words, actions and responses don't align to whatever it is that we're talking about, something needs to change. Because in an example that I would give, it would be if you're in a relationship, and maybe it's an abusive relationship, right? The action is despicable, but the way that things tend to to happen is that people will respond with, Oh, but I love you so much. And the victim says, oh, but he loves me, or she loves me so much. So which is more and powerful, the words, the action or the response to whatever happens. So something has a shift, because it's not in a lot. Not in alignment. There's no way that you love me or care about me and you beat me, but you tell me you love me, right? And so that's a that's an aggressive example, but he would use examples like that so that you can apply them to simple things, because it's the impact of the aggressiveness of the example that makes you learn how to apply it to something simple. And so that was a big learning to me. So I would go to extreme examples to understand simple concepts.
Yeah, very memorable and a great filter
for someone in your inner circle. I think just as important is to reflect on who may be should be removed from your inner circle. It doesn't mean that they're not a kind person or a loving person, but they might not be in alignment with your values and the vision that you have, even if the overall mission is the same. So the very difficult season that I went through, one of the big changes that came from that was removing a couple people from my inner circle where the vision was not in alignment, and that had a really strong reflection on how I view myself, and that then changes the way that I am in the world. So that's one part of it is we can always find things to add and people to add in our inner circles, but also looking at maybe who needs to be removed, and being brave enough to do that, and then the individuals that I add to my inner circle. It's not always necessarily someone that I'm meeting with a therapist or whatever, but in my journey, I've come across someone where you just kind of know they're they're charismatic, They're glowing, they're on the rise. And what I like to do is I like to watch them, and then I like to watch how I internally react to their rise, because then I know about myself. Okay, why do I feel jealous? What am I jealous about? And then I work on that, because that has nothing to do with them and everything to do with me, and that affects the impact that I can have so watching other people rise and then questioning the way that it affects you, and then making the necessary changes so that your impact and quality is in alignment with you're not offended by something that someone else is doing that's right for them. If that makes sense,
It does. I think that's a fascinating actually exercise. And I love that you brought that up, because what do you call that parasocial relationships like that people have with celebrities and whatnot, but you're using it in a positive way to really use it as a reflection tool and to increase your own self awareness. That's amazing. Bobby, did you have something to add? Or we can also move on to the next question.
I have nothing really else to add. I mean, for leadership, you guys all said it, well, you add or you remove things that could positively or negatively impact your leadership. And that's kind of the same focus I've had for the last decade, is removing the negative and increasing the positive
love that. all right, this next question you can answer one of two ways. One way would be, when have you felt limited in your own leadership capacity, and how did you seek help to work through that challenge that you faced, or to expand your own capacity? So if you choose to answer that way, I'd love for you to give everyone a quick context on what the challenge was and what the specific solution was that you applied, or conversely, share a time where you try to go it alone and you ended up getting stuck. And now, with the benefit of hindsight and perhaps having expanded your leadership at this point, where do you believe the blind spot was that kept you stuck.
I'll go first. I feel limited every day, and I think that's just part again of being a leader and being out front is that, yes, you have resources and you're looking for mentorship, but you're out front like you you should be uncomfortable out front, so the more that you stretch and grow, that's reducing your limitations. And what was the second part of the well, in those limitations, like in those times that you felt limited, perhaps even as recent as this week, how have you sought to expand your capacity to meet that challenge? And what was the specific solution? Okay, so one of the things that I've noticed over the years is that if it's the first time I'm trying something, it is going to be uncomfortable, I'm going to feel limited, and it is not going it. I'm not going to have all the skill sets that I need in order to do it well. But if I'm on like, repetition 15 and it's still not going well, like I need a different system. I need a different process. I need more mentorship. So if it's the first time I'm doing something and I feel limited, I give it some time. What things do I need to learn to be better at it. And if I'm already in it, then, then maybe that's where I outsource. The accounting thing really hit home. So that's my advice. Is, where are you at in the process, have you given enough time for yourself to learn and grow? And if you have given yourself enough time now, you need to outsource mentorship and find maybe it's not a strength for you, it's a weakness.
