Ep.40 What's it Like to Be in the Room with Ryann Dowdy

Reaching the million dollar mark in your business opens a lot of doors and conversations.  However, only 4.2% of women owned business hit a million dollars.  Imagine if we start having conversations earlier.  Ryann is changing the game.

Ryann Dowdy is the founder of Be in the Room, a leadership collective of high achieving women.  She's a community builder, a best selling author and a business consultant.  Listen up as we dive right in to what happens when you surround yourself with women who inspire you.

In this episode, we chat about:
1. Taking messy action to refine your offer
2. The importance of getting it in writing
3.  Ditching the guru status

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Resources:  Want to know 7 things you can do today to make leaving corporate easier?  Grab it here!

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Episode Transcript

Ryann Dowdy (00:00):
And that's why I say we don't serve the beginner

(00:01):
market because in the beginning,you do need a coach you do need,
you do need a step by stepguide. I know I did, right. And
I know that in my firstbusiness, that's how we helped
people. There eventually comes atime in your business where it's
not another $30,000 coachingprogram. It's not another
certification. It's not anothercore. It's not another tactic.
Right? Right or strategy. It'sthe people right? It's the

(00:22):
perspectives it's the ideas.

Jamie Stephens (00:26):
Thanks for tuning in to another episode of
Breaking up with corporate eachweek I chat with everyday women
that ditch their nine to five tobet on themselves. We break down
their journey intoentrepreneurship, unpack the
lessons learned and create thevision of how this life gets to
be if you're willing to getuncomfortable and step into your
potential. I'm your host, JamieRenee, to time corporate escapee

(00:49):
and coach to burnout womenlooking to plan their escape.
Let's go Hello, and welcome backto a another episode of Breaking
up with corporate today. I haveRyan dowdy on the show. And Ryan
is founder of be in the room acollective of a leadership
collective of high achievingwomen. She is a community

(01:12):
builder, a business consultantand a best selling author. Ryan,
welcome to the show.

Unknown (01:17):
Hi, I'm excited to be here, Jamie. Yeah.

Jamie Stephens (01:20):
So I just want to jump right into your story
that you have got such acollection of things that you're
doing now that I want to getstarted a little bit with the
backstory so we can spend moretime on what you're doing now
because it sounds all kinds ofexciting.

Unknown (01:33):
Awesome. Well, thank you so much. So yeah, I actually
that 15 year corporate career, Istarted selling radio
advertising Orlando, Florida atthe age of like 21 years old. My
entire career in sales, reallyfell in love with sales, sales,
training, sales enablement. Sostarted working in the startup
space back in 2011. And helpedcompany build companies build

(01:54):
sales organizations, right? Sowe're going to hire a sales
team, how do we train them? Whatdo we do with them all that
different stuff I never intendedto become an entrepreneur, to be
honest, any I wasn't sales,right. Like a lot of control of
VanCamp. I had a lot of freedoma lot of time. And it wasn't
until I landed my dream job. Iwas the Director of Sales for a
digital marketing agency here inKansas City. I had traveled for

(02:15):
years, this job required notravel, I just had a baby, that
baby is five and starting in acouple of days. And I went back
to work and this this job thatwas supposed to be amazing. And
it wasn't like total come toJesus moment where I was like,
this cannot this caveat likethis can't be all that God put
me on this planet to do. And atthe time, even then it wasn't

(02:35):
like start a business, right? Itwas bigger just needed an
industry change, right had beenin marketing and advertising in
some way, shape, or form for solong. You know, I've been in
sales for so long, like maybethere was some other way to do
this. And through networking,learned about online
entrepreneurship and the abilityto take the skills that you have
that like people would pay forthat now what that's a blink of

(02:56):
an eye and united sold marketingto traditional businesses, right
to brick and brick and mortarbusinesses, and all those other
things. But it didn't occur tome that like consulting and
coaching and like I said,packaging up, you know, your
your, your expertise that peoplewould pay you for that. So what
I liked about that, I wish Icould tell you that like all the
light bulbs went off, but itstill took me a little bit
longer to figure out that likewhat I was doing in corporate

(03:19):
and building a training salesteams very much led to
entrepreneur world. And this wasbefore the great resignation had
a name. There were women stillleaving corporate in droves, but
struggling to grow theirbusinesses. Right. And I learned
it was because there was Zalesissue right. And unlike sales,
had a bad relationship withsales didn't know how to do it
didn't know how to startconversations with strangers
that build relationships andsolve problems and all of those

(03:40):
things. So my first iteration asan entrepreneur, I was teaching
sales to new entrepreneurs. Thatwas wildly successful, a lot of
fun. And out of that was born asecond business in partnership
with my then business coach,where we started teaching sales
to sales T and let's forentrepreneurs, so we started a
sales training company. And thenin the end of 2021, I literally

(04:01):
burned everything to the ground,started over launching the be in
the room community. And there'sway more story than that I gave
you the Cliff's Notes version.
But it really was an opportunityfor me to be like, okay,
whatever they want, like I builta business to get out of my job,
right? I built a businessleveraging the skills that I
had, I built a business that mybusiness coach told me to build,
I built the business thateverybody else was building. And

(04:21):
I really got a cool opportunityto say what what do I watch?
Like, what do I want this tolook like? How do I want to
serve clients? And what Ilearned, you know, some deep
inner work and some seriousreflection is that for me, it
was really about community andconnection and collaboration and
idea sharing and bringingtogether smart women. I kind of
got burned out being the guru,right? The person who has all

(04:43):
the answers, I'm like, that isjust not meant to be I don't
want to be the person with allthe answers. I don't have all
the answers. I'm gonna surroundmyself with humans who have had
different experiences anddifferent perspectives. And in
talking to women, I'm seeing alot of that so we launched the
be in the room community inJanuary and it's been Just a
really cool evolution of what isnow what we call a conscious

(05:03):
leadership collective where webring together high achieving
smart, successful women to haveopen honest and vulnerable
conversations about thechallenges and the successes and
the wins and the triumphs ofbeing a badass at what you do.

