The Resilient Journey to Create a Support Empire with Aimee Kandrac

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When the going gets tough, they say, the tough get going. Amy Kandrac embodies this adage, turning a deeply personal challenge into 'What Friends Do', a robust support network born from the chaos of a health crisis. Join us as Amy takes us through her entrepreneurial odyssey, from the platform's early days before smartphone ubiquity to its transformation into a sustainable modern business model. Her journey is a heartfelt testament to the resilience required in the startup world, especially within the software industry in the Midwest. As she shares the hurdles of growth, funding, and the switch from nonprofit fundraising, Amy's story offers a candid look into the adaptability needed when your venture is as personal as it is professional.

Navigating the waters of a family-run business has its unique trials and triumphs, as Amy deftly illustrates. The blending of personal connections into professional ones can either be a recipe for success or a potential minefield. This episode peels back the layers of this delicate dynamic, discussing the challenges of managing relationships and the subtle art of maintaining friendships and family amidst business pressures. Additionally, we delve into the world of venture funding from a female entrepreneur's perspective, celebrating Amy's status as the first woman in Indiana to secure such funding and discussing how she managed to break through barriers that many women in business face today.

The conversation doesn't shy away from the leadership labyrinth—balancing the need for confidence with the humility of seeking support. Amy's insight into fostering a culture of compassion within her company and the broader business community sets an example for all leaders. Coupled with her vision to extend 'What Friends Do' on a global scale and the introduction of a new concierge service, Amy's drive to innovate support networks has the potential to revolutionize how we help each other through life's toughest challenges. So, tune in to hear how one woman's mission to provide a lifeline for those in need has blossomed into a life-changing enterprise for many.

Episode Transcript

Zach (00:05):
Hello and welcome to the Owner's Odyssey, the podcast
where we delve deep into thetransformative stories of
courageous business owners whohave embarked on an
extraordinary adventure.
I'm Zach Jones and I'm BrookeGattia.
We're here to explore the reallife experiences of
entrepreneurs.

Brook (00:22):
Each episode, we'll embark on a quest to uncover the
trials, triumphs andtransformations of remarkable
individuals who dared to answerthe call of entrepreneurship.

Zach (00:34):
Like all adventurers, our guests have faced their fair
share of challenges, vanquishedformidable foes and braved the
unknown.

Brook (00:41):
Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, a
seasoned business owner orsimply an avid listener hungry
for captivating stories theOwner's Odyssey is here to help
you level up.

Zach (00:52):
So join us as we embark on this epic expedition.
This is the Owner's Odyssey.
Let's start our adventure.
I was waving to you for theintro.
You're going to edit this out.

Brook (01:07):
It's okay.
Well, sorry, I'm going to bereally bad for this and all your
editing side of things.
So, amy Kendrick, I have knownfor oh gosh, I want to say 10,
12 years.

Aimee (01:20):
Kind of close to that yeah.

Brook (01:21):
And so I had known you after you started your business
what Friends Do or the app forwhat Friends Do.
So I have gotten to see a lotof the journey you have gone
through, the ups and downs andall of that, that piece of it.
But I would love for you totell us what is what led you to
wanting to start this business,to engage in that

(01:43):
entrepreneurial side of things.
How did you get to?
Hey, I have this business thatI have here.

Aimee (01:50):
Right?
Well, thanks for having me on,and I will say there was no part
of me that had any ideawhatsoever that I was going to
start a business or, even as Iwas starting it, that that's
what I was doing.
I had two small kids, myhusband was in medical school, I
was working full time and mysister's very, very best friend,

(02:11):
who was like a little sister tome, was diagnosed with brain
cancer when she was 25.
And my family was kind of thefirst in line to check in on the
family at the hospital and thenshare that information with
everyone else.
And what we found as, and thenshare that information with
everyone else, and what we foundas we were sharing that
information with all of thefriends, was the response was

(02:32):
always twofold.
The first was please tell thefamily that I love them and I'm
thinking of them.
And the second was and let themknow.
Let me know if there's anythingI can do.
And it was a lot to manage.
It was a lot to try to rememberwho all wants to say hi, who
all wants to have their wellwishes said, and how can we as

(02:54):
the intermediary not that it wasnecessarily our responsibility,
but we were looking forsomething to do, because when
there's a major life event thathappens, people really, really
want the opportunity to connectand to help and feel like
they're doing something, even inthese unimaginable situations.
So my mom called me one night.
I can really clearly remembersitting on, you know, like our

(03:14):
most hammy-downed, nasty sofa,and she called me and she's like
Amy, I think we need to figureout how to create something
specifically online to help morepeople than just Laura.
So then we created an onlineconsumer software called what
friends do, and it was just thatfast.
Then we just created it and itwas ready to go.

Zach (03:36):
So but the idea was an app or something.

Aimee (03:40):
Well, this was before apps, but yes, oh, okay, that
was my kind of.

Zach (03:43):
I was trying to place it in the timeline, of like, so you
needed a resource.

Aimee (03:47):
Yeah, so this was, you know, 15, 16 years ago, and apps
didn't exist, got it.
So we were strictly onlineconsumer software and our
initial business model we werestrictly B2C and we were looking
for affiliate revenue.
Wow, yeah, yeah.
And so we had all of the modelsput together, we had all of the

(04:12):
affiliate links in, becausethen it was, and it still is now
, when you're helping someonethrough any kind of crisis, you
need to buy them things right,like whether it's the food to
make a meal, or supplies forthem, or just something to make
them smile, and so we weregetting small amounts of
affiliate revenue, but you haveto have a really, really large
consumer base in order to makeany money on that?

Zach (04:29):
Did you have any kind of background in that sort of
fundraising partnership?

Aimee (04:33):
Well, so my background professionally was a fundraiser
for nonprofits.
Okay, there you go, but thatwasn't necessarily the same.
Gotcha my mom had a backgroundin actually in a lot of
production, and so she had areally good idea of how to

(05:00):
Gotcha.

Brook (05:01):
How did you know what to do first in the midst of all of
that?
Was it storyboard of it out?
Was it finding money to raiseto do stuff?
Were you self-funding it?
How did you guys choose?
Okay, I have this great ideaNow what do I?
Do with it.

Aimee (05:17):
Right.
So it started because we hadanother friend who just helped
us put together a small websitefor our friend, laura, and we
kind of just were thinkingthrough what else do we need and
then looking at how do we makethis available for others.
And then we were really reallyself-funded for quite some time
but also went to a couple offriends who were able to give us

(05:39):
a little bit of seed funding tokind of just pay the developers
to get it out there and to getthings going.
And we were self-funded for alot of years until we kind of
got to a point where we werelike this is not.
This B2C market was notsustainable and we weren't
growing fast enough andespecially located here in the
Midwest B2C software there's nota lot of people who do it and

(06:02):
there were not many people atall who were doing it 10 years
ago and kind of restructured thebusiness and the business
relationship with my mom andmyself.
So I kind of took over most ofthe business actually all of the
business and also pivoted in doyou have a bingo card, by the

(06:22):
way?
Like all of the entrepreneurialwords that people will say.

