If These Heels Could Talk

During COVID, business owners have faced many lose-lose situations. For a group used to strategically finding the best path forward, it’s been a frustrating year, even in those industries that have been less disrupted than others. Many of us have had to reconcile what we thought we could control with what we can actually control. It’s a whole new face of courage.

Who ever thought that an early introduction to Al Anon would help JoyGenea in business? With an Oz-like devotion to finding out we always had the heart, brain, and courage we needed, JoyGenea and Michelle reflect on the different ways they find courage to change. 

In this episode we reference:

• Serenity Statement
• Grant me the Serenity to accept the things I can not change
• Courage to change the things I can
• And the wisdom to know the difference.
• The Awkward Yeti (https://theawkwardyeti.com/

The time has come, the walrus said, to talk of many things. Of shoes and ships and pandemic effects on our businesses. Welcome, everyone, to the third wave. Here in the midwest, we’re experiencing quite the surge, with a ton of new cases and, unfortunately, hospitalizations and loss of life. 

What is the impact on business? Outwardly, it’s different for different industries and different companies. But in reality, we’re all on different levels of stress and anxiety overload. This impacts areas of a business owner’s world - employees, operations, budgets, and personal life - very differently.

Listen in as Michelle and JoyGenea discuss the impact of the third wave and how they’re pivoting business...Again.

Business is dynamic and so are decisions - as circumstances change, our decision-making has to change as well. Are there decisions you’re making passively? That is, decisions you’re making by simply allowing the status quo to continue or allowing someone in your organization to ‘take care of it’ without forethought or proper compensation?

This happens in our personal lives all the time - partners negotiate who is going to be a primary parent to their children at different times (drop-offs, pick-ups, emergency calls) as well as who is going to be responsible for different tasks at home. That is, partners negotiate the work of living: dishes, laundry, trash, calling the pest control guy because there are raccoons in the attic again. Often, partnerships negotiate these responsibilities passively, with one party simply doing the work and the other person not even seeing the way the work benefits them. This leads to resentment and contention - all of which can be avoided with open communication and negotiation.

The same thing happens in your business when Jan from accounting is the only person who cleans out the breakroom refrigerator or coordinates staff birthday cakes. It might seem like the stakes are pretty low here, but a year or two of unacknowledged labor will cause problems. Michelle and JoyGenea discuss what you can do to be more active in decision making and how to prevent these issues from creating resentment and undermining your team’s culture.

Recorded Pre-Pandemic and still, if not more, relevant today than in 2019.

Why is it that when someone sells a business, people feel like the business failed? What is your business exit strategy? Small businesses are personal and our personal feelings color our expectations of others.

No one lives forever, and no business goes on forever. So what does your ultimate transition look like? To quote every insurance commercial ever, Have you planned for the unexpected? Denial gets you nowhere. Recognition of reality is key to successful transitions.

Proactive or forced, business transitions are challenging. Selling, ending, stepping back, get your 6 trusted advisors. Who are those advisors? Besides the attorney and accountant, those advisors are key to a successful transition.

Michelle and JoyGenea talk about limits, preparation, and making decisions in advance. And how to manage internal and external expectations along the way.

Numerous studies have shown how attractiveness can help people get ahead in their careers. In this episode, JoyGenea and Michelle discuss a new study that explores the drawbacks of beauty. Spolier alert: Those drawbacks disproportionately affect women. 

As two women who do not identify as particularly beautiful, both JoyGenea and Michelle question their own responses to themselves and other women in their lives. Why might this bias exist in the first place? How can we can address our own judgments and assertions so we don’t contribute to this bias?

Advice isn’t always welcome, even if it’s requested. It can make us defensive and angry, even if it’s true. We can’t always see the truth through those emotions. Even when we ask for advice, it can hurt. And sometimes, great advice from great people isn’t in agreement. What do we do then? How can advice help us make decisions if it’s not consistent?

Join in as JoyGenea and Michelle discuss advice and feedback - solicited and unsolicited, from friends and from strangers, welcome and unwelcome.

The idea of writing a business plan fills some entrepreneurs with dread, some with excitement, and some with dogged determination. Depending on who you talk to, a business plan could be a 120 page graduate thesis or a single page outline. But the purpose of a business plan goes beyond gaining start up funding. The purpose of a business plan is to help you make decisions. Which, of course, means you need one and need to keep it updated. 

Michelle and JoyGenea talk about the uses for a business plan - the things that make the time and energy actually worth spending. Not to mention how you can prioritize, organize, and think about this living document for your business.

It’s not you, promise. It’s all of us. We’re all tired. We’re all overwhelmed. We’re all anxious. And when we hit a wall, we hit a wall. 

Michelle and JoyGenea give you a raw look into what two successful business owners sound like when they are in the middle of scaling and going over the walls that we hit. It’s not pretty and it’s not nice. Yet, it is one of  the reasons people become entrepreneurs and business owners.  When you overcome something you didn’t think you would, it’s an amazing feeling. 

You’re not built to do this all the time. None of us are. But we can surprise ourselves. You’re stronger than you know.

“Would you really trust your life to 50 white male designers, age 20-35?” That’s the question posed by The Social Dilemma, a Netflix documentary about social media’s role in our lives - whether we fully engage or not. 

Social media is a reflection of us - individually and collectively - and not a very flattering one. Why? Because every decision we make teaches the platforms we use what to show us next. And they have to keep upping the ante to hold our interest. Using principles of positive intermittent reinforcement, social media provides us social approval every 5 seconds. That’s a powerful pull when we have access to the platforms in our pockets. 

Join Michelle and JoyGenea as they discuss The Social Dilemma.

In our businesses, it can sometimes feel like ‘Help’ is a four letter word. Okay, it’s always a four letter word, but saying it feels wrong. We have a much easier time helping others than we do accepting help for ourselves. Why is that? Maybe because it feels like accepting help creates a future obligation to do the same. But think about it in reverse - does this mean if you help someone else, you have future expectations?

Listen in as JoyGenea and Michelle discuss receiving help. Everyone needs help sometimes, including us.