Jamie Stephens (05:16):
That was a mouthful. for a really long
time. No, you're good. I just Ilike I had so many questions pop
up, like during the process, butyou were just on a float. So
let's back up just a little bit.
I want to tease out kind of thethe part where you landed your
dream job. Yep. And did not likeit wasn't all that it was

(05:38):
cracked up to be? Yeah, so wecan pause there for a second.
And then I'll get into some ofthe other stuff that you're
doing. How did you know? Like,how did it present itself what
was going on in your life towhere you're just like, I cannot
do this anymore. Um,

Unknown (05:57):
so what it was so at the time, I had an all fairness
I had a tiny human in thisseason of life, but I just
everything was a rush. You know,we got out of bed in the
morning, we rushed around and wecut up the door. And then you
know, at the end of the day, werushed to pick the baby up, and
then we pick the baby up and werush through generally rush to
put him to bed. And then it waslike, and it was like Groundhog
Day Genie. And it was just, Iwas like this, this is not like

(06:19):
this can't. Right. So for me, itwas just that feeling of like,
and then every weekend, it waslike we gotta grocery shopping
to clean house. Gotta geteverything done. And, you know,
it was like, where's the timefor fun. And there were simple
things like my my in laws have aproperty in Florida. And we've
never been and they've beenthere for like two or three
years because we didn't haveenough PTO to go because I had a
baby. And then I had a friendget married, right. And so we

(06:41):
had to use all our PTO for allof those things. And it was just
like, I felt so stifled all of asudden, like this was a very
sudden thing I was completelyfine prior to All right, with my
two weeks of vacation and mythis and my math. And it was
just

Jamie Stephens (06:55):
ABS bring a whole other aspect to the
picture to where your time is nolonger like the time that you
did have for yourself to likedecompress and have fun and do
all the things like that's notyours anymore. Oh, no, very long
season.

Unknown (07:11):
Yeah, and did all of that we had also moved away from
a group of friends, the timethat I would not have said that
I didn't have the words todescribe this time. But it was
super unhealthy, right? It wassuper toxic. A lot of just
gossip and drama, and just alifestyle that I really didn't
want to raise my kids in. And soI think some of it to me was

(07:33):
getting away from that, right?
Like it really having some timeand some space to think about,
what do I actually want my lifeto look like?

Jamie Stephens (07:40):
Yeah. Do you remember about how long that
process took from the disk? Atthe time you decided this is
really not working for meanymore to the time you left and
stepped out on your own?

Unknown (07:52):
Yeah, it was about two years. Gotcha. So all of this
came about in the summer of2017. And the reason I did so
clearly is we had built we werebuilding a home. And we built
that home with my mother forthree months. Like I remember
vividly, literally, part of itwas my commute was really long,
and I started listening toaudiobooks again. And I listen

(08:13):
to Jensen chair as you are abadass, and that's when she
started love her coaching andall the other things. And so
that was where the seed wasplanted. I finally hired someone
to kind of help me flesh it allout at the end of 2017, a
girlfriend of mine who hadlaunched a community says like
whatever you're doing, tell meabout that. So that was the end

(08:34):
of 2017. I tell people I spentall of 2018 getting ready to get
ready, right, I did all of thethings, none of which made me
and money in case you'rewondering.

Jamie Stephens (08:42):
I'm familiar with

Unknown (08:46):
that at the end of 2018. I got pregnant with
Georgia who is my three yearold. And so that all of a sudden
put a timeline on things Georgiawas due in June of 2019. And I
was like, I'm not going back.
And so that really acceleratedthis whole we're just this round
thing. It's just a side hustle.
We'll see where it goes to like,

Jamie Stephens (09:05):
I'm not coming back. So I've got a plan.

Unknown (09:07):
And so I probably could have latched on to was born in
June, I probably could have leftMarch, April, I had replaced my
salary, but at that point, I wasso pregnant that I was like,
I'll just stay here and keep thebenefits and the you know, yeah,
short term disability that theybarely paid me and yada yada
yada. I just didn't go back.
Yeah. So you

Jamie Stephens (09:23):
just glossed over that. Like it wasn't a big
deal. But tell me aboutreplacing your income while
you're still. Like while you'restill in your job, and mom of
littles

Unknown (09:35):
are a little Yeah, for me. I got really good at talking
about what I did, right? Like Iwas really good about talking
about sales problems. And I wasnot eloquent. It was not sexy.
It was not like, oh, I have allthe slides in this thing. I was
a sales coach and I coachedanybody and everybody who would
hire me to coach them. So whatI'm saying is like I worked with

(09:56):
a small tech company andbuilding their sales process I
worked well I'm on with aninsurance agent helping her set
up some outreach Seth and I hada hodgepodge of clients. It was
not I didn't launch like a truecoaching program and sell right
around to actually was afterGeorgia was born with I finally
launched our uncensored salesprogram, which went on to do

(10:16):
almost a million dollars insales in two years. I didn't
want that to introduce pause

Jamie Stephens (10:20):
that is so good.
Yes, that is.

Unknown (10:24):
So for me, it was just a lot of consulting, I guess,
you know, all different types ofclients. It wasn't like I had
one offer doing one thing. I wasworking one on one with one
woman to, again, build the salestraining program was somebody
else did you know what I'msaying? Like I just, I became
known for sales. It was mything, anybody who would give me
a stage to talk on I talked, Italked to everybody I knew I

(10:46):
networked my face off, I toldeverybody that I could teach
sales. And I literally touch anyand all plants who wanted help
with sales have all sorts ofdifferent capacities and didn't
really launch a true programuntil like I said, it was right
around, right before GA wasborn. When I realized that there
was an opportunity with onlineentrepreneurs, I launched like

(11:06):
this little mini four weekprogram that I sold a couple of
times before week program to asix week program to actually
what was eventually my 12 monthprogram. So in the beginning, it
was messy. And I'm reallypainting this picture very
clearly for any of you that aresitting in corporate right now
thinking that it has to bepretty and it has to be perfect.
It has to be a program and ithas to be to serve all these
clients in the same way. Andlike for me, that was not the

(11:27):
case. Right? One person payingme $1,500 a month, I had one
person paying $500 a month, Iwas selling this little course
thing for $197 above, right?
Like I was just purely inexperimentation of like, I know
sales is my jam, I'm good atthat. I can fix those problems.
I didn't know who I wanted tofix it for. I didn't know what
it was going to look like I noneof those things, right? I just
went out into the world and gotdirty. And that's really kind of

(11:50):
how it all started. Which that

Jamie Stephens (11:53):
is such an important process. And because
that in my own personal journeythat has stifled me so much the
perfection, the tinkering, butit has to be perfect. It has to
be efficient everything in placebefore I can start, you know,
and it's scalable. That's myfavorite. Business. How about
you make $1 That's about that.
Business before we scale abusiness, let's do, right. You

(12:17):
know, it's like the curse of youknow, type A personality where
you're like, I am 47 steps downthe road. I you know, and that's
like, Wait, can you just likesimmer down and just actually
help somebody? Yeah. So how areyou doing that? Like, are you
meeting with us people afterhours on the weekends are you
had flexibility because yoursales job was you had been there

(12:39):
and done the things andautonomy.