Zach (06:25):
Like I said, no, we'll dev out one we don't, but I can
picture it in my head the secondyou say it.
That's funny, Sorry.

Paul (06:33):
That's funny, I like that.

Aimee (06:36):
So so we we did, we pivoted and made it a a B to C
or a B to, from B to C to B to B, Okay, and looked at how do we
get to the people who need usfirst, and that was going to
where they were being diagnosed,so healthcare.
And we were able to land apretty big healthcare company

(06:58):
like a healthcare institutionand white labeled our software
for them to give to theirpatients.

Zach (07:03):
Very interesting.

Brook (07:04):
So what was it one?
What is it like working withfamily to get something started?
I'm going to ask vulnerablequestions in the midst of this.
Was that journey for yousomething that it was an
inspiration to like build off of?
Was it like I don't know, justlike was part of the getting
started?
Was that an emotional journeyof doing that with your mom and

(07:27):
kind of working through all ofthat?

Aimee (07:30):
It was an emotional journey and I am really happy
that right now she and I arestill best friends and
everything is great.
I think one of the reasons thatwe stopped working together was
because it was not going verywell.
Yeah, um, and for us therelationship that we had as

(07:51):
family was more important thanthe relationship that we had as
business partners.
But it took a really it wasn'tpretty for a while.
Um, I will say, at first it waskind of exciting.
Um, we knew we were both likediving head in, ready to go.
We knew we were both super,super committed to it.
But there's just differentdynamics that happen in a family

(08:13):
relationship when you'reworking together.

Zach (08:16):
Do you feel like those dynamics were unexpected or
expected, but palpable?

Aimee (08:24):
In hindsight they were not unexpected at all.
I was enough younger that Idon't know that I saw it and I
think I was so excited aboutwhat we were creating
rose-tinted, uh-huh, but I waslike oh, we'll make it work.
It'll be fine, but it wasn'tgreat for a while.

Zach (08:46):
And then, as you're navigating that, the trickiness
of that, what kind of tools orwhat helped you untie that knot
eventually with her?

Aimee (09:03):
I haven't thought about this in a while.
It was hard.
She put in a lot and she put infar more of the seed money
financial seed money than I did.
Um, because I just didn't haveit.
And you know it took a lot ofof consulting with other people

(09:25):
who knew the business, knew ourrelationships, knew and like
advice.
How do we untangle this?
Other people who had been inthe business world for a while
and had worked with either oneof us in different ways.
Gosh, I don't.
It wasn't great Again.
I'm really happy that where weare now, but it was.

Zach (09:47):
And is that a product of just time?

Aimee (09:49):
I think it's a lot of time.
I think it's because we doactually have a really great
relationship as family and if wedidn't have that dynamic and
for us our family is the mostimportant, and if we didn't have
that dynamic and for us ourfamily is the most important,
and if we didn't have that, Idon't think we would be where we
are right now.

Paul (10:10):
What were the main sticking points that you found?
Was it personality, was itbusiness differences?

Aimee (10:19):
What were the real issues that you had to overcome.
Well, this might be a surpriseto some of you Maybe not Brooke,
who's known me but we're bothpretty strong-willed.
But we also just workdifferently, and I think that
that's something that neitherone of us was good at.

(10:40):
So I think a lot of it wasbecause we were so close.
Right, you can see thepotential that the other person
has, um, and you can push themin different ways than you can
if it's strictly a workingrelationship, um, and then you
can get irritated with them indifferent ways.

Brook (11:01):
But uh, we probably bring old baggage to the table, like
my mom.
When I was a teenager, she toldme to do this and it made me
mad.
And now she's telling me to dothis and I'm an adult and I
don't really like it.
That dynamic of going fromparent to mutual adult and in a
working environment that justhas to be hard.
I'm very impressed with manyfamily-owned businesses that can

(11:23):
.
They've had to have overcomesome dynamic of that growth or
they're probably sitting in somebent up like stuff to it.
So I think it's reallyadmirable that one you engaged
in hey, we have a visiontogether, let's do this, let's
work through this.
And then, of course, withanyone, you have conflict and
you're going all right.
This conflict is building tothe point that I don't want it

(11:46):
to burn our relationship asfamily and we are going to
choose that over this businessevery day and I think that is
way admirable.
I don't think it's surprisingthat it would go through and
that's part of why asking likethis has got to be something
many people deal with of like,hey, I come up with an idea, I'm
talking to my brother about it,like this is a great idea, and

(12:11):
you kind of implement it andthen, as time goes on, you
change, and that change bothinternally to you and to the
other person.
It, it, it rubs against eachother and sometimes it just
doesn't.
Partnership is hard, and Idon't think there's any.
I think it's admirable to saythis isn't working, or it is
working or you know, I don't.
I don't think there's any pieceof that.
So I I totally get, I totallyget all of that from that aspect
of things, and you probably hadfriends that came in and did
this too.
Like lots of them, I wouldimagine a lot of this is.

(12:32):
I mean, it's not like you wentout and got corporate sponsors
right off the bat Like you'regoing, hey Joe, you're my
friends here, like would you bemy, like customer service person
or like whatever from from thataspect, was that also hard to
let go.
I'm not only bringing in family, I'm bringing in friends.
And that dynamic of like Idon't have enough money to get a
professional, skilled ex, I'mlumping this together as I'm

(12:54):
going along how, how did thatwork for you too in that?

Aimee (12:59):
Um, we did that a lot and I would say a lot of them were
professional skilled ex but weweren't engaging them in that
way and I think that was aproblem, because you couldn't
pay them because we couldn't paythem um, so they were doing it
kind of as volunteer time whenthey had, is that?
yeah and and like, because theybelieved in the concept, they
believed in the mission umwanted to see it succeed.
But I think one of the likelessons that I am learning now

(13:26):
and I didn't know at the time,but when we were so excited at
the beginning we didn't likedifferentiate who's good at what
, who is going to be overseeingwhich part, and because of that
it got so murky and it it burneda lot of relationships as well

(13:46):
with some of the other peoplewho were volunteering time right
, and they maybe didn't have thesame type of commitment that we
did and either me or my mom,one of us, would not appreciate
the way they were working.
The relationship was differentif it was my friend versus her
friend and we didn't like whatthey were doing.
But because they weren't acontractual employee, it was

(14:10):
really hard to manage thoserelationships.

Brook (14:13):
Over the years, do you feel like you've spent more time
developing the software,managing the relationships?
Where do you think most of yourtime has Like over?

Aimee (14:19):
all the years.
I really don't want to thinkabout how much time I have
wasted on probably managing allof the relationships.

Brook (14:29):
How do you feel like you've developed in that, like
how you manage them?

Aimee (14:32):
Not as well as I should have probably.
Well, let's let's point outsome other vulnerabilities.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Zach (14:42):
I you get fluffy on the back half.
Is this the back?

Aimee (14:49):
half.
I hope so.
That would be fantastic If Ihad to like quantify.
So I've spent more dollars onsoftware development, but I've
spent more dollars on softwaredevelopment also because of not
great people management.
This sounds kind of crappy, butI think I was just a little too

(15:17):
nice.

