Elite Achievement

It's hard to believe that it's been two years since we launched the Elite Achievement podcast! In that time, we've had the privilege of interviewing top business and lifestyle leaders as well as helping our listeners grow and achieve their goals. Today we are delighted to share a combined episode of three of our past guests Julia Pimsluer, Beate Chelette and Nisu Patel in honor of our anniversary.

Julia Pimsleur is the founder of Million Dollar Women, a New York City-based social venture which has helped thousands of women entrepreneurs scale up their businesses. She is also the author of Go Big Now, a mindset-focused book about how to get and keep the go big mindset.

Beate Chelette is the growth architect and founder of The Women’s Code. She provides visionaries and leaders with strategies, blueprints and results-oriented tools and techniques that give clear steps to scale your impact.

Nisu Patel is a Financial Advisor and Growth & Development Director at Northwestern Mutual. Nisu was honored as one of Northwestern Mutual’s top financial planning advisors in the country. He is the second youngest advisor to achieve this esteemed forum status and is the youngest within his home state of Alabama. 

Today we’re talking with these three business leaders about how to achieve big goals in our professional endeavors.

Highlights:

05:40 - You can't just start teaching someone business skills without first addressing the mindset. Because if you take someone who was raised thinking, oh, if I promote myself, that's being pushy, or women, sometimes we've been taught that's not feminine.

08:13 - You can only grow your business as big as you can grow yourself. Because if you have the dream of a $5 million business, but you have a mindset that oh, well, if I put myself out there too many people are going to hate me, or my kids aren't going to love me anymore.

16:30 - When we are building a business, the idea is not incremental growth. The idea is quantum leaps – so much more fun. When I sold my business that was a quantum leap. That's like, how do you get from a revenue of a million dollars to having a multimillion dollar payday?

24:35 - Change only works if you consistently run the new program every single day, until the new program has taken hold so significantly that the old program just kind of runs in the background.

28:48 -  A lot of times, scarcity thoughts and scarce actions come up because we have fear as well. And for me, having faith, trusting the process, having a game plan, and believing in what you're doing allows you to be more abundant.

31:07 - I think belief had a lot to do with it. But belief is only so much, right? It can only give you so much energy. But I think tying your belief in what you're doing to your why was very helpful for me. Because at times, there's not many things that can re-energize you when there's just compounded thing after thing after thing going wrong and going against you.

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Personalize Your Prospecting Process

Connect with Nisu

Instagram

LinkedIn

Connect with Julia

Website

Million Dollar Women

Go Big Now

Connect with Beate

Instagram

Website

Airtight Avatar: How to Find Really Good Clients

Podcast

Today's guest is Dr. Mira Brancu, the CEO and founder of Brancu & Associates, a leadership team and organizational consulting firm that serves as a strategic partner to executives and their teams. Mira brings over 20 years of experience in academia and healthcare, including an award-winning career at the US Department of Veteran Affairs. Mira is a licensed psychologist who holds a PhD in clinical psychology and a Master's degree in counseling. She is passionate about leadership, organizationational development and helping others better understand themselves and the people they work with.

Mira is a leadership expert and has worked with leaders from all walks of life.This episode is packed with valuable information on leadership and is a must-listen for anyone looking to develop these skills.

Highlights:

04:47 - Leader development is outdated, where there's the model of the single leader who needs to know some very static, specific skills.

07:30 -  It's okay to make mistakes. It's okay to fail. Don't even call it failure. It's just continuous improvement.

12:17 - What I noticed a lot with the teams that I work with on team development is how little time they have ever spent getting to know each other, or reflecting on how they work. Or sharing their values and what they're bringing to work with them.

26:22 -  I'm a big, big proponent of getting to know yourself. Some people know themselves really well, but most of us need multiple inputs of feedback, and how other people see us as well.