Unknown (12:45):
I had a lot of flexibility. I did do a lot of
nights I did a lot of art. I didlike coffee. It was like coffee
and lunch coffee was kind of adamn it when you know, meet a
client at 8am. I would take alunch with the client. I did a
lot of work virtually in theevening, I did do some virtual
work in the evenings withpeople. Yeah, so it's kind of
all over the map, I did have alot of flexibility. I was very

(13:05):
lucky in that way. As far as youknow, I was not chained to a
desk so to speak, I have theability and numbers and all the
other things, right. That mademy life a lot easier. But I
worked. I mean, I worked in themorning, I worked over lunch, I
worked in evenings, I worked onSaturdays. I mean, I worked a
lot. And I know that there's alot of people who are very anti

(13:26):
hustle culture, and I get it.
But in the beginning, I I don'tknow another way to do a little
hustle. And I don't mean hustleand burnout and then like work
80 hours a week and work untilyou die. Like that's not really
what I'm proposing here. I'mjust saying, if you're working
40 hours a week, and you want togrow a business, you have to
assume you got to put in thetime, you know, that you're
gonna probably have to planyou're gonna have to put in 10

(13:48):
to 15 hours a week, because evenif you had clients, even if it
wasn't sales activity, right,like when you have clients, you
have to serve those clients,whether you're a copywriter or
coach, right, like you seem tofind a time to do the work. So I
mean, you are putting in thehours, and I did put in the
hours, wherever I could find it.

Jamie Stephens (14:05):
So tell me about your community. It's not a paid
community, or is that like afree community? How does that
work?

Unknown (14:12):
Yeah, so the other room, we have a free Facebook
community. So we pour a wholelot of knowledge and value into
the world on Facebook, andFacebook or copy of the rooms.
And then we also have a paid cutmastermind so I don't love the
word mastermind because in allhonesty, I feel like the online
coaching world has ruined theword mastermind. masterminds
don't actually have like leadersor gurus or blueprints or how to

(14:34):
use right masterminds or littleof that, like the way Napoleon
Hill designed a mastermind waslike the meeting of the minds.
He broke together with differentexperiences and different
perspectives, different skillsets, because when you put those
minds together, right, like,that's where the magic happens.
So it is a true mastermind inthat way. So it is a paid
community. We host weekly liveevents. We do small group

(14:54):
masterminds, everybody's in asmall group of four. We do a lot
of disability for our clients.
We have a strategic advisoryboard. So we serve the middle
market really well. Most of ourclients have businesses
somewhere between, you know,150, to 150,000 to 1.2 million
are our corporate friends,director and VP level
traditionally, so they're kindof that middle market. So we've

(15:14):
got our strategic advisory boardof multi seven figure business
owners, and, you know, C suiteexecutives and stuff like that.
So we've created that. But it'sreally about pure collaboration,
I'm more so that's exciting,

Jamie Stephens (15:29):
because I know that that is something that I
like, since leaving corporate issomething that I really, really
miss, of being able to just kindof have somebody to bounce ideas
off of, to where it's like, youdon't necessarily want a coach,
you don't need somebody to tellyou what you just said, to kind
of hash it out and have somebodyelse's perspective and like, be

(15:51):
able to do that. And I feel likethat's such a space that is
needed whenever like for onlinebusiness owners, because it's
like, typically a group of hardworking, you know, really smart
people that are doing this, orit's just like, or, you know, in
their areas, and you know, to beable to supplement. I mean,
that's just that's really cool.

Unknown (16:10):
Thank you. And you and you nailed it. That's the thing,
like, and that's why I say wedon't serve the beginner market,
because in the beginning, you doneed a coach, you do need, you
do need a step by step guide. Iknow I did, right. And I know
that in my first business,that's how we helped people,
there eventually comes a time inyour business where it's not
another $30,000 coachingprogram. It's not another
certification. It's not anothercore. It's not another tactic,

(16:31):
right? Right, or strategy. It'sthe people, right? It's the
perspectives, it's the ideasthat really are like, Oh, in
that industry, they're doing itcompletely differently, or Oh,
and, you know, in the corporateworld, this is how they're doing
it. And that's really where thematch. So that's what we wanted
to create. Because what I wasfinding Jamie is so many women
were continuing to stay incoaching programs, not because
they needed the coaching, butbecause of the community. And I

(16:53):
like, that's cool. I did that.
But a lot of those coachingprograms are 3040 $50,000. And
at some point in time, it'slike, the person's out, right,
like 50 grand to be in reallife, you know? Or do you want
to, you know, hire somebody todo something for you and your
business and still have thatcommunity. So, you know, you
know, we wanted to create thatspace that didn't come at that
price tag, but so broughttogether a really cool people.

(17:15):
Yeah,

Jamie Stephens (17:17):
now I love that.
Let's backtrack just a minuteand talk about your first course
that you launched after you hadyour baby like how you said it
started out as for we kind ofwalk me through that process,
like what you did, how youpromoted it, all of those
things, because you said itended up being like a million
dollar in revenue course. So Ithought that was

Unknown (17:41):
a program. So I had hired a business coach, who then
became my business partner. Hername is Kelly wrote, she's the
founder of the live lunchmethod. Unfortunately, our
business divorce did not gowell. So unfortunately, I don't
know what she's doing thesedays. But at that time, she had
a program called The Unstoppableentrepreneur. And she taught
people how to launch and she shetrademarks, the words, I think,

(18:03):
live launch method. And shetaught this like nine day
strategy on how to launch and soI joined that program in January
of 2019. And I launched like twoor three times and sold nothing.
And I feel like it's reallyimportant to tell people,
because so many people will trysomething once they'll do a
launch, they'll do a webinar,and they'll do something, and
they won't sell anything. Andthey're like that strategy

(18:24):
didn't work, right. It's notnecessarily right. So I first
wanted to do that. Second thingI did is I had a Facebook group.
And I drove everybody to myFacebook group. It was like,
that's all I talked about onsocial media. When I did
speaking engagements. This is apre COVID world, like it was the
place to be I met somebody in aFacebook group, and I said, Oh
my gosh, you should come hangout in my Facebook group. So I

(18:45):
grew a Facebook group, thatFacebook group by the time we
retired, it had about 7000people in it. And we only spent
about 15 grands and ads totalthat entire time. So we built a
lot of that organically, throughmarketing through outreach
through using my personalprofile as a tool like I
Facebook was I was all in onFacebook. I'm kind of all over
the map and like it's all comingback to me of it. No, it's all

(19:06):
good. So Facebook was my thing.
So So I launched it, I didlaunches to sell that like
couple 100 bucks, that was allpre GA and I did I did some
version of like the nine dayLaunch, to launch that. I don't
recommend doing a nine daylaunch to launch like a 299
product to that it's terrible.
But I did it a couple of timesit did teach me a lot about

(19:26):
launching. So that's good. So Idid that a few times. And then
the whole thing and in mycoaches program at the time that
she taught 12 month programs,she was like honestly, you know,
for somebody to really learnsomething new. Get to know it,
figure it out, perfected youknow, the whole idea of like
mastery takes 10,000 hours. Soif you're teaching somebody a
strategy or tactic or a skill,you know, they need 10,000

(19:49):
hours, right so so 12 monthprograms were a great place to
start. So I turned that personin that that course into a 12
month program so the courselived inside of the program and
then we coach live If we didlike one on one, accountability
causes a really robust and funprogram. So we live launched
that program. So pre pre GA, Ihad just launched that little

(20:10):
mini course for a couple 100bucks, they sold it to about 10
people. And again, got a lot ofinsight, a lot of information,
what clients like, whatquestions are, they asked that I
hadn't really included or didn'tthink I'm sorry, helped me
really flesh, like flesh out myframeworks and how I wanted to
help people and all of that. Soyeah, I knew I had had it
already. Pre GA, I have a baby.
And I knew I wasn't lined upback after my maternity leave.