Paul (15:18):
What about the specification for the software?
I'm picking this up with quitea few other clients.
They're putting software outthere, they're overrunning and
I've had that development myself.
If it's not defined well, youcan spend a lot of money going
nowhere.

Aimee (15:30):
You can spend a lot of money going nowhere.
I would say I was maybe theopposite of that.
I think we were so specific inour design requirements that
when it wasn't attained and itwasn't meeting exactly what we
had specified, we ran into lotsof problems then.
Okay, so for us we were maybethe other side of that, which is

(15:53):
also a problem, right, becauseit could have been good enough.
If we had been good enough, getout there with 90% of it, get
it started, we wouldn't havewasted 90% of the dollars on the
last 10% and or pissing off oneof our developers and having to
find somebody new.

Paul (16:10):
You're trying to get it for perfection.

Brook (16:11):
Right.
I've heard that many times withsoftware people.
They're doing the software andthey're trying to get it perfect
and they're like, no, you needto put it out there in that beta
format and just get it outthere so that you can start
building all this other stuffaround it or determining what's
really worth spending the moneyon.
I feel like I've heard thatstory numerous times especially
now that everything can beupdated instantaneously.

Zach (16:32):
It's like there's, there's never, there's never the final
version of something, or there'snever a need for the final
version and things will breakinstantaneously.

Aimee (16:40):
Like I am seriously queen of like, give me your beta and
I will break it faster thananybody else.
I'll find it I am really goodat that that's a valuable skill.
And I will say people laughedabout it at first and now
they're like oh no, really, Ifyou want to find your first bug,
Amy will find it really fast.
My poor kids, they're so usedto it.
I'm really good at findingbreaks.

(17:00):
My husband's job is to tellpeople what's wrong with them.
They're doomed.
Really good at finding breaks.

Brook (17:04):
My husband's job is to tell people what's wrong with
them.
They're doomed.
What do you feel like you wereable to successfully overcome in
the midst of all of that growth?
Because it's been how manyyears since you deployed this?

Aimee (17:13):
So, with the new version of the business, we closed
venture funding in 2017.

Brook (17:19):
How was that?
How was your venture capitalraising journey for you?
Did you freak out?
Were you loving?

Aimee (17:25):
it.
So I had no idea what I wasdoing at all.
I had a mentor who I loveddearly, but she was 23 years old
and she was the person kind ofguiding me and telling me I
would call her.
I'm like I don't know what's onthe term sheet.
What's the term sheet?
Do we have a term sheet?
We didn't have a term sheet yetI couldn't tell people what the
terms were, so I really went incompletely unaware and clueless

(17:50):
of what to do.

Brook (17:52):
Do you wish you had known , or are you glad you didn't?

Aimee (17:55):
I think I could have saved myself a lot of time with
some pretty quick and easy likeokay, these are the things you
need to know.
That said, for me I do a betterjob of learning as I'm going.
So even if you had sat down andtold me how to negotiate all of
the terms and everything that Ineeded to know, as far as that
goes, it wouldn't have clickeduntil I was actually doing it.

Zach (18:17):
It can be dangerous.
Yeah, it can be dangerous whenyou have your style of approach
as well, when you want to doeverything 100%, because when
you start learning about itwithout the practical
application, you're like I don'tknow what of this information
is relevant.
So I'm going to pick all of itup, and probably more than I
need and things that don'tpertain.

Aimee (18:32):
But there were some things.
So I was the first female inthe state of Indiana to close
venture funding.
That's awesome.
Well, thank you.
I say that because there havebeen only a handful who have
closed venture funding in thestate since then.
That's sad Because Indianaranks, I think, number 48 or
49th in venture funding forfemale entrepreneurs, and the
venture funding for females isless than 2% of all venture

(18:56):
funding.

Zach (18:57):
Is there any kind of understanding of what the yeah?

Aimee (19:00):
Well, it's very clear Venture capitalists give to
people they know and things thatthey know, and so women?
Well, in all honesty, women areusually creating products where
they've seen a need, andthey're often not in the same
space.
I had men look at me and say doyou think that there's money in

(19:21):
taking food to people whenthey're sick?
I don't understand.
Does this something people do,Right Um?
no frame of reference none atall, you know, and I I asked him
flat out.
It was like so you have a wife.
Has she ever taken a meal toanyone?
Oh, yeah, she does that all thetime.
I said, okay, so if you, and toput a dollar amount on her

(19:41):
hourly wage, which I guaranteeyou this man would never
consider doing.
But she spent probably an hourgoing to the store, two hours
making food, an hour dropping itoff, because honestly, that's
how long it really is going totake once you go round trip and
do all of these things.
She spent at least $200 at thegrocery because she's also
making a meal for you and yourfamily.
Let's pretend you are willingto say your wife is worth $25 an

(20:02):
hour, like let's go real lowball here, and so now you've got
four hours of her time, sowe've got $100 plus $200 in food
.
Pretend we're saying 300 buckshere.
That's one person taking onemeal to one family.
There's money around this andmen not all men, I really don't
mean that, but a lot of the menin the VC world, specifically in

(20:24):
the Midwest.
This is just not something thatthey do.
Indiana, indianapolisspecifically really, really
loves B2B SaaS marketing.
That's all they invest in.
That's where people have mademoney, so they know how to do it
and so that's what they investin.
And if you aren't doing B2BSaaS marketing, there aren't a
whole lot of investors who arelooking for that.
That is changing now.

(20:44):
Healthcare is getting reallybig.
Healthcare innovation inIndiana is a really fast-growing
thing, but it's still nothingconsumer and it's still very
tech-focused and pretty specific.

Brook (21:01):
So why do you think you were able to get through that
barrier?

Paul (21:03):
Should I grab some more thread?
Grab some more thread, or areyou just not sure?
Think you were able to getthrough that?

Brook (21:06):
barrier.
She grabbed some Listerine.
She grabbed some Listerine.

Aimee (21:07):
Or are you just not sure.
I think I'm really good atpitching and it only takes a few
people who can believe in thisproduct and I really, really
firmly believe that my companychanges people's lives.
Not everyone needs it, noteveryone uses it, but those who

(21:29):
do use it, we really help themthrough their journey and, for
people who have been in thissituation, they get it.
So I think that I was and I hada lot of friends and family.
I did take on some VC money,but I also had nine females of

(21:50):
friends who invested.
So those investors that wasalso apparently not newsworthy
that they had nine investorsthat were female.

Brook (21:59):
Uh huh, that's interesting what do you mean?

Zach (22:03):
not newsworthy?

Aimee (22:04):
I mean media outlets said that that wasn't something that
they would even mention.

Zach (22:08):
That's wild.

Brook (22:08):
So you threw it out on like some PR things and they
were like nope, we're going tocut that part out.

Aimee (22:12):
I had a reporter in town specifically say oh well, but
you only raised a half a milliondollars.
We really don't mentionanything.
At this low amount I was likeI'm the first female to close
venture funding.

Paul (22:28):
And most of my funding came from female investors.