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Connect with Dr. Mira 

LinkedIn

Website

Psychology Today Blog Posts:

1. Why Women Leave Leadership and What to Do About It

2. A New Perspective on Mentorship in the Post-#MeToo Era

3. How to Improve Mentoring Relationships

Content from Website:

4. Achieving Gender Diversity & Inclusion Quick-Start Guide

5. Brancu & Associates' Business Reports and Scorecard Examples

Today's guest is Co-Founder and Co-CEO Katherine Salisbury. Katherine and George Friedman had a growing family, and growing money stress. Keeping track of their finances from a traditional joint account proved impossible. They needed a joint overview of all their finances, and they wanted to automate how their money moved to savings, investments, bills and spending accounts – but neither was possible with their bank setup. Out of their frustration, the idea for Qapital was born.

Join us as we discuss how to make saving feel more like shopping, how to reduce money tension in a relationship, what it's like to be in business with your partner, and how to navigate the emotions of being an entrepreneur.

Highlights:

03:49 - The idea was how can we get aligned? So take this summer, for example. Are we going on trips? What are we spending on summer camps? We can create an experience where I'll make a goal - sailing trip.

06:12 - And so that, to me, is also clear communication. It's just like managing people in the company, a really clear definition of the specifics makes the stress go away.

10:45 - One of the biggest challenges is, this is our first time doing it. So we have been learning by doing and learning in front of everyone and making mistakes as we go. But at the same time, there's just no better way to learn something than for it to really be mattering and pulling the levers.

20:00 -  For me, one of the things that I wish someone had said to me, and George, at the same time and earlier, is neither of you are wrong on how you want to approach your financial life. You don't have a crystal ball. We don't know if we're gonna live to be 130 or if we're going to live to be 60. We don't know what's coming. And so how much you plan for the future or live in the moment seems to be a lot of the tension in couples. How much risk do you take, which is similar to that, and having respect for each other. 

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Connect with Katherine 

LinkedIn

Website

Today's guest is a freelance writer and former magazine editor who writes on a variety of topics ranging from business and careers to parenting and dating. Laura Roe Stevens has contributed to the New York Times, Inc., Forbes, and the Los Angeles Times, amongst others. Posts from Laura’s blog have also led to guest appearances on CNNfn and HuffPost.

Laura has also written three novels and is halfway through a fourth. When she is not writing, she is teaching yoga and meditation across the globe, and more locally in Los Angeles, which is why she’s joined us on the Elite Achievement podcast. Listen to our conversation as Laura talks about the many benefits of meditation for being present, reducing stress and much more.

Highlights:

03:21 -  I like learning about what makes really smart people tick and usually it's because they surround themselves with smarter people. They're not in their ego so much.

11:52 -  The more I awakened, the more I knew I needed to sit back, detach and learn more. And that's where I think meditation plays a huge role.

16:16 -  If you keep putting your thoughts back towards the sound, you will relax. It's really simple. And of course, you can do others where you can have guided meditations.

23:04 -  Start putting yourself first. Not everyone needs to get an instant email back from you. They respect you more when you set boundaries and you'll start to get answers. Slowly but surely.

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Connect with Laura

Instagram

Website

This Elite Achievement episode is a special one! Our guests are Heather DelaTorre, Lindsay Schmit, Yaya Margarita, Hillary Lewis, and Lindsey McMillion from the Grow Towards Your Goals IG Live Series we did this past March in celebration of Women’s History Month.

Heather was born in the Midwest, fell in love with the Pacific Northwest, but will always live on the beach. She is a certified yoga instructor, project manager in corporate America, and passionate about practicing yoga.

Lindsay is a Wisconsin native who worked as a consultant in corporate America for 12 years prior to business ownership at Right Hand Consultants. Lindsay enjoys live sporting events, concerts, running, and outdoor activities with the family. She loves when a good plan comes together.

Yaya and Hillary both grew up with a love of dance and while dance and movement have always been a huge part of their lives, when it came to exercise, they both struggled to find a workout that was as exciting and engaging. After years of less than exciting gym sessions, both Yaya and Hillary started finding workouts that they loved and were inspired to bring these ideas to their community in southern California through Shine Society Fitness.

Lindsey is the principal and owner of McMillion Consulting. She is a speaker, writer, and prospecting trainer. She focuses on using LinkedIn as a business tool and has worked with thousands of professionals and teams since 2013 to help them connect with purpose and increase their revenue.