(20:30):
So I had scheduled a line watchfor at the end of July. So she's
probably like six weeks at thistime. Like I literally launched
it like with her at a babycarrier. And how did we promote
it? I mean, it was our Facebookgroup at that point in time
probably had between 507 100People at it. So we marketed and
marketed and marketed. And Imean, we DM to everybody. I

(20:53):
mean, we just did our face thatand that's what I was taught for
three weeks prior to launchingthe market. The workshop, like
we market your face off forthree weeks. That's what we did.
I don't remember how many peoplewere registered. But when we
launched that program as a 12month program and launched it
for $99 of us. And we had 20people locked. And that was like
when my mind was blown. I waslike holy, it worked. It's

(21:15):
working. It's working like, youknow, $99 a month, it's $1,200 a
year I sold it to 30 people, I'mbetter now. But that was $36,000
in sales in a week. Yes,

Jamie Stephens (21:27):
thank you. I was like sitting here trying to do
the math in my head. Because mylet

Unknown (21:31):
me like a little less.
But you know what I'm saying?
And I was like, No, it works.
And the model was what my coachtaught was that you launch every
six to eight weeks. And so everytime we launched, we would raise
the price. So we went for $99 amonth to win 19 amounts to 149 a
month. And then it was 202 50.
By the time he actually retiredthat program, it was $750 a
month. So it's $9,000 a year tojoin that program. And we

(21:55):
launched every six to eightweeks. And we did it the same
way we sell Facebook group madethe heck out of the workshop for
three weeks. And we launched it.
And we did it over and over andover again. And when to roll any
enroll anywhere from I'd saylike 12 to 20 people at a time
into the program every time. Sowe put I think the final numbers
were like 200 and change womenthrough that program in some
capacity. So from July of 2019is when that started. We retired

(22:19):
that program. We launched it forthe very last time in February
of 21. So a little less than twoyears. And this is

Jamie Stephens (22:29):
basically teaching everything that you
were doing in corporate likeyour sales.

Unknown (22:35):
Yep. And my ceasing sale all of the Yep, we talk
sales to new entrepreneurs. It'scalled the uncensored sales
program. And our tagline was wehelp high achieving women leave
their nine to five and buildprofitable businesses, which is
why I love the name of thispodcast so much. That's the
toughest conversation becausethat was my thing I found I
worked really well, with peopleexiting corporate again, that
was my thing. I was side hustle,I had a limited amount of time,

(22:56):
I had to be extremely, extremelydiligent with my time and spend
the time on the right things,which is what I found. I know
that's what stumped me foryears. I spent a ton of time but
it wasn't on the right things,right. So that's what we taught
was sales. And we did we had amindset coach, we have a copy
coach. I mean, it was a veryrobust program at that time we
retired it, it was incredible.
Our our clients got really greatresults. And ultimately, I
decided to retire that programwhen my business partner came to

(23:20):
me we had so when we launchedthe second business, she was
gonna run her business, I wasgonna remind, we're gonna launch
this together, it got very big,very fast. My business coach,
you know, ran an eight figurebusiness had, you know, a really
huge audience. So she was theaudience, I was the execution of
that model. And it got reallybig, really fast. And she came
to me and she was like, for thisthing to really be what we want

(23:40):
it to be. Somebody needs to runit. And it was very clear that
somebody was me. And I took thatopportunity to cause big picture
vision for me. I want to writebooks, I want to speak on
stages. I and I want to inspirea lot of people. And I knew that
if I was teaching sales toentrepreneurs I could get so far
but like No, no company isbringing me into like their

(24:00):
corporate keynote to talk aboutsales, if I'm encouraging
people. You know, so for me, itwas it was bigger reach it was
bigger impact, right? If I'mteaching sales, I love women,
and I love women in sales. And Iwas like this is just an
opportunity make a biggerimpact. So a lot of people asked
me why I said yes to that. Thatwas why it was impact. It was I
could reach more people teachingsales that I could teaching
sales to entrepreneurs. Yeah. Sowe retired that, at that time,

(24:23):
was what we shut all that down.
And so is that the partnershipthat didn't end? Well?

Jamie Stephens (24:31):
Yeah. Yeah. So can you speak freely about that?
Or maybe not really, but can you

Unknown (24:40):
say, you know, we did gosh, almost a million dollars
in sales in about 10 months inthat business. It was really a
values misalignment with mypartner. It was one of those
things honestly, Jamie, I got apeek behind the curtain and what
I saw was not what was beingpresented on line one, and two,
it was very much one of thoselike, that's the cause I'm not

(25:00):
willing to pay it. Meaning ifthat is the cost of an eight
figure business, that's theamount of hours the size of team
the stretch, knit parkpass. Forme. Yeah, so once the seed is
planted, at least in my brain,it does not go away. So I wish I
could say that, like, I saw thered flag and I was smart. I'm
not it took me a while, figureit out. And just to realize it

(25:22):
was just a really large valuesmisalignment. And I was proud of
what we built, I was proud ofthe clients that we were
serving, I just knew that I justknew that it was not a good
match. And so I went to mypartner, and I said, this was
not a good match. And at first,it was fine. But her when I
said, I don't think this is agood fit, her answer was okay,
well, let's shut it down. Idon't have the bandwidth to take

(25:43):
it over. And I have the team totake it over. So let's just be
done here. And I was like, oh,gosh, I think I just put my job
I didn't need to like I wasdrawing a salary out of that
business. And what I launchedbeing the real not I want to say
I don't want to say because Ididn't have a choice, but like I
did have to eat like I had to dosomething. And it didn't make
sense to shut down one salestraining business, and then

(26:04):
start sales consulting, youknow, so I'm like, I have to, I
have to, there was no pivotinghere, like I had to totally
reinvent. And so we launched tobe in the room community. And
that apparently set off a seriesof events. Or tip the dominoes
if you will, which led to a veryfun legal battle. And a lot of
very gross accusationsmismanagement of company funds,

(26:26):
intentionally running thecompany into the ground ceiling
leaves stealing content. Andagain, I can legally say all
those things, because I havethose things in writing all of
those accusations, obviously,none of which were founded or
feel like a lawsuit would havebeen filed. And then we finally
were able to resolve everythingin April of 2018. Here's the
thing I will tell you, anybodywho's like, okay, good business