Aimee (22:29):
Oh well, that's just not really newsworthy.
Is that a male or femalejournalist?
I'll let you guess, can you?
Can you tell me the femalejournalists covering business in
the city?

Paul (22:35):
I don't really know that many journalists.
I honestly don't.

Aimee (22:37):
Well, the answer is it was not female.

Zach (22:40):
I've got the Jeopardy music program in here somewhere.

Aimee (22:43):
Let me be clear I don't want to be male bashing.
I really, really that's not myintention here.
My intention, though, is to andagain, it's not yay, Amy, good
job being the first female to dothis, it's.
I think people need to knowthat this is real.
This is happening right here,right now.
We have a lot of really amazingwomen who have scalable ideas,

(23:06):
and I say that because there's alot of women and there are a
lot of organizations in townthat are good at helping women
get their businesses started,but they're not helping them
think about scalable businesses.

Paul (23:12):
I've got a connection for you I'll hook you up with.
He's an angel investor, oscarMorales.

Aimee (23:16):
Oh, he and I had lunch at Starbucks last week.
Yeah, I know him.
Thank you.

Paul (23:19):
I've known him for 20 years.
Oh good, he's a really good guy.

Aimee (23:22):
Yeah, and Vision Tech is great.

Paul (23:24):
In the healthcare business as well.

Aimee (23:25):
In the healthcare business as well.
Right and well, we can talkmore on that.
Yeah, yeah yeah.

Brook (23:30):
So you said that part of why you're able to well, part of
your sight of the visioncapital is that you really have
this deep passion for this andit really hits you.
I'm also hearing you say it washard to come up with the
software that is present for it,to manage the people that are
present for it, and that's partof the journey.

(23:50):
Like, okay, I'm super excitedabout something, but how do you
maintain?
How did you maintain in themidst of this journey of like
I'm exhausted by all of thesedifferent pieces, but this
vision is still something thatis more powerful.
I mean, you talked about it.
It's just more powerful thanthe problems that are going on.
Like what was that?
Are you still in that?
Do you ever hit that?
Like, where are you?

Aimee (24:11):
I think that's yes.

Brook (24:12):
Of like, just keep with the passion of your thought
pattern in the midst of thehardness of running a business.

Aimee (24:22):
Oh gosh, it is so hard, right?
Yeah, thing that keeps me goingis seeing the end users and
seeing or being out in thecommunity, and someone gives me
a story of when they've used mysite and how they were able to.
It just allowed them to helptheir friend in a little bit
easier way and I'm like, okay,then I'm doing what I'm supposed

(24:42):
to be doing.
That's really what keeps megoing with it, and there have
been a lot of times when I amlike, all right, I'm, I'm done.
This is not worth it.

Brook (24:56):
What pulls you?

Aimee (24:57):
out of those moments?

Brook (24:59):
I'm not sure yet.

Aimee (25:00):
Do you have an idea for today?
Because, um so, 2020 was thebest year we ever had.
We, I mean- it was needingsupport Um 2021, 2022,.
We lost all of our clientsbecause, um, we had started a
new channel partner we wereselling into pharmaceutical.

(25:22):
Uh, they write fantastic checks.
We do a lot, we were doing alot of great stuff.
We launched with them on March9th of 2020, um, getting
utilization yeah, that was notuh-huh, uh-huh.
And then utilization did notreally pick up and then by the
end of 2021, they actually wentout of business.
They lost their FDA approval.
We lost our healthcare clientsduring that time, um, because we

(25:45):
had not figured out inhealthcare how to be um.
We were-to-have, not aneed-to-have, and any
nice-to-haves got cut Like 100%when you were in healthcare.
They had no capacity foranything else.
It didn't matter that we couldhelp everyone else, it was just
like no, we're talking aboutsyringes and gloves and masks,
we don't need anything else.

(26:06):
So we lost it all.
Essentially, and I have beenlooking for the past nine months
for a buyer to see where we canplug in as an add-on software
for somebody else, because it'sa really heavy lift to bring a

(26:26):
company back out from, and overthe past few years, we really
haven't spent any time or energyon our consumer facing site
everything that was.
My next question was if therewas any attempt to kind of
create a resurgence into thatb2c space, given kind of
technological upgrades and thechanges in our climate and right
and uh, oh, I mean we can do awhole nother episode on

(26:46):
technological upgrades and thefact that I have two code bases,
because one is consumer and oneis enterprise, and some issues
that we had in the tech buildsand I say that as a plural
builds, and anyway I don't thisvery.
Second, I don't know.
I I've been in a really badheadspace for a year with the

(27:10):
company, and I say that becauseit is a lot of headspace when
you're running a company and notknowing how to kind of lift it.
I was teaching a class at thebusiness school in the spring
and I can't, like I can kind ofremember the moment, but not
exactly what we were talkingabout, in the sense that all of
a sudden I was like, oh, I knowwhat makes things work in my

(27:34):
company and what we're missing.
And the funny thing is it was aquestion that almost every
customer asked me at the veryfirst meeting and I blew off for
years.
Everybody said now, do you havea call center or do you have
someone who can handle this forus?
And I was like, no, no, no, youdon't need that because our
software is built in such a waythat it's, you know your patient
or their primary caregiver isgoing to take care of it.
And all of a sudden I was like,oh, but the teams and the like

(27:58):
people who use our site, whoeither engage in our free
customer support or have areally great person to manage
this, they do great.
And so I was like, why don't Ihave a person that you can pay
to do this?
So this was at the end of April,early May, that I had this kind
of aha, and we're the middle ofJuly right now, as we're
recording this.

(28:19):
You can take that out if youneed.
It's all good and I've had alot of stuff going on, so I
haven't done a whole lot withthat.
Yet I've got three proposalsout to healthcare spaces saying
what if you hire my concierge tocome in and manage these
support pages for your patients?
So this is my long-winded wayof saying, okay, I've got a new

(28:41):
idea.
This is giving me a little bitnew energy.
It's giving a little bit morelife.

Zach (28:46):
Yeah.
So let's kind of extrapolate onthat a little bit, because it
is.
I kind of want to shift into alittle bit of what you see ahead
of you now.
So let's play pretend that thehurdles are gone for a moment.

Aimee (28:59):
Can we, can you tell me where this is, Because I really
really want to go there.

Zach (29:03):
So we'll play pretend that they're gone or that you know
they're.
They're more of a bullet point,right that you just this gets
fixed is the thing.
So walk us through, kind of um,those bullet points of where,
in a perfect scenario, what arethe next steps and what kind of
things do you see on the horizon?
Uh, whether that be thesethings resolved or new things,

(29:25):
you know, kind of planted andgrowing.

Aimee (29:28):
Um well, I think one of the problems that I have as an
entrepreneur is that I see allthe possibilities ahead of me
right now and that really can bea huge Paralyzing.
Paralyzing, because I'm likewell, if somebody wants to
acquire us, great, I'm all onboard for that.
If someone just wants the tech,great.
If I get 15 new clients inhealth care and I can do this
concierge service, fantastic.