What was something you recently outsourced
accounting
seems to be a theme today.
I'll just talk about expanding my capacity. I have a I can rule the world mentality, and I think that I can do it by myself, but I can't. And so the realization of realizing that I was maxed out, traveling around the world, traveling around the country, having clients all over these places, I realized that I also have a second business, which is a multi million dollar business, and I have staff on that, and I'm busy just by myself, trying to manage staff, trying to direct sales people, trying to direct operations, trying to handle all of the finance, trying to be a good father, trying to I'm a school board chair of a public school district. I'm on the Goodwill Industries Board. I'm on the shoot River Alliance board. I have a lot of hobbies, and I was realizing that I can't do all of those things, and so hiring CJ, and CJ helping me bring in a whole team of people, I went from just being me to 11 people over the course of a month, and even with 11 people, I still feel like I don't have enough people. But what it did for me was made me realize that the path that I was on was not healthy. No one should be doing the job of 11 people, and I don't care what it is that you're trying to build right and so I keep saying this, and I keep saying CJs name. It's the reason that I continue to to bring his name up is because he's been one of the few people in my life who's been willing to challenge me. And I respect that. I always tell people that I don't want friends in my life that allow me to to ruin myself. You're gonna allow me to just hurt myself, and you watch it like I have a problem with that, and that's not a friend, that's not people that I want in my life. And so I like people in my life who challenge me, who make me see the things that I don't see. That's why they're blind, right? And so when you respect someone, and respect is everything to me, and I respect CJ, so I respect his opinion, so I listen. So that was a big step for me.
Absolutely. Asking for help is one of the hardest, hardest things we do as entrepreneurs, but so necessary.
One of my limitations early on in the business was scaling my customer service. It was just me, and I was answering hundreds of questions a week, and then eventually 1000s, and I couldn't do it myself. I tried bringing on somebody, maybe they can replicate what I'm doing and answering the same way, but it wasn't the same. And so I learned quickly that I couldn't scale that version of me. I had to let that go and figure out how to get that growing on its own, but what it really I wanted to become is just a father. I wanted to be a home with my kids. I didn't have a great relationship with my father. He was out of my life by the time I was five. And my mom was a single mom raising three kids, so she really was busy all the time. And one of the things I said, when I get older, when I have kids, I don't want that. I want to be there for them. I want to be involved. I want to show up to everything that they need me to be. I want to go to every doctor's appointment, at every appointment, whatever I need to be. I want to be there. So how do I get there? I got to have some financial, you know, safety, I got to be secure there. How do I get there? You got to create some kind of company or business. You can't work your way there. So, how do I get there? And so I started working my way backwards and figuring out where my challenging parts are going to be and how to overcome that. YouTube university really helped a lot, learning so much from YouTube, learning from people that I looked up to on YouTube, and I felt like they were friends of mine, even though I never met them. Watched hundreds of hours of their videos and learned from them, and just kind of replicated what they were doing, and it obviously worked, and it's got me to where I'm home with my kids, and I'm able to be wherever they are.
they
are.
Who here is a fellow degree holder from YouTube University, yeah.