Highlights

04:40 – Having a positive mindset is just so important. I think it's really easy to have negative thoughts when it comes to goals and achievements and next steps for us.

16:46 - Why do we take time to work on our business? It pulls us away from working in our business, those revenue-generating activities. But at the same time, investing that time and working on your business can pay dividends down the road.

26:46 - One thing that Yaya and I have both been doing is sitting with each other and talking about what our goals are for our business, for ourselves, and what we want the future to look like. I think as business owners, we often get so wrapped up in the everyday that we're like, hey, are we actually doing what we set out to do?

39:21 - The first piece when I think of the importance of growing your network is that it keeps you relevant and top of mind. When you're actively growing your network, making connections, having conversations, that keeps you top of mind. The second thing is it actually allows you to give back and when I think of giving back as it relates to networking, I mean introducing people. So, as I'm meeting people, I'm constantly just being a connector. It’s kind of part of my DNA anyways. It's why I love LinkedIn so much.

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Honor Your Ambition

Connect with Heather DelaTorre

Website

Connect with Lindsay Schmit

Website

Connect with Yaya Margarita and Hillary Lewis

Website

Connect with Lindsey McMillion

Website

Today's Elite Achievement guest is a speaker, host of the Get Carried Away podcast and an expert on networking and creating a community.

Carrie Murray earned her Bachelor’s degree in Social Work and her Master’s degree in Social Justice. After becoming a court advocate, she helped victims understand their rights and navigate the judicial system. She later became a teacher, an administrator, and a principal. In 2011, she started Prestique Academy, a school for twice-exceptional kids, all before leading her to where she is now as the founder of the BRA network. BRA stands for Business Relationship Alliance and is a network of powerful female entrepreneurs devoted to advancing women-owned businesses.

Highlights

03:03 - I really wanted us to create a space where women didn't look at each other as competition, but as collaborators. And here we were hiring each other, working together, kind of keeping the money flowing between us.

08:49 - But if you are a branding expert, your best friend should be a photographer. Your best friend should be a videographer, a website designer.

10:58 - I think honestly, you have to be genuinely curious. And I really am. I'm really like, tell me more about what made you go into speaking for diversity and inclusion, what made you want to do law or be an accountant? Like, I'm really curious. And you have to be. If not, it kind of comes off a little bit fake.

21:39 - I think it's for when you're struggling. And you can be vulnerable. You have a safe place to be like, I don't know what I'm doing. Or, I've decided to leave this and now I'm going to do this. But it's that feeling of being accepted and vulnerable.

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Connect with Carrie

Instagram

Website

LinkedIn

Today's Elite Achievement guest is a former photo editor at Elle magazine in Germany. As a first-generation immigrant, she got herself out of $135,000 of debt by bootstrapping her passion for photography into a successful global business that she eventually sold to Bill Gates in a multi-million dollar deal.

Beate Chelette is the Growth Architect and Founder of The Women’s Code. Beate provides visionaries and leaders with strategies and results-oriented, tangible tools and techniques to improve business systems as well as strengthen leadership skills and teams so that you can scale your impact. In this episode, Beate shares her business journey and how it eventually turned into a multi-million dollar deal, as well as other business tips and insights.

Highlights:

05:51 – I fell on my knees, and I raised my fist, and I yelled at God for 2 minutes. And I said to him, if you have a plan this would be a really excellent time to fill me in, thank you very much. And then you surrender.

08:28 – I decided that I was not going to drown in a puddle. Because it's not worth it, drowning in a puddle. If you drown, you drown in the ocean, at least it's a better story. And I learned that I had to be very precise on how much time I was going to allocate to worrying about things that I could not change at that moment.

19:40 - I think most entrepreneurs are thinking that doing an incremental growth plan is the sensible thing to do. When we are building a business, the idea is not incremental growth. The idea is quantum leaps.

30:23 – Yes, that is the key: the attachment to the money invested in one strategy, and then holding on to that strategy until the ship sinks. Not every strategy is going to work. You're going to have to allocate money, two different strategies with the idea, like an investor.