(29:50):
If I can, as simple as like,redo my homepage such that I can
just go strictly to consumersand do a $50 a month thing, that
might be the quickest andeasiest.
But I'm at one of theinflection points with all these
forks in the road and one of myproblems is I usually go about

(30:11):
like an eighth of the way intoall of those and I never dive
straight in for one.
Um, I can understand that forsure.
So I don't know.
I'd love to listen to anotherone of your podcasts that's
going to give me the advice onlike, okay, how do I?
How do I like dive all the wayin and trust that that's the
thing that I should be doing andreally make that happen?

(30:32):
So I don't have that answer foryou.
I really.

Brook (30:35):
I would love someone to tell me which one I should do.

Aimee (30:39):
Which one of those can you control?
Well, I mean, I can give youthe reasons why I can and can't
control each one of them right?
Yeah, yeah, I don't have like Idon't know right now, and so
part of my problem as anentrepreneur is that I kind of
like have little things andlittle like fishing lines in

(31:03):
most of those right now, kind ofwaiting to see which one bites
yeah.

Brook (31:06):
And sometimes it's a waiting game.
You're like, okay, I sometimescoming back to a little bit of
things of like how do you getyourself out of those headspace
things?
And maybe this is me, but it itcomes a lot to inspiration.
So, whether it's talking tosomeone that gives you a vision,
whether it's hearing someonesay this really worked for me
and it made all the differencein the world, and it makes you
go, okay, I get my back to myinspiration again.
So my headspace of beingexhausted kind of goes to the

(31:28):
side because I there's aninspirational moment.
What really, really hard, whenyou're the, the owner, is you're
the catalyst for all of theinspiration.
And if you were trying to go,where is my inspiration in the
midst of it, that is that'ssometimes that's just feels
impossible to get to, but yetyou have to fight for it.
Whether it's like all right,these are the people I need to

(31:50):
go have coffee with, because andwe've done that where we're
like right, I'm not in a greatspace, let's's sit down, let's
talk, we talk through things,and at the end of it we're like
oh, okay, let's go.
Or listening to a podcast, ordoing a book or an audio, like
in something, or going to aretreat, something that goes my
brain, my headspace isn't greatand I need to shift it, whereas
those underneath are looking upto the person who's in charge
going.
You have to create that visionand that inspiration, and

(32:12):
there's that expectation, thatfor a second yeah.
And so that's just hard, justhard, and it's very intentional
to walk through.
And then you sit and going allright, I don't have my
inspiration completely aligned,and so now I have these options
and all of them I'm okay with,but which one is going to bite?
So I need to wait until nextmonth to know which one to bite
is going to like.

Aimee (32:29):
Say yes or no, just tell me yes or no so that I know
which way to go Like if one ofthese proposals would click,
that would be a huge inspiration, right, like, okay, great, then
I'm going to head this way.
But one of the other things I'msorry I completely interrupted,
but one of the other thingsthat like going back to what
have I learned?
This was a much earlierquestion, but when I show that
little bit of lack of vision,that little bit of lack of

(32:49):
inspiration, my employees fall.
I mean, they are, they arejumping ship really, really fast
.
And I don't I mean like gettinglunch with fellow business
owners who understand and youcan just like let's dive right

(33:11):
into.
Okay, what are our businessproblems that we're really
struggling with right now?
That helps me a lot.
I'm a verbalizer and so that'sgood.
But the second I try to do thatwith my employees.

Brook (33:19):
They go.
Oh crap, she doesn't know whatshe's doing.

Aimee (33:21):
They're like oh, I got to find something else.
Like this is if she's worried,then I'm really worried, Because
they know what's they knowright, and yet I wish and I
don't know how to engage with.

Brook (33:31):
But what does it look like to be very vulnerable with
your people too, and that nakedperception of like we're
together as a team and guys likeI don't know what the next step
should be.
Here are all of the puzzles.
Help me out, because there's somuch in it.
They can have that advice thatneeds to be given.
And how do you cultivate thatvulnerable, strong, vulnerable,

(33:52):
yet strong space to say there'san unknown here and I need your
help?
And maybe it's the differencebetween I'm asking you like to
get help me with my emotionalspace versus a tactical thing,
but I I also get in that spaceof like I want, I want to be
very vulnerable.
I don't know how to not be crap, I'm having a crappy day, like
sort of thing.

Zach (34:12):
It's interesting too when you speak with people that are
business owners versus peoplethat are employees, and business
owners are like it's a ship andI've got the most in the pot,
so I'm going to make the mostdecisions, but other than that,
we're all kind of in this.
And then you speak to employeesand it's almost more of a
parent child sort of thing,where it's like I'll be part of
the team and collaborate, butyou have additional

(34:34):
responsibilities as the parentof knowing what direction we're
headed in and or you know,knowing that the security is
there, like if you're you knowvoicing things that are a
concern from like a is my nextpaycheck going to be there, or
those kinds of things.
Then all of a sudden you'vebreached this kind of parent
child relationship in their eyes.

Aimee (34:56):
Oh, and when you're working with your mother, that
doesn't work out very well, yes,you've got another dynamic
Parent-child, parent-child,parent-child relationship.

Paul (35:00):
You've got the other dynamic where the job market is
very, very volatile.
People will jump ship for 50cents a dollar, $2, $10, $50,000
, whatever.
So that's another dynamic.
They smell blood, they're off.

Aimee (35:15):
And that's been like that for a long time.
In tech, at least People can gofind another, at least in indie
, and most of my team has beenremote for a really long time.
I haven't cared where they'rebased, but they can find another
remote tech job doing any ofthese things, which is where
culture comes into play andbuilding relationships with
people, where they are seen.

Brook (35:36):
And that is also exhausting because you're going.
I'm trying to make sure I havemoney and I'm also trying to be
emotionally present so thatpeople enjoy working here and
aren't feeling like I'm leavingthem hanging to dry somewhere in
there and so, but yeah, thatcultural aspect is a really big
piece.
So, but yeah, that culturalaspect is a really big piece.

Aimee (35:55):
But then if you have such a strong culture and they're
not pulling their weight andthey're not doing their job and
this is something that Istruggled with for a long time
Like I can pinpoint a couple ofemployees and even contract
workers who I was like butthey're fun in the office, we
really enjoy them, but they'rejust bleeding us dry and they're
not doing anything.
But because we've created theserelationships, Now you feel bad

(36:16):
letting them go.

Brook (36:17):
I feel bad letting them go, but it's saying the kind
hard truth, like how do you saythe truth, the hard truth, in a
kind, respectful manner?
It doesn't mean they won't walkaway being hurt, it doesn't
mean they won't not be mad atyou, but you still said the kind
hard truth and that's not easy.

Aimee (36:34):
And one lesson I did learn multiple times, so didn't
clearly learn it the first fewtimes.

Brook (36:39):
It's amazing how we have to go through the iterations.

Zach (36:41):
They don't stick the first time around.

Aimee (36:44):
But the rest of the organization would have been so
much better off if I had letthose people go much, much
earlier, because I didn't alwayssee how toxic it was for
everything else.
Because, while theresponsibility is on that parent
, that business owner runningthe ship, everybody else knows
what the hell's going on Like.
They know the person who issitting on their computer online

(37:04):
shopping the whole time orworking for other side gigs and
not prioritizing ours.
So it and you?