Oh, man, this, this is I'm listening to everybody. It's hard for me to articulate. I feel like limits in, you know, historically, in my past have been something my brain goes to, a place of what we have to blaze through, that roadblocks have never been comfortable places for me to kind of sit and pause. So limits were something that it didn't matter whether I knew they were good or in place, for a reason I would, you know, keep the train moving at the expense of my bandwidth and health and everything else under that umbrella. So I feel like limitations. Now, I have a really good relationship with limitations, because I don't know if I speak for many people on the panel and entrepreneurs in the room, but I feel like I'm limitless in a lot of ways. If I see a void in the industry, I can build a business to fill it. I feel like I can offer a lot right to people in a mentoring way, regardless of the invitation, by the way, you know, unsolicited advice. I feel like I can. There's an algorithm in my brain that I have struggled with for probably the last two or three years, that is, I am a serial entrepreneur, and that has nothing to do with the end game. It has nothing to do with whether or not I could see this through. I'm just, I'm the idea girl, and I know how to put it in place. And what I really need is someone to come in and then and then take that vision someplace. But I have been incentivized because the businesses have been successful. So you can see the trickery, right? It's this double edged sword of I'm building something that there's a void and people need and people love and people want, but at what cost? And so where I struggle now is trusting my. Yes, and saying that just because there's a void or just because it's a good idea doesn't actually mean that I should do it, maybe rest and pause and you know, just not letting it live is the right choice. So I feel like limitations are becoming my friend, and limitless is not goals for me at this point, especially as a mother, and to trust, to really say, like, is this? And this is a question I ask myself all the time, but because of this historical behavior, is this where I've been, or is this where I'm going? And a lot of times it's where I've been. So yeah, boundaries allegedly a beautiful thing.
And
And I wanted to say one other thing, and then I will let it go on, is, first off, I have an apology that I need to also issue to OG LLC, which is Tamika and Jania, because as pivotal as CJ has been, they have been behind the scenes as a consulting they're not immediate members of my organization, but I consult, and I've been working with them for months, and they to challenge me, which is really annoying, because it went from one to three. And so again, as a consulting firm, I the same way that I treat my clients and not really caring about their feelings is the same way that they treat me in return. And so it gives me some perspective as to the way my clients might feel when they have to deal with me I have that's how I feel when I deal with them. So I didn't want that to go on set, because they've had a huge impact on my business, too. So thank you.
Of course, giving flowers and gratitude where it's due is so important. Also I feel like a challenge I want to issue to all of us here in this room and also listeners. Is since you guys have mentioned being challenged by other people and how crucial that is to your own growth, I want to assign all of you the homework assignment this week of finding one person to challenge you on something just to, like, have some sort of conflict or disagreement in a healthy way, of course, but I think that would be really interesting, and maybe report back to the group. I don't know if there's Carmen, maybe like a Facebook group or something, we could all share how we've been challenged this week, but I think that'd be really interesting to learn from each other. You guys up for it? Yeah, okay, all right. I want to ask each of you an individual question. Ashley, so you obviously have created this incredible organization. And part of creating something a concept like you've created of running across America, this big Herculean task requires curiosity right to come up with something that unique. So how has curiosity in embracing the unexpected or unknown been a strength to building your unique business model and expanding your impact.
This is a great question, because it is one of the keys, if not the key I hold to closest to my heart. I started my nonprofit 15 years ago, and I hear time and again, you must be so busy, you must do so many things like, Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm like bothering you right now, but I just need you know a few seconds of your time. And what I really want to articulate is that there is only so much you can do in X amount of time, and I am very deliberate about doing focused work, but then I think it's really important to remain open to unexpected ideas, people, events, opportunities. That is where the power in our Creator that made us is allowed to enter in, I believe, and is so much more powerful than what we can even accomplish on our own, and especially as a as a leader, as a business owner, it's so easy to get caught up in a lot of hats and being Oh, I can do this, I can do that, I can do all of these things, and it will, like, save some money on the bottom line. So I'm just going to keep spinning my wheels. And I think it's really important I make sure to create the space for the unexpected to happen, and baking that into my day so that not only do I know that when I'm doing my focus work, doing it 110% in the allotted time, but then that I'm not doing it alone, and that there is so much more power in things that I can't see, and I have to allow space for that to happen.
So when you say allowing space for that to happen, what does it actually look like in your schedule? How do you plan or make the space to just receive?