(26:48):
partners avoid that. I got antibusiness partners, isn't when I
ever have a partner again, Iwould partner with somebody who
had an opposite skill set of me,right. She and I had very
similar skill sets. We're bothsalespeople, right? We were both
dynamic face, right. And shewasn't in the business, right? I
was the managing partner, shewas technically on paper, like

(27:09):
in our operating agreement, asilent partner in the business.
She didn't make decisions or anyof those things if she couldn't
legally do any of those things.
And that I think was theproblem, right as I was running
the business day to day, and Ihad this partner who had a lot
of opinions, and a lot ofexperience just a lot of things
happening. And so we were neveron the same page. Yeah. And that
was the part that I think wasreally challenging. So I'm not
if anybody's like, okay, don'tever do that. I'm not, never say

(27:31):
never. I'm not saying I wouldnever have a partner, I would
just be like, if I were to startsomething again, it would be
difficult in the business. Weboth work here, we both have
responsibility for the growth ofthis business, right? Because
for me, my paycheck was comingout of that business. Right?
Versus Right. Right. It wasdistribution. Like it was like
whatever that profit makes mesplit it right. And so her she
didn't have the investment thatI did in the business. So that

(27:55):
was the part of partnership thatwas really hard for me. Yeah,
for anybody listening, I don'twant to discourage you from
partnerships, I see a lot ofwildly successful business
partnerships. I think there aresome partnerships that are
completely unnecessary, becausewe don't have the skills that we
need on our own. For me, thosewere the mismatches.

Jamie Stephens (28:14):
Yeah, just going in with like, eyes wide open,
who's doing what, how are makingsure you're not gonna get
resentful, like all of thosethings. Because once that kind
of start,

Unknown (28:24):
yeah, and having an exit plan, have an exit plan
written into your operatingagreement. Write that one down.
That was something there werelike, who did what was in our
operating agreement that likewhat the exit plan was, was not
very clear. So that that's whatled to such a long legal legal
battle, is those steps were notclearly documented. So what I

(28:47):
mean by that is, like, if onepartner wants out option was to
sell their shares to you knowwhat I'm saying? Like, it's not
well documented, it was like, sothose types of things. One
partner wants out what we do,right? That sort of stuff. Whose
responsibilities are what putthat in

Jamie Stephens (29:03):
here? So for people that are just getting
started, maybe they'reinterested in doing a partner
and all of that sound or havinga partner all of that sounds a
little overwhelming. Is it fairto say that you can wait till
you actually start making moneybefore you do that? Or is it
something that needs to be likecourse hashed out beforehand?
Because sometimes you just needto go in and figure out what the

(29:25):
hell you're even doing. I wouldnot start

Unknown (29:27):
a business with a business partner without it
hashed out ahead of time, whenyou're when you're doing it on
your own. For those of you thatare like, I'm doing this all by
myself, go do get dirtyexperiment. I told you the
beginning of my journey, right?
But like, if you want a part, Ifeel like it all has to be
hashed out in the beginning,because and I watched this
happen with one of my clients.
She partnered with somebody,they had an agency, she was the

(29:49):
offspring, the other person wasthe creative brain. And it was a
match made in heaven they weremaking between 15 and $20,000.
But like their goals of wherethey wanted to take the business
were very different. Right, likemy client, the observation one
is like, let's take it to themoon. The green one is like, I'm
good, where we're at, we canmake decent money. I don't work
that hard, you know. And thatwas a problem. And they didn't

(30:10):
have everything documented aheadof time. So there was a lot of
honestly, there was a lot ofdrama, they were able to part
amicably. But there were a lotof things that have those
things, but departed ahead, likedecided ahead of time, it would
have been easier. So I would sayany partnership, hash out as
much as you can ahead of time,even if you're like, we're just
experimenting, I don't care,right, because like I said,
inevitably, somebody schools mayshift, somebody might get

(30:34):
presented with a new opportunityfrom the outside, like all of
those different things, I thinkare really, really important.

Jamie Stephens (30:38):
Yeah. No, I love that. It's all great advice. So
on your community, I mean, Iknow a lot of times we end up
creating the things that we needfor ourselves. Yeah. What is it
that you've been able to get foryourself out of the community?
Share some of that?

Unknown (30:56):
Yeah. For me, it's so funny, you say that. You're very
intuitive, my friend. That'swhat it was. So my whole story
was in July of 21. I was like, Ihad reached peak burnout, like,
on the floor in my shower,crying like cannot do this
anymore. I'm managing a team ofeight, my payroll is huge. Like,

(31:16):
that's if anybody remembersthat. And how about the like,
that's when the iOS updatehappened. And Facebook ads went
crazy. And the launch strategiesthat were once effective or
ineffective anymore, like itwas, it was pretty epic. And
there was nowhere for me to go,to have this conversation.
Because all of the communitiesthat I had, I was the leader of

(31:37):
right, so even my old communityof new entrepreneurs, right,
they saw me as a thought leader,my other mastermind community
was run by my business partner,and all those people were
potential clients. So it waslike, there was nowhere to talk
about what I was experiencing.
And I felt alone and isolated.
And I felt like I couldn't likeadmit to anybody. And I felt I

(31:57):
went through the whole process,like feeling like a failure, and
all of this all by myself. Andthen once I started talking to
people, because eventually I,you know, got up off the floor
and dusted myself off and wentto work and start talking to
you. But I realized I was notalone in that there were a lot
of people, maybe theirexperience wasn't as dramatic as
fights, but they were feeling alot of similar feelings,

(32:19):
frustration, overwhelmedburnout, wanting to make changes
in their business, etc. And notknowing how feeling very
trapped. A lot of that I was notalone in that. That's really
where a lot of it stemmed from.
It also stemmed from I get tobecause we did six feet, Arabs
or we did seven figures lastyear between my business and the
partnership as we did 1.2million. And so it got us into a

(32:41):
lot of rains, that I would nothave otherwise been in that you
had to be at the million markmillion dollar mark to get into.
And I realized that waiting thatmall to have those conversations
to create those spaces wascounterintuitive. Yeah. Right.
The statistics are that only4.2% of women owned businesses
hit a million dollars. Imagineif we wound like started having

(33:03):
conversations earlier, right?
These types of content? How do Iavoid burnout? Right, like

Jamie Stephens (33:12):
to the up to that mark and support them
before? Right? Yeah,

Unknown (33:16):
that's exactly what what so much of that was that it
was that space, were labelingthe gap. It was still a big gap.
But then also like I got intothese rooms with these people
making a million dollars, andfrankly, my 15 years of
corporate cracking more businessacumen than 80% of the people in
the room because of my corporatecareer than just because
somebody could run a milliondollars through a funnel, like
being able to run a milliondollars through funnels does not

(33:37):
make a business owner, right?
Does it make a businessstrategist? Does it make a
business? Frankly, it's amarketing funnel. So for me, I
was like this, this is silly,right? First of all, these
people don't know anything thatmost of us don't know, right?
And so why did we wait to dothis? And it's really where it
temper. I was like, this isreally silly. I started having
these conversations, you know,again, in our first management

(33:57):
job in the corporate career,instead of leading to our
executives, right? Or if westarted having these
conversations with ourbusinesses, or making 150,000 to
$200,000 a year, instead ofwaiting until they're a million
dollars, and they're huge, andthey're bloated, and we have a
team of eight and hate it right?
What if we have theseconversations way earlier, it's
a hate be mindful of this, orthis was my experience, or I did
this and this is a huge mistake,he should do it this way

(34:18):
instead, like, imagine if westarted having those
conversations earlier. So that'sreally what it was, was creating
that space of watch out for thepitfalls, right? This is what I
noticed, or this is what Ilearned or this is what worked
really well for me or did it? Ifwe start having those
conversations earlier on. We'renot unwinding these horrible
messes that $1.5 billion.