Paul (37:11):
you allowed that.
Therefore, it's good for themto do that as well.

Aimee (37:14):
I let, well and I um, and you allowed that.
Therefore, it's good for themto do that as well.
I let, well and I um, I allowedeveryone there to just like see
that I, I was trying to just bea little too nice to that one
person, um and I, and it justruins everybody, right?
They're like well, okay right.

Zach (37:33):
it kind of sets off the chain reaction of okay, well,
I'll grab as much as I can grabfor me then, because that's what
that person's doing and thatseems to be working out.

Aimee (37:39):
So, and then Well, and I that one, in all honesty, that
didn't.
I haven't had that.
That's good, but I have had,but I have had people just
really angry that they're notworking.
Everybody else is working, weare all in this, and why can't
Amy see how hard we are workingand this other person is like

(38:01):
pulling one over on her.

Zach (38:02):
I would have to imagine that, based on the nature of
your work, that if you were tosurvey your employees, the value
of your actual mission would beextremely high for them.
So to have somebody on the teamthat's not paying into that pot
.

Aimee (38:21):
Exactly, and because of that, employees who haven't gone
through something before andthey don't understand on the
same level.
And for me specifically,specifically my developers, who
have never been throughsomething um, and this is like,
okay, let's just talk about tech, but, um, building software for

(38:44):
people who are going through areally high crisis, high stress
time, is very different thanbuilding software for enterprise
employees who are pushed andyou have to use this and it
doesn't matter if it doesn'twork.
There's just a different levelof compassion and understanding
that has to go into that.
That's been a huge breakingpoint, also because my

(39:05):
developers are like nope, we'regoing to use this because this
is this brand new, fancy littletech thing I'm like, but no one
understands it and we can't bethe ones who have to teach them
how to do this because they arein such a bad mental space.

Zach (39:16):
They need it to be simple A to B.
That makes sense.

Brook (39:19):
What has been your favorite part of running this
company?

Aimee (39:24):
Meeting all the people I've gotten to meet.
I'm a people person.
I have had opportunities tomeet people all over the country
and learn so much from all ofthem.
I think if you had told me thekinds of people that I would
have met when I started this andall of the new knowledge like

(39:48):
if you had told me that I wasgoing to be able to teach
entrepreneurship when thisstarted, because of all of the
things that I had learned alongthe way, I was like it would not
have occurred to me that thatwould happen.
Entrepreneurship, when thisstarted, because of all of the
things that I had learned alongthe way, I was like I would not
have occurred to me that thatwould happen and I never was
like, oh, I'm a lifelong learner.
That was not like a label thatI would have put on myself, but

(40:10):
it has been really, really funand, again, it's all of the
relationships with peopleeverywhere that I've gotten to
make.
I think that's the best and mypodcast has been so fun.

Brook (40:16):
I was.
I was actually thinking aboutyour podcast as I'm saying the
statement to you of, like I andI probably say this from a space
of knowing you um, what I loveand I'm so impressed by is that
you have taken an edge.
You've educated so many peopleon the journey of how to support
people when they're goingthrough hard, hard times.
I think and I think this is apart about social media that is

(40:37):
actually really good is when Isit there and I follow people
who are talking aboutdisabledness or something that
they have and like a realitythat's there and like, hey, do
you realize that you weretalking?
You're not getting the piecesof this puzzle and it's just
that education that goes aroundpeople with different life
events that happen to them andhow those events are hard.
And you have come around andsaid, hey, guys, there are
people in our world who aregoing through hard times and

(40:59):
they're sometimes your neighborsand they're trying to be strong
and all of this stuff.
But sometimes you need to askthem how are you doing?
And step into their pain insupporting them, and you've kind
of educated and created thiscompassion around it.
Slash connected people.
You are a connector of people,which is really awesome, and I
think, if nothing else withinyour platform of things, it has
given you this space because youare an advocate for it to go

(41:22):
talk to people and say, hey,this is something that's
important, even if you'resitting in front of a bunch of
venture capitalists who are justabout, hey, I need my bottom
line and my SaaS model and allof this stuff.
Let me educate you that there'sthis whole world out here that
desperately needs what you can'tsee, like you are bringing
light to something that is kindof often hidden and that is
beautiful, and you're not onlydoing that in just a kind of you

(41:42):
could have lots oforganizations out there that are
nonprofit or like they goaround this mission, which is
cool and awesome, but you'realso trying to do it in a
platform that hopefully cansustain that piece and build
something that is sustainable.
And you sit back and go.
This is hard, like it's hard toput that emotion out there.
It's beautiful, I'm inspired byit, which is way cool, but it's
hard.

(42:02):
It's hard because when you hitthese things, you hit things
with your friends and you hitthings with your family and you
hit things with your coworkers.

Aimee (42:07):
Yes, and that's something that I think that business
owners sometimes forget Venturecapitalists sometimes forget,
when you are sitting in a roomof venture capitalists, when
you're sitting in pretty muchany room that you're walking
into in a business meeting,somebody's got something going
on.
Yes, it's not just yourneighbor, right, it might be

(42:28):
your coworker whose mom felllast night and now they are kind
of in the meeting for the mostpart, but every time their phone
buzzes and their watch vibratesit's like, oh shit, what's
going on with mom now?
And their head's not alwaysthere.
And if you as a business owner,as a coworker, can remember,
they're people.
We've all gone through something.

(42:48):
I guarantee we've all gonethrough something and we
continue to do that.
It's not going to change.
People are going to have babies, they're going to get hurt,
they're going to get sick,people die.
I wish that wasn't the case,but we're all going to
experience it at some point andremembering as we go into the
workplace that we're all humansand the more we can support each
other and create that cultureof support as well, the better

(43:10):
that's going to be.

Brook (43:12):
And you even put that out when you get back to your
mother's side of things andyou're going I'm going to value
the person more than thiscompany.
I'm going to value the peoplethat I'm touching more than the
company that I'm building.
To say I finally see thatreally to get people don't just
need a platform, they needsomeone to be their intermediary
.
So I'm going to bring aconcierge to come in and see the
person and not just put theapplication in front of them.
It always is coming back to you, to the people, which is

(43:36):
beautiful and I think that is agood concept for business owners
as a whole to go.
It always comes back to thepeople somehow or another, and
if you're not serving peoplesomehow, I mean you could
probably be successful withoutit.
But I think leaps go on whenyou can try to put that
mentality into place and figureout how to deal with your own
trauma as you're dealing withpeople and all of that aspect of
it.
But yeah, I think that's ratherawesome of what you're going

(43:59):
through is to kind of see thatcomponent of it, and it's no
easy feat to make that into abusiness model by any means.

Aimee (44:06):
Well, thanks.
Well, if anyone has othersuggestions to make this wildly
successful, I'm all ears.

Paul (44:12):
I'm ready to go you want a ninth and tenth avenue to go to
yes, gotcha because but buthere's like this is not going to
go away.