That's a really good question. Okay, so I'm gonna take it back to 15 years ago, when I was setting up this crazy run across the country, the idea I was 24 I didn't have any money. I didn't but I was going to live in a motor home that someone was going to give me the gas and the food was paid for by sponsors, and I was going to give all the money away to charity. And so this was the plan, the business model for the 15 months that I was training to do this. And And I'd set a date on the calendar March 22 I'm going to be in San Francisco on the Golden Gate Bridge March 22 with all of the stuff in place six weeks to that start date. I didn't have a sponsor, I didn't have funding. I didn't have the motor home and my support person at the time, because my boyfriend was like, we have to push the date back, like there's not enough time to get all of this stuff pulled together for us to be in San Francisco on March 22 and I said, No, there is just as much opportunity in today as there was six months ago, as there was nine months ago. This day hold as much power, and the fear of it just being closer to the date doesn't affect my willingness to push it forward and stay present and be open to what happens. So within six weeks, I got a motor home. I had a sponsor. I did as much as I could. I gave 110% in the time that was given to me, and then I allowed for whatever was going to happen to happen. So I showed up in San Francisco. I had the motor home, but I didn't have a vehicle. My idea was to just get a moped, and we were gonna relay back and forth from the campground where the motor home was gonna be on a moped through like the Rocky Mountains, through snow, through rain. I didn't think that far, but I was just like, yes, a moped is cheap. We're gonna do that the Vespa right in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and I get out to San Francisco. I was staying with someone I didn't know, connected from someone I didn't know. So there was a newspaper article about my run across America for my mom. Someone reached out to me on Facebook and said, I went to high school with your mom. I know someone that lives in San Francisco. You can go stay with them. I've already talked to them. I was like, great. So we we show up with this motor home, and I said, Hey, do you know where I can get a moped? I need a SAG vehicle back and forth from the camper. And it just so happens that this person, for the length of time that I had founded my charity and been training, had this extra vehicle that they were wanting to give away to charity, and they just hadn't come around to it. So they said, Are you a 501, c3, and I said, I am. I got chills. And they showed me the car, and they said, it's yours. Wow, that's that's remain. I did all of the work, 110% of what I was capable doing, and then I was open to whatever was already in place a year ago that I didn't know about. What a powerful lesson in exercising trust and not letting external outcomes deter the energy in which you show up for whatever vision you're building, that's really beautiful. Thank you for sharing that story.
Louis, okay, so we both share a love for making data driven decisions, but sometimes leaders are faced with circumstances where there are too many unknown factors to accurately predict the next best step, or, quote, unquote, right response, which we know is very subjective. So how to approach decision making as a leader in times like that, such as, let's take the economic uncertainty many small business owners are experiencing right now.
What
What I usually try to do is lean on my past experiences or find commonalities, commonalities and things that I've already done over the past 26 years. And so the unique thing about business is foundationally, it's all the same. You know, you can put whatever you want on top of it. It doesn't matter if it's medical, it doesn't matter if it's financial, it doesn't matter if you're selling ion bottles. Business is business, and one of the things that I try to think about is building a sense of confidence in the people that I work with. And sometimes that confidence might not exist when we first sit down and they start to gain confidence, the more knowledge and the more familiar that they become with their own business, because I know their business better than they know it, and I'm teaching them about what it is that they don't know and what they don't see in their business. I'm able to speak from a place that starts to help them build that confidence. And so some of that comes with faith, and because I am a man of faith, and I know that I am favored. So I may not always be obedient, but I have God's favor, and so I just lean on that faith, and I try to pour that faith into their cup also. And I'm not talking about just from a religious context, but I'm talking about, how do I help this person realize that there's a greater call for what they're doing in the space that they're in, and they just can't see it. And so I'll try to find examples. And sometimes I use very harsh examples, like the one I used earlier. But when you take people to a place of harshness, it sticks. The concept sticks. So you can make a concept stick with a really harsh example, usually better, because they know how to remember that story and how uncomfortable it made them feel, and then they're able to take that uncomfortableness and apply it to whatever it is that they're going through, which may feel uncomfortable in that moment too. So that's what I always tried. I'm not always successful at it, but, you know, more often than not, I'm able to do it.