Jamie Stephens (34:37):
Yeah, no, that's brilliant. And I can tell that
you are and it's such a passionof mine too. But like empowering
women is like in my bones. Youknow, I mean to where it's just
like I just want all the womento just step up and claim the
power that they have. Make themoney make the decisions. Yes,
and get things right with thisworld. I mean, good lord. So all

(35:01):
of that is like very at theforefront of what I want to do
with my business as well. And,you know, obviously, I'm in
those very beginning babystages. Sure, but it's like,
knowing even that this type ofcommunity is out there. And
that, you know, there's there'ssome hand holding, or not hand
holding, but collaboration, Imean, because that's like the

(35:23):
real use of stuff, because it'slike, it's amazing what comes up
whenever you're just in a roomor in a space with all of these
people that have all thesedifferent experiences, but are
all working towards a similargoal. So I love that mission. I
love all of it. It's reallyexciting to me.

Unknown (35:44):
Thank you so much. And thank you for seeing it.
Because, you know, I don't, Inever, I never set out to be a
disrupter, right? Like, that wasnever really something I did
intentionally, I just happenedto like, it's my business brain,
like I could walk into abusiness. And I can tell you
where the sales process isbroken immediately, like, within
like, 20 minutes, right with aconversation with somebody. I

(36:06):
think that's kind of what it wasat the business side looking
around, I was scanning thelandscape of spaces a
collaboration and and all thisother stuff. And I immediately
saw it, I was like, this is theproblem, right? It's either a
million dollar mastermind, or anexecutive coaching retreat, or
it's a $30,000 coaching programfor newbies. Or there's a lot of

(36:27):
networking organizations, whichI'm a fan of networking, right.
But networking organizations tome represent open hands, not
open hearts. Right. And, and sothat's what I saw on the
landscape. And it was likeinstantly, like, this is how we
fill this gap. Women who arelike, no, no, it's not another
coach. So what are thestrategies, some other tactic,
it's another degree, it's notabout, you know, because of what

(36:47):
I mean works, women spendhundreds of 1000s of dollars on
those things, and still notreally get the result that they
want. Because so much of it isan inside job, right? And they
stopped building stuff isolated,they still feel frustrated. And
so that's what we're reallylooking at.

Jamie Stephens (37:01):
So how are you reaching these women? Like, what
are you doing to really pullthem into your network into? Let
me ask you this forclarification, because I don't
I've never been in a mastermindor like something like this. So
I'm not exactly sure. Buteveryone contributes right? How

(37:22):
do you make sure like people arequalified?

Unknown (37:27):
Yes, there's two things we do everything is an
application. So we make peopleapply, there is no Buy Now
button to our community on theinternet. We do that very
intentionally. And it's also ourprice point, you know, our meds
$5,000 for the year, which is byno means the most expensive,
right? Like, you know, I've seenmillion dollar masterminds, you
know, the $50,000 point and the60. Me, so we're by no means

(37:49):
like the most expensive option.
But if you pay $5,000, you'regonna show up. If you pay
$5,000, your business isprobably where your career is,
at a certain level where thatlevel of investment makes sense
for you. So we have literallyuse price as one of our biggest
qualifiers, in addition to thatapplication process. And there
has been two reasons why Jamie,we have told people No, or not,
no, that told them no, but notreally need an invitation, one

(38:12):
people who are still too new,where they're at that place
where it's like, No, you reallydo you need coaching. Yeah,
that's what you need. Because wedon't provide that and I don't
want anybody to be frustrated,or have their cash tied up in
investing and be in the room,when that $5,000 easily could
have gone to a coach that maybewould help them get there
faster. So that's important tome. And then to the people who

(38:32):
are really looking for ourRolodex, meaning the people who
are like, I just want to jointhis group and see how much
money I can make out of it.
Again, I want to be reallyclear, our women are doing
business together. I do businesswith men, you know, like that is
happening. But that's not.
That's not the point. Yeah,right. So there's been a couple
of people that were like, well,I don't really know if I'm gonna
get an ROI from that community.

(38:54):
And I'm like, getting back tothose had been like the two
biggest reasons that we have, DQanybody. As of right now, we
have about so we started abouteight months ago, we have about
40 members, and all of them arepeople that I know in some
capacity. So we had not reallygotten into cold traffic yet. My
thought process was for thisfirst year, like, I've spent
years building these giantaudiences, like, Let's go talk

(39:16):
to these people first. Yeah.
Before we try to go build a newaudience, right? These people,
they already know me, they'vealready seen me. Some of them
already. Trust me in somecapacity. Maybe they bought
something from me in a differentspace. So like for 2022, it
would like head down, connectwith the audience and actively
have we soar. We start buildingcold traffic. So we've also been
very fortunate that 98% of thepeople that have applied to be

(39:37):
part of the community are allwomen. I know. Yeah, that's
fortunate. So we have a veryclear code of conduct that we
have all of our people sign. Andhonestly, and this is for those
of you that are startingbusinesses, I have a fantastic
attorney. They wrote a reallygood client service agreement
that basically says if you breakthe code of conduct or the
agreement that I can kick youout and I hate to say that

(39:58):
because nobody's like, I'mjoined to be kicked out. But I,
it felt so important to me thatwe protect the integrity of the
community, I would rather refundsomebody their money and send
them on their way, then let theminfiltrate the community, you
know? Yeah. As we grow, I have alot of ideas, Jamie, as to how
we're going to, to police that,right, because there will come a
point in time where it'sobviously not all people know,

(40:19):
or to the point where I can'tget my arms around everybody.
But like, right now, everybodygets a personal onboarding. I
think in the film of my programdirector, she walks him through
everything. So right noweverything is very high touch.
But we have a lot of plans andideas as to how we're going to
put those parameters in place aswe grow. And we can't do as much
like manual touch on everything.

Jamie Stephens (40:40):
Yeah. So what kind of team do you have in
place now?