Aimee (44:22):
People have been supporting each other for
centuries, like that's the onlyway that human exists.
Humans exist that's.
One of the biggestdifferentiators of the human
species is because we cansupport each other.
I am not doing anything new.
What I am trying to do iscreate a platform that just
makes it a little bit easier,because we are spread out so far
.
Right now, right, like as a kid, we went to church and so there

(44:44):
was a you know bulletin boardwith a piece of paper and you
signed up to bring stuff thatdoesn't happen now, or the
prayer chain, or the prayerchain, or the phone tree that
like okay, well, I'm in chargeof calling these three people
now to tell them what this is,you know, like so, so I'm just
trying to modernize that.
Modernize that.

Brook (45:00):
Which is awesome.
Yeah, Great so oh sorry, goahead.

Zach (45:03):
I was just going to kind of last.
We have some kind of once offquestions that are a fun thing,
but before we get into that kindof last question to build out
the arc here, happily.
Last question, to build out thearc here, Um, happily ever
after.
What does that look like forthe company and for yourself?

Aimee (45:20):
Happily ever after.
Um, I really want everyone whois going through something to
have a support network that iseasy to use.
I can't do that by myself, Iknow that I can't do it from
Indianapolis easily.
We're just not willing topromote this type of thing at

(45:42):
this point.
If somebody is willing to,that'd be fantastic, but it's
not.
So looking for partners who arewilling to move this so that
everyone around the country andit's really global right, like
because our friends are global,but who can help put this in the
hands of people when they needit, that's my happily ever after
.
I would like to just be theface of this and chatting with

(46:05):
people on a regular basis aboutlet's talk about supporting our
coworkers.
Let's talk about supporting ourneighbors.
Let's talk about what thatreally looks like and what is
vulnerability.
What does it mean to ask forhelp?
Like?
that's the biggest thing I wantmy Ted talk to be, you know,
asking for help as a sign ofstrength and changing those
dynamics, um, and somebody whowants to come in and help me run

(46:26):
this, because I've been doingit for a long time and I think
it's ready for a little bit offresh strength.

Brook (46:34):
That's a beautiful way of saying it.
Like, not just at the freshstrength.
Yeah, that's different, I likeit.
Okay.
Random questions.

Zach (46:43):
Oh, ready, we've got a sort of inside the actor's
studio type, you know quickquick round for you.

Brook (46:49):
So you're at a business meeting.
What drink are you drinking?

Aimee (46:52):
What time of?

Brook (46:52):
day.

Aimee (46:55):
Can you tell me Before five before noon I'm drinking
coffee.
Noon to five I'm drinking icedtea.
After that probably a glass ofwine.

Brook (47:05):
Perfect.
What's your favorite person tofollow?
Podcast Instagram books.

Aimee (47:13):
I'm not very exciting and I am still trying to learn all
of the Brene Brown lessons.
I think that's awesome, I don'tknow.
So I am like every time sheputs something out, I'm like, oh
shit, I saw this two years agoand I need it again.
And then my favorite podcast Ireally like America's test

(47:35):
kitchen, which is kind of silly,but that's my go-to when I'm
like working in the garden.
What do they do?
I haven't heard of America'stest kitchen.
America's test kitchen, um oh,it's fabulous.
So it's going to tell me all ofthe ways to like make the best
pie crust.
We've tested these fourdifferent ingredients and these
four different methods and solike a scientific method
approach, so it's a scientificmethod approach of cooking and

(47:56):
they'll go through and say youknow, okay, and this is the best
recipe for mashed potatoes, andsometimes they'll do like
really complex things, butthat's probably my.

Brook (48:05):
They learned on the last podcast that Zach's next goals
for his life was to become acook chef sort of thing.

Zach (48:10):
Learned how to do that, so now you're figuring out how to
not give you a hot guy In my, inmy empty nesting.

Aimee (48:17):
I'm a.
I'm a huge gardener, Nice, Ipicked seven cucumbers yesterday
.

Zach (48:21):
Nice.

Aimee (48:22):
And so I'm.
This summer is the summer ofpickling.

Brook (48:27):
So I'm learning.

Aimee (48:28):
They're pretty good.

Brook (48:29):
I'll bring you some.
Okay, maybe I'll just come overfor the last one.

Aimee (48:35):
How late is fashionably late For a business meeting or
social Both.
Business meeting five minutes,social probably 30.
But also I just feel likethat's super dependent.
I say it's probably how long ittakes me to get there.
Well, but I also think, like onZoom, one minute Interesting,

(48:59):
like if I am on a Zoom meetingand someone is not there a
minute after it starts, I willgive them like three or four
minutes until I'm like, allright, we're rolling Like this
is not that is true.

Zach (49:08):
Just based on the fact that you could be doing it from
anywhere, so you should be.

Aimee (49:11):
Yes, that is exactly right, and if you're having
technology issues you can text,then you should have texted
someone to say so so zoom, Igive, or any online meeting
platform I.
I don't have a lot of leniencyon that one.

Zach (49:21):
Um, I never thought of it like that big, big on the heads
up on that I'm being cool withwhatever as long as you know,
just tell me a little bit aheadof time, like I don't ever want
to be just twiddling your thumbs, doing nothing, waiting on
another person.

Aimee (49:32):
Right, but then if it's like only two or three people
and it's like a small gatheringof people, again like 10 minutes
maybe.
Anyway, Biggest pet peeve whenpeople say the word anyways
plural instead of anyway.
That's a new one, Okay.
And the second one is what Ican hear people chew.

Brook (49:52):
I have a thing with that.

Aimee (49:52):
That's a new one, okay, and um.
The second one is, uh what.
I can hear people chew like Ihave.
I have a thing with that theopposite of asmr reaction yeah,
no, like I can't in my and my mypoor husband is the worst.
Like he'll come over and standover me he doesn't intentionally
does me well, sometimes he'lldo it intentionally.
Usually it's not, but he's justa loud chewer and if we're the
only two and he's standing overme, I'm like you're going to

(50:13):
have to walk away.
This is not okay.

Paul (50:15):
Are you goading him by pickling stuff Right Crunchy,
exactly.

Zach (50:21):
Perfect ammunition.

Brook (50:23):
Personal motto.

Aimee (50:28):
I don't know that I have one.
Is there I?

Brook (50:30):
probably should.
I think we probably havefundamental things we do but we
don't even realize that they'refundamental to us until we hit
that like aha moment.

Aimee (50:37):
So I wish the one I wish that I had as my personal motto
is that everybody's doing thebest they can.

Brook (50:44):
I think, but that's a fair one.

Zach (50:47):
That's a totally.
That seems like a motto with alow bar too.
Like you don't.
Well, I did think, not like getup and attack every day, like
that that's a big commitment,but just everybody do right by
each other, that feels well, I'mnot saying I live by it really
well like okay I was reminded ofit as I was driving up here and
some idiot didn't put theirflip and turn signal on, and
then I was like you know what?

Aimee (51:05):
we're all just doing the best we can.
Maybe they're having a badmorning, but sorry, that's fine.
That makes me think of that,have you?

