In author and business strategist Amy K. Hutchens’ years of personal branding experience, two things ring true: you need to engage in tough conversations in order to grow and you need to know how to tell the right story about your brand. So, where do you start? Find out in Part One of The 19: Entrepreneur Edition.

 

MUSIC Intro

Recorded Intro:

This is The 19. In 19 minutes or less, game-changing insights from Orange Label, the leading response marketing agency for established brands that are driven by a fearless entrepreneurial mindset.

Host Intro:

Hi there, this is Rochelle Reiter, agency principal at Orange Label. Today on The 19, we’re thrilled to bring you another installment of our entrepreneur and leadership series, and this time with none other than the incredible speaker, author, and business strategist Amy K Hutchens. Now I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Amy K speak and I’m absolutely blown away by her vivacious energy and profound insights. From communication to culture, leadership to sales, Amy K’s innovative real-world tools streamline and enhance businesses at every level. She has been named Vistage UK’s International Speaker of the Year, and has helped thousands of executives in over ten countries ignite brilliance and generate results.

Rochelle: Amy K, welcome to The 19. We’re so excited to have you.

Amy K: I’m excited to be here, thank you for inviting me.

Rochelle: Amy K, tell us about your background. What led you to become a speaker, an author, a trainer, and a business strategist?

Amy K: One of the things that I think has been a common thread throughout my whole life is teaching and learning. So when I was really little I was playing school with imaginary students. And when that became “so not cool,” I was an intern in high school and actually working in an elementary school classroom. I became an elementary school teacher. Then I became a teacher trainer, and then I became a national speaker. And so, a lot of times people will say “Oh my God, did you ever think you would end up being this entrepreneur, and running your own company?” And twenty some years ago I would have been like “no, never!” But what it is it’s just the evolution of me, continuing to do what I love, which is to teach and to learn.

Rochelle: Oh, that’s awesome. What are your favorite topics to talk about with other business leaders?

Amy K: I spend the majority of my time talking about how hard communication is and how much we struggle with it. And yet one of the things that I sincerely believe and I don’t mean this in any cheesy way, and that is that life is happening one conversation at a time, and the quality of our lives is a direct reflection of the quality of our conversations. And so most of the time, I am working with leaders on the conversations – the tough ones – that they are either attempting, or avoiding every single day.

Rochelle: Are there some common themes that come up? I have to imagine that there are.

Amy K: There are. And you know, some of them are the outward ones that we can all identify with in terms of having the tough conversation around a lack of performance or a lack of productivity, or an unhealthy culture, or mergers and acquisitions, and successfully navigating change or not so much. But then there’s also the much more personal ones that are happening with me, myself, and I. And that doesn’t sound strange when I explain that, you know everyday we are having internal conversations about, are we good enough, and do we know enough and are we creative enough, are we networked enough, do we have enough energy, do we have too much energy, do they like me, do they not, are they judging, are they not. And so, I work a lot with leaders on that internal mindset as well.

Rochelle: Yeah. Let’s talk about personal branding. You mentioned to me in an earlier conversation that we market ourselves in every conversation...