Unknown (40:44):
Great question. I have two team members, two full time
team members. So I have amarketing manager. And then I
have a program director. So mymarketing manager anything
pretty that we've ever done onthe internet, just as a pretty
over the years. And then Valerieis kind of she does kind of ops,
some VA style work, and reallyanything operationally because I

(41:05):
am a full fledged visionary.
That is the team and then I haveI work with a couple leave a few
bas that help us with audiencegrowth. So I don't know if you
were asking about that early. Ithink that's where we started to
go to question and then hepivoted. So most of our
conversations that are beingstarted online, right now we use
a couple of different outreachsoftware's. And then we have the
ace that ran a lot of app forus. Those are bas that I've

(41:28):
hired through agencies that Iwork with. So we have a handful
of of people who support us inthat way, helping us grow the
Facebook group, and again, usingour existing audiences. But I
think I have 13,000, LinkedInfollowers, LinkedIn connections,
and I was like, I'm not gonna goDM all those people. So we, you
know, who does that outreachbaits, those people to our
communities, those types ofthings?

Jamie Stephens (41:50):
Yeah. That's really cool. Thank you. So tell
me, you said, your eldest isabout to start kindergarten in a
couple of days. How has yourlife changed? Since you decided
I'm done with this? I'm notgoing back? What is opened up
for you, your family? Like allof the good stuff?

Unknown (42:10):
Yeah. Thank you so much for asking that question. I love
that, though. Um, so for us, itwas my husband left his job in
February 2020. To pre pandemic,apparently, somehow I was able
to time that were you that heneeded to get out. So Kevin has
been home and then obviously,which was a huge blessing. When
daycare closed and everythingclosed, he was able to keep the

(42:32):
kids home with him, which wasreally amazing. So my husband,
my husband is at work, which hasbeen really fantastic. We
lovingly joke that Kevin is theproject manager, and I am a
project. Now, that's that. Andthen we bought, we bought our
dream home in July of 2020. Sowe had built, we built an app.

(42:57):
And finally back in 2017, youbuilt a property, uh huh. And
then got to know kind of a newarea, you know, it was like, Oh,
we build this house, and you getto that area you're living in,
and we found this community thatwe were just really obsessed
with. And I had a five year planto buy a house in that
community. I also happen to havea girlfriend who's a very
overzealous real estate agent.
She's like, I had your plan. Iknow, somebody was actually, the

(43:18):
timing was a credit, I

Jamie Stephens (43:21):
was gonna say perfect timing with the whole
real estate market, she did do asolid,

Unknown (43:26):
she did a huge solid.
So God bless her for that. Andso that was gonna be how that so
you know, and we've just, we'vebeen able to travel, we've been
able to make a lot of coolchoices in life, you know, we
got to decide public schoolversus private school, right? It
wasn't a financial decision, itwas what's best for a family
decision. You know, we traveloften, as a family of four,
we're able to pick up a gowhenever we need to, or want to,

(43:49):
it's really lovely. We actuallyjust booked a cruise for January
of 23, in which case, we're ableto take my mother in law, and do
some really cool stuff likethat. So my our love language is
travel. And so for me, that wasthe biggest thing if I wanted
the freedom to be able to go,which was part of the reason why
my husband needed to quit hisjob because he was like, as long
as you have a job tied to thatPTO. Not okay. You know, and

(44:10):
that's why I told you before wehit record, like my thing is
always if I want to travel, howcan I turn this into a business
opportunity business to pay forthe travel? So we do we do a lot
of that, like we're going toDenver in October, I'm going to
host an event with my mentorwhile we're there and you know,

(44:31):
all those different things andmeet with a couple of plants
that girlfriends that I have outthere. So I tried to do as much
of that as possible and havingthe freedom to do that because
my husband's not stuck in a job.
House nearly luckily for us.

Jamie Stephens (44:46):
I know there's lots of benefits to having him
home. Have there been challengesand adjustment. Things that have
happened like gender role type,things like that you've had to
overcome so not

Unknown (45:00):
So much gender role because when my husband and I
met I've always been thebreadwinner, right? Like it was
before. Before I ever became anentrepreneur. I always made more
money. He was always the morepatient one. He was always that
he wanted to be a teacher likeanybody was staying home with
our kids. It was him, right.
Like that was never a questionfor us. So I don't think we went
through like that power strugglethat I think some couples you
maybe that was a predetermine.

(45:20):
So that that did set us a littlebit further ahead. But the
things that I have had topersonally learn as somebody who
did like I was bearing thefinancial burden of our family,
and then also still managing ourfamily. And so when he quit his
job, I had to let go, right?
Like, I had to let go of likethe way he does laundry.
Shouldn't thing on the planet? Imean, what are you doing with
your life? My water bill is $4million, because you do so much

(45:42):
laundry, but you know what,Jamie? I don't have to do does a
laundry. Nice. Little thingslike that. Right? Like the
grocery store that you guysthree different grocery stores.
And he I might not efficient.
And I just had to learn to letgo and not ship like double
check him on things like, againwith Dave is starting
kindergarten? Is he registered?
Like do we know what's going on?

(46:03):
Like, a year ago, I would havechecked it double checked. And
did you do it? Right? I just hadto let go. And sometimes things
fall through the cracks. And Ijust had to be okay with that.
So for us, it was really aboutlike, if this if his his role in
our family is to run this house,I have to let him run the house
the way that he wants to run thehouse. Right? And I can't tell

(46:24):
him I want you to run the house.
And here's how I would do it.
That does not work. Right.
Right. You're both working ornot. Right. So it was really
just coming up with thoseagreements. Like randomly, he'd
be like, it's Sunday afternoon.
He's like, I'm gonna go mow thelawn. I'm like, No, that's fine.
You don't work. So you don't mowthe lawn on a Sunday afternoon.
On Tuesday, yeah, you know, buthe was like, Oh, I didn't That

(46:46):
didn't occur to me, right likethat. So for me, I was like, but
no, like, the weekends are afamily time. I don't work. The
kids are home. Like, let's go dothat. So when you just really
had said work through it? Are weperfect? No. And the gender role
piece really only comes outexternally. Right. So out
socially, or meeting new people,or unconditional love your

(47:07):
husband do it right? Or, youknow, we live in a golf
community and my husband golf'sa lot. And people are always
like, Hey, man, what are youdoing? Like I am a stay at home
dad. And so I think he actuallydid more drama with it than I
do. There are still days whereI'm like, are doing it wrong.
Like what do people think am Iemasculating him because of
this. And we just, I mean, wetalked about it, we talked about
a lot. And you know, like Isaid, it's never perfect, but

(47:31):
it's good. I've always wondered

Jamie Stephens (47:33):
that because I mean, my long term plan is to
make a lot of money. That'sgonna affect the dynamics of my
relationship.

Unknown (47:43):
My My best suggestion for you and for anybody
listening to like, start talkingto your partner about it now,
right? I told my husband inJanuary of 2019, that this
business was going to makemillions of dollars, right. But
I and in the beginning, he waslike, yeah, yeah, whatever.
Right?