Thank you. Bobby, family remains your number one priority while scaling a multi million dollar business. What do you find most similar about being a CEO and being a dad, and what do you find most different between leading a company and leading your family? Louis, Your face says, I'm glad I didn't have to answer that question.
I find it similar. Let's see the similarities to being a CEO and being a dad. You know, you're trying to get all these people in a similar direction. You're all trying to go out the door, trying to get somewhere on time, try to get your shoes on, trying to get your employees to complete the task they're directed to do, and the time frame that you're you're asking them to do it. So it's very similar. One you're paying the other one. You just, you hope that they'll listen, and you don't have to yet raise your voice, right? You don't want to become that dad. But I remember spending a lot of time in the early months of the of the business, up until three or four o'clock in the morning, and this was early COVID, right? March, April, May of, June, 2020, my wife was still full time at a medical and medical job. So she was working. I was home with our one year old son. I was Daddy by day, 7am to 6pm and then entrepreneur by night, after she my wife went to bed. My kids are asleep. I'm working to three or four in the morning trying to build the stream. And so the similarities I found working through my day to day, those struggles that I had throughout the day, that I knew I could overcome. And every time I hit one of those struggles and I overcame it, it was just an unlocking so I was able to do that again in my job, I was able to find this struggle accounting that was a problem every every business owner, if it was start of making some money, you're like, oh shit, I gotta pay taxes. You know what? They want this. And you start calculating those things, like, that's a struggle, but you overcome it, just like in life, you're gonna overcome it. The universe will give you, just like you were saying, Ashley, that car, the universe will just somehow come around and give you what you need. If you're there and you're accepting of it, that's how I believe it.
Thank you. All right, Annie, you're closing us out. You work in an industry that preys on women's insecurities, skincare, right? How do you reframe insecurities, both for your own customers, but also for yourself as a leader?
Okay, go with me on this. The first thing I pictured are like, those medicine ads that all look like they're produced by the same company. You know what I'm talking about. I'm not gonna say any brand names, brand names. So it's like everybody's like playing frisbee and like dating and having a lot of sex. Why is it always Frisbee? Side effects are also like, blindness and involuntary urination. That's the beauty industry. That is the beauty industry, right? It over promises and under delivers, and that's my experience. So I remember feeling less than as a child. I remember feeling less than in my 20s. I definitely felt less than in my 30s because I didn't look like the women that were in the ads. And every time I would look at the ads, the mascara ads specifically, right now, you have to, you have to disclose that these are fake lashes, because the mascara is actually not going to do that as it you know, claims of volume and length, I have made it my work to not even talk to women and men about their insecurities, because my skin care is going to do nothing for your insecurities. How could I do that when a multi billion dollar industry can't so unless it has to do with an actual skin concern. If you have acne or your crow feet or you have hyperpigmentation or dryness, that's what I'm here to help you with. But in terms of your insecurities, I refuse to tell any human that if you use the geranium drops in your bag from last night, you will no longer be lonely, single and overweight, because that is the beauty industry, and I can't stand it. I cringe. If you open your eyes to it. It is everywhere with men, it is, you know, the testosterone and the strength and the hunter kill. You know what I mean? Like, it's like you are here to provide and have all the muscles, and if you are not providing and the bacon winner, and full of muscles, you are weak and with women. I mean, aside from the fact that after the age of 48 the beauty industry has completely forgotten about you, it is you are withering away and dying, and we will see you someday in your hole. Not that whole you know what I mean, maybe we will see you one day in your hole. I don't know. my point. My point Jesus, my point is that this industry is relentless, and I often feel shame, you know, in terms of being in this industry. But I very much understand who skin Ellen is and who we've always been it is in our bio link on Instagram that says, simply supportive skin care. We are here to meet you where you are, and I have no other promises than that. I can tell you about my experience. I can tell you about other people's experience. I let the customer do the talking. I refuse to make women especially feel any less than they are in the year 2024 It's hard enough, so that's where we're at.