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Connect with Beate

Instagram

Website

Airtight Avatar: How to Find Really Good Clients

Email

Podcast

Today's Elite Achievement guest is an expert on imposter syndrome and perfectionism. She has inspired thousands of individuals at various companies and conferences across the United States through her keynote speeches and webinars.

Heather Whelpley is a speaker, author, and consultant who helps women let go of other people's expectations and instead make their own rules for life. Heather published her first book An Overachievers Guide to Breaking the Rules in 2020. In this episode, Kristin and Heather dig deeper into topics such as the inner critic vs. the true inner voice, manic mode, how to set boundaries, and much more.

Highlights

06:24 It's always been this balance between self-reflection and outward action. Because I learned through doing both that if I'm completely missing the quiet and the space and the self-reflection, then I can take actions that are not really aligned to who I am, and that true inner voice, and my own values. But if I'm only doing self-reflection, then I'm not learning from others.

08:31 That was certainly true for me that I was trying to prove at least a part of my worth as a human through this external achievement by getting things done, by doing them well, by having them validated by other people.

11:24 So I think the first step in defining what success means to you is starting to unravel what it doesn't mean to you. To understand the definition that you've been given and sifting through what part of that works for you, and what doesn't. Because it's not about throwing it all out the window. It's about looking at it and saying, of what was given to me or what I've learned over the years, what still holds true for me now, and what doesn't hold true for me?

13:43 In every part of my business, even though I was in year one, I still felt like I was behind where I was supposed to be. 

33:16 The problem is, the true inner voice is very strong but it's not always loud. And especially when we aren't used to listening to it, or it's kind of been trained out of us not to listen to it. 

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

LinkedIn

Website

Speaking & Webinar Info

Book

On this episode of Elite Achievement, Kristin interviews Julia Pimsleur. Julia is a scaling coach, mindset expert, speaker and bestselling author. She is also the founder of Million Dollar Women, an education platform and community that is helping one million women achieve $1M in revenues. 

Tune in to this episode as Julia talks about how she started building Million Dollar Women, shares the meaning and importance behind scaling a business and more ideas on how to become a successful entrepreneur.

Highlights

02:53 – You need to be more than smart and driven and determined to succeed in the business world.

07:42 – Once you know these terms and how they work — what is scalable, what is not scalable? It's very obvious, and you want to help as many people figure it out as possible because it's a game changer.

11:28 – I always like to say you can only grow your business as big as you can grow yourself.

12:57 – Most people don't understand the entrepreneurial life except for entrepreneurs. So, while you don't have to ditch your friends in corporate America, you should definitely find an intentional community of people who really get what you're going through and can help you navigate the tough times and celebrate the good times.

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Connect with Julia

Website

Million Dollar Women

Go Big Now 

On this episode of Elite Achievement, Kristin interviews Amber Gray who is the Founder and CEO of Trusty Oak, a virtual assistant agency based in Austin, TX. Under Amber’s leadership, Trusty Oak was named the top freelancer hiring platform of the year and led Amber to be named Austin’s top businesswoman of the year, both in 2021. Join us as we discuss the process of hiring a virtual assistant and much more.

Amber talks about her experiences before she started building her agency as well as their core values and what services they offer at Trusty Oak. She also shares her hiring best practices and common hiring mistakes to avoid.

Highlights

07:23 – I did apply for a job and they said “You're overqualified for this position” and I had a light bulb moment that I could start a business that does this.

09:31 – Now I'm taking home a decent salary, but still not where I want to be, but it's still something that I can be proud of.

11:57 – So the number one thing to think about is that you need to know what you need first.

14:23 – A lot of people do want to work in remote, flexible jobs and we want the best of the best, so aligning for values is the main thing. Skills can be learned, especially if you’re resourceful.

28:47 – My mission statement is “500 virtual assistants have sustainable jobs and we want to support entrepreneurs to thrive and not experience burn out.”

Connect with Kristin

Instagram

Website

Breakout Plan

Connect with Amber

LinkedIn

Website