Jamie Stephens (48:01):
When Jason was saying, like,

Unknown (48:04):
so it's like, ease them into it. And that was really for
me, like, we talked about it. Italked to the business. I, I no
longer talk to him about this.
But early on, I did. So he feltincluded. He knew what I was
doing. You know, when I wasworking when I was working my
casts off. Sorry, Milan, saythat? Yeah. When I was working
so hard, after bedtime, and allthat other stuff. Like, I felt

(48:24):
the need to include him. So heknew what I was doing,

Jamie Stephens (48:28):
right? Like, you're not just not avoiding you
have a vision.

Unknown (48:33):
And so, in the beginning, it didn't even when
it started to take off. And Iwas able to quit my job. Like I
told him, like, this is what Idid say, these are my clients.
So what's going on? This is whatI do. And I included him in
things. And like I said, at thispoint, it's kind of like, you
know, what else? I don't as muchanymore as I once did, but I
mean, it was I wanted him to belike he was part of it. And he

(48:54):
understood it. So what I waslike, No, we make enough money
for you to not work. He was litlike are you sure you know? That
in all those different things?
So I would say for any of youwho are still in that corporate
job, or maybe just left orbuilding a side hustle or
whenever like start includingyour partner now and those
conversations if you have thosegoals? Yeah, it was okay to not
have those goals. Can we justnormalize like, hey man, I want

(49:16):
to make like 80 grand and not goto a job every day like yeah,
that's 100% Okay, please don'tmake people on the internet make
you feel bad about that. Right?
But if your desire is to buildan empire like that's cool too
but I just my mind that was likeI talked about it from the
beginning. And so when ithappened, it wasn't like what

(49:37):
what do you do? Like see was soaware of it when I quit my job.
You know, all of those things.
Were decisions made together andlike so this point in the game
and we really don't talk aboutit that much. But in the
beginning, we talked about it alot. Yeah.

Jamie Stephens (49:49):
My husband has made it very clear that he is
perfectly fine to have a sugarmama.

Unknown (49:55):
No funny story. I will tell you this as we wrap up. My
we are family we In the car, inthe Outer Banks, my mother is
one of 10 children. I know it'swild. So I got to spend time
with like my adult cousins thatI hadn't seen probably since I
was a teenager. Right. And so,we are out having drinks one
night, and one of my cousins hastalked about, he doesn't love

(50:15):
his job. And this, this andthis, and of course, you know,
my entrepreneur, great brainflips on I'm like, What do you
think you know, your job? Like,that's ridiculous, like, what's
wrong with the world? And solike, what did you want to do?
You know, it was like, Well, youknow, to be honest with you,
cause it's like Kevin's got thescabbard up. Like, I kind of
want to golf, he was like, I cantake care of kids like, I can do

(50:36):
that. Like it. It was so funny.
And I for me, it was like areally, you know, a moment, I
felt really proud. Because likeyou said, there's the gender
roles. Your wife makes all that,you know, and this kid was like,
trying to figure that out. Niceway six, right? Yeah. But he was
like, how did I get that gig?
And it was just really funnythan and I love that people are
just being more open minded toit. Yeah. At events. I don't

(50:59):
know, to actually pull it off.
But I thought that was good.

Jamie Stephens (51:01):
I love it. All right. Well, thank you so much,
Ryan, I've had such a fun time.
I mean, the time has just flownby, do you want to tell people
where they can find out moreabout you start following you
all of those things? Sure.
Absolutely. So we've a Facebookgroup, and it's called be in the
room. So we'd love for you tojoin us there. Our

Unknown (51:20):
website is be in the room.org. I'm a very avid
networker on all platforms. Soyou can feel free to connect
with me. I spend most of my timeon Facebook and LinkedIn. And it
is Ryan with two N's dowdy. AndI love to connect and meet
people and talk to

Jamie Stephens (51:34):
people. Great. I will link all that up in the
show notes. So thank you so

Unknown (51:38):
much. Yes, thanks, Jamie.

Jamie Stephens (51:40):
What a fast and fun conversation. That was. I
cannot tell y'all how lucky I amto get to do this podcast. It's
like my very own mastermind.
Getting to ask all of the thingsof such amazing women like
Brian, her growth is definitelyadmirable. And as always, I'm
excited to learn from her. Someof the highlights from our
conversation include, numberone, what do I want, you've

(52:01):
built the business everyone elsewas building, you've built the
business your coach told you tobuild, but go inside and do the
soul searching and ask yourselfwhat do I want. Number two is
this Groundhog Day, running fromone thing to the next day after
day on repeat can give you thesense of Groundhog Day. When you
notice that you have little tono quality time for yourself,

(52:22):
you can recognize this as anopportunity to make some changes
in your life. Number three,start with what you know and
take the messy action. Whenyou're first getting started.
You don't have to haveeverything figured out to talk
about your expertise, how youcan help and take money from
anyone that'll pay you thingswill start to become clearer
with who you want to work withand how just let it be messy.

(52:44):
Number four, respect the hustle.
Listen, I know that hustle hasgotten a bad rap because it's
very much linked to burnout.
However, if you're starting yourbusiness alongside your full
time job, you have to put in thehours to make it work, you will
be busy, you will work a lot butit does not have to be forever.
Number five, try and try again.

(53:06):
When you go to launch a newproduct course program service
or whatever your thing is, justplan on doing it over and over
again until you start to seesuccess. Launch, observe, tweak
and repeat. Number six alignyour values. If you're
considering having a businesspartner, make sure there's an
alignment of values. How hard doyou want to work for how long?

(53:28):
Who's doing what what are thecosts, the size of the team, the
amount of hours, get alignment,and a written agreement on all
the things you each value orfind a better fit and at the
very least get an exit plan.
Number seven, ditch the gurustatus. When people are looking
to you as the expert or you'rein a community with potential
clients. Finding a space to bevulnerable and talk about the

(53:49):
problems you're facing in yourbusiness can be challenging,
create or join communities whereyou can talk about these things
with experts in different areasso you can all learn and grow
together. Number eight, fill theneed. If you're looking to start
or expand a business, take alook at what you've overcome
your expertise and what you wishwas available to you. Create
what you wish you had. Andnumber nine, share your vision

(54:13):
with your partner. Whether yourvision is to replace your
corporate salary or build anempire. start having
conversations with your partnerso it's not a surprise, ease
them in and share what you'reworking on. Share your goals and
create that comfort level sothey can support you. Okay, that
is it for this week. Thanks toRyan for joining me on the show
and big thanks to you for tuningin today. You can find all the

(54:35):
links in the show notes and ifyou're feeling like a rock star,
go ahead and send this episodeto a friend or leave a review so
more women can find the show.
Until next week. Find me onInstagram at Jamie Renee. Bye
bye