Zach (51:11):
seen the image of the man saving the woman on the cliff,
but the man is being crushed bya boulder and it's like the
whole thing of she can't seethat he's being crushed by a
boulder and he can't see thatshe's falling.
But they are trying to helpeach other out of this, out of
each other's predicament, andit's this notion of you know.
You don't know what the otherperson is going through at any
point in time, right.

Brook (51:30):
compassion, which comes back to your business thing of
caring about people and like howyou never know what they're
going through and so with loveon them, however, that looks
like, which is kind of cool.

Aimee (51:38):
I do try to remember that every time I sit down,
especially in a business meetingand with people who I've never
met before and even people who Ilike in a social group, I'm
like everybody's got something.
And if you don't, then I meanone congratulations.
And two, do you need the numberof a therapist?
Because probably something ishappening that you are really
just not like.

Zach (51:58):
therefore, and it's almost its own.
I mean, that's almost its ownunique thing to be somebody
that's not had those hardshipslike those are defining moments
as a person, so it's its ownkind of way of separating
yourself into this uniquecategory to be somebody that
doesn't understand those thingsand hasn't had those.

Aimee (52:17):
And it's super fortunate.
But if you, if you actuallystart to dig into some of that
they probably have.

Brook (52:22):
They've just blocked it out.
It's their trauma dealings.
We're a world of trauma.
Last question what color do youthink of when you think of a
business owner?
First thing pops into mindBlack, interesting.
Now I want to know the why.
I'm not sure if there's a why,it's just a color, is it?

Aimee (52:41):
the professional factor.
Um well, it's my favorite color, um, and I think it is a super
strong color.
I was trying to decide betweennavy blue and black.
I actually feel pretty strongabout this.
Those are they're clean colors,they're strong colors, they are

(53:01):
just, they stand the test oftime colors.
And yet there's also so muchvariation in these colors.

Brook (53:13):
That is true.
I can wear totally differentblack colors and they look weird
together because they'retotally in these colors.
That is true, I mean totallydifferent black colors and they
look weird together because it'sdifferent black colors.
So, yeah, I get it.

Aimee (53:18):
But, um, I mean, when in doubt, I just always buy black.
It's kind of unusual that I'mnot in black today.
Um, it's just so versatile.

Brook (53:28):
Okay, Um so the camera's battery has died, oh, is that
what that was?

Aimee (53:34):
Well, that's probably our cue to be like.

Zach (53:36):
all right, wrap it up, amy we did have two other questions
that we wanted to add to thatreel, if you've got the extra
couple minutes.

Aimee (53:42):
I am fine with time.

Zach (53:45):
What would you say is your superpower if you had one?

Aimee (53:54):
I think people talk to me a lot and there is something
like I I find out pretty quicklyand easily what's going on in
people's lives and I don't meanto do it.
It's not like I'm trying topoke and prod.
Maybe it's my company Um, but Ido think I'm pretty good at
that Um, at that Um, and I thinkI'm also pretty good at like

(54:18):
coming in and getting a lay ofthe land.

Brook (54:23):
I would agree with you on your superpower of uh, getting
people comfortable and willingto open up.
Uh, and I do think there's anart to that.
Uh, and I, I think you do.
I would agree with you on thatbeing a superpower for you.

Zach (54:33):
And last question, I won't in I'll being a superpower for
you.
And last question, I'll edit sothat this isn't the last
question because it's a weirdnote to end on but define
failure.

Aimee (54:47):
For me, failure is when you give up.
Oh, it makes me a little sad,yeah, because that's not failure
for everyone else, but for meit's like okay, giving up, um.
Oh, it makes me a little sad,yeah, Because that's not failure
for everyone else, but for meit's like okay giving up that
means I failed.
Like if I, um, if I make a mealbut my one of my love languages
is cooking for people, um, andgiving food to like anyone who

(55:10):
walks in my house, I'm like no,no, no, no, you have to eat this
that I've just made.
I just made cookies, I justmade a cake.
You have to eat all of thesethings.
If it flops, it doesn't botherme too much, but if I'm like
screwed, I'm never going tolearn how to do that, that to me
is a failure, not the fact thatI still have brown stuff in my
oven right now.
So on the flip side of that, issuccess just keeping going.

(55:36):
Well, I don't know, cause, I'mnot sure that that's where I
would put myself with it rightnow.
Cause sometimes, like, as, asI'm thinking that through like
maybe it's the headspace of I'mdeciding to stop versus I've
given up.

Zach (55:49):
I also.
What do you think about the?
Is there a difference betweensaying I'm stopping?
What I'm doing and I'm givingup, like the difference in that
internalization of like I didnot accomplish this versus like
I'm I finished the journey.
It makes sense for me to chooseto stop it.

Aimee (56:07):
I think there is a difference.
I'm not sure that I haveachieved that difference, but
theoretically, yes, there is adifference on that, and that's
where I would put it.

Paul (56:17):
But are you taking a new direction?

Aimee (56:21):
I am always open to new directions, and that doesn't
seem like failure to me.
That just seems like growth.

Paul (56:31):
Make a decision.

Aimee (56:32):
Yeah, probably failure for me is also the fact that,
like I've just been beating myhead against the wall and not
changing direction fast enough.
But we'll just let that staywith me.
We don't need to dive into that.
We're about out of time, right?

Zach (56:46):
Oh, no, oh, and the camera battery died as a as a wrap up
here, is there anything that youwould like to plug, anything
that you are working on,anything that listeners can tune
into or log on to?
That sort of thing.

Aimee (57:02):
Yes, there are two things .

Zach (57:03):
Follow along.

Aimee (57:04):
The first is my podcast, which is called Kitchen Chats.
So, as we've mentioned, I lovemy kitchen, but the bigger thing
is when something major in lifehappens for me, my family and
friends we gather in the kitchenand we figure out the next
steps, and so my podcast is allabout diving into those things
in life and how we support eachother, and most of those

(57:26):
conversations happen in thekitchen, so I record in my
kitchen.
So I would love for people tofollow us on all the places.

Zach (57:33):
That's just everywhere that you could typically find a
podcast.

Aimee (57:35):
It's everywhere you can typically find a podcast what
friends do all one word, kitchenchats.
And then the second is that ifyou're going through something
in life or you have a friend whois going through something
medical any time that they couldneed support.
I'm testing this new conciergeservice and I would love to help

(57:56):
people through this supportjourney.
We help hundreds of thousandsof people.
I actually do know some prettybasic like let's just get
started with these few things.
You might not have any ideawhat you need, but we kind of
have some places to start foryou.

Zach (58:13):
And how do they reach out and engage on that side of
things?

Aimee (58:16):
If they go to whatfriendsdocom and we have a
live support agent and as ofthis very second, that's the
best way to do it or they cansend a message directly to info
at whatfriendsdocom and we willget them set up and started.
And, even better, if you are ina position in your business
where you think that having aprivate concierge to help your

(58:37):
constituents, your patients,your employees any constituent
let me know we would love toprovide that for you.

Zach (58:46):
Excellent.
Well, thank you so much forbeing with us here on the
Owner's Odyssey.
We appreciate you sharing yourjourney with us.
That was all excellent.
Does anybody have any otherlast minute?
No, just thank you, thank you.