Monday Motivation: Crossing The Goal Line
Monday Motivation for Women, Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners, Small Businesses
Disney World conjures up all types of visions like typical thoughts of Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Cinderella’s powder blue castle, parades, laughter and fireworks. Even the Super Bowl loves advertising the winning Super Bowl MVP traveling to Disney World the first thing after their big win. So yesterday as I monitored a friend compete in his first full Marathon – the popular Disney Marathon – where runners traverse wonderland for 26.2 miles, it reminded me how visions – our own and others – can produce positive outcomes in our lives.
The friend who ran, once asked me what it was like to run and complete the 2017 Boston Marathon, as a first-time marathoner. My emotional description, wise words of practicality, and encouragement might have spurred on his vision to do the same. He could see what I did and heard what it took and made a decision to do it. Yesterday, as I watched his live video crossing the 26.2 finish line with Mickey and Minnie nearby, it reminded me of the importance of visualizing one’s dream.
A year before I even knew I’d have the opportunity to join a charity team to run in the Boston Marathon, I asked Teresa Huggins, one of our Women TIES members to inspire women at one of our events on dreaming big. At the event, we had to write down what we saw ourselves accomplishing, sealed an envelope, gave it to Teresa for her to send back four months later. During the time I signed my card and received it, I had signed up to run my first marathon. The pink card I opened said, “I’m going to run THAT race.” Honestly, I didn’t know which race I meant until I received the card months later and decided to join 261Fearless on their team a month prior.
And like my friend Dan, I had people watching me online as I traversed the beautiful hills and roads of Boston to get to the finish line myself. I left my followers a video message of gratitude, almost falling into the curb because my legs were so tense from running that I couldn’t sit down, but they enjoyed my pure joy of accomplishing such a once-in-a-lifetime goal. I remembered that memory as I watched Dan’s self-announced ugly cry when he finished.
So, what do you want to put on a blank card for yourself right now, tuck away somewhere and read in four months? You can mark your calendar to remind yourself on May 14th to find your card and open it up. If you want to do something more visual, you can join me Thursday, January 13th at our “Envision Your Future” Vision Board Creation Event, and start there dreaming of a yearly goal.
One way or the other, visualizing your own success after watching someone else’s or just conjuring up your own, will help you cross that big goal line down the road. Give it a try and let me know what you plan because I’m ready to cheer you on.
Wednesday Wisdom: Brilliant Business Ideas
Wednesday Wisdom, Business Success Strategies for Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners, Small Companies
Appreciating the fact that women love my wisdom in the weekly Wednesday Wisdom editorial, doesn’t mean I have a wealth of insight all the time; although I’d like to think 27 years representing, counseling, connecting, and promoting female business owners gives me a leg up on others. But today’s wisdom, comes from a cool article I saw entitled, “51 Best Small Business Ideas for Women in 2022.” After reviewing all their ideas, I settled on sharing my thoughts on the first one which caught my eye.
Yesterday by chance I reviewed my blog statistics since I’ve been blogging since 2008, but haven’t checked out my recent numbers. Excitedly, I found www.womenties.blog had 9,854 views, 4,759 visitors, 3,333 subscribers, with 100 posts written in 2021. Astounding, I thought. I’m positive these numbers pale in comparison to other more popular, national bloggers, but I was pretty thrilled to see it had almost 10,000 views and the most so far in its history. Sometimes, just sometimes we surprise ourselves in beautiful ways.
In fact the first best small business idea for 2022 in the article was “start a blog.” According to it, running a blog is currently one of the most legitimate business ideas for women to make money from home. Now, I have never made money from my blog, but it is a goal of mine for 2022. How about you? Is it something you have wanted to do for a long time? Perhaps this is the year to begin. It could supplement revenue from your main business.
If you are like most women I speak with, they don’t know how to conjure up blog posts. I learned a long time ago to let my posts come from conversation with clients, visual triggers, current news, social or activist events, my own expertise, and even the way the sun lifts my mood. We all have universal feelings and tapping into your own and sharing them in blog format and then social sharing them is a perfect way to start. Plus, it starts creating content for a future book or articles.
Take a blog one step farther, which WordPress is promoting now, and record your written work into a podcast format and share your wisdom in a new digital format reaching listeners instead of readers. Don’t think you are behind the eight ball if you haven’t taken up blogging or podcasting or anything else you see other female business owners doing. All you need to do is commit to learn what you want to do, add it to your business plan, do it religiously until it becomes and habit, and then sit back and enjoy your own marketing platform expand in numbers.
Today’s Wednesday Wisdom is to inspire you to read the article “51 Best Small Business Ideas for Women in 2022”, highlight the ones you are already doing, choose 3-5 new ideas you think you should try, and then join us for next week’s Vision Board program to put together a visual support piece to aid you. It all ties in when you read, see, and work new ideas into your business to make you a more successful entrepreneur.
Business Wisdom: What Button Are You Pushing for 2022
Business Wisdom, Tuesday Thoughts for Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners, and Small Businesses
Over my small business career, looking to long-time entrepreneurs for advice has always helped me hurdle an issue, consider a different decision, or lead me down a better path. If wise people can’t share what they’ve learned with others, they waste opportunities to aid other people.
One of the women I’ve always turned to for sage advice was, and continues to be, my 84-year-old Aunt Elaine, who started dabbling in real estate in the 1960s investing extra income into houses and restaurants to flip. She became a millionaire with her actions and thus, a role model to me as I contemplated entrepreneurial life at age 30.
Recently we had a heart-to-heart talk about decisions in her business life that spoke to where I am now, continuing my 27th year as a woman entrepreneur. Over the years, some of her businesses have come and gone based on a plethora of economic decisions. I asked her how she could let go of a business, since I have held on to mine for so long, her reply, “When you know it is time, it is time. Most people hold on too long and can’t let go even though they should.”
If making a decision about ending or continuing a business is based on purely monetary figures, then a decision to close a business or try to sell it, can be easier to make. If a passionate small business owner is emotionally attached to their company and the people they try to help, it may be harder to make a decision. Someone once said to me, “A business isn’t your child, it isn’t an extension of you personally, so let it go when it is time.”
The beginning of any new year brings with it contemplation of changes to be made. For some reason a new year provides a reset button along with an eject and replay button. As entrepreneurs we need to take a look at our console and decide which one, we want to push for 2022. The clarity of a new year gives space and wisdom to make year-long decisions that maybe should have been made sooner. What button are you going to push?
Business Inspiration 2022: The Year of the Tiger
New Year Inspiration for Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners, Small Businesses
For the Chinese culture their New Year revelry originated with end-of-harvest celebrations when people would offer thanks to gods for good harvests and entreaty for a good crop in the following year. Traditionally, this holiday encouraged families to thoroughly clean their homes to sweep away any ill-fortune in hopes to make way for good incoming luck.
Each New Year is named after one of the twelve zodiac animals – for example on February 1, 2022, the Year of the Tiger will begin. As women entrepreneurs plan for the start of a new business year, they have an opportunity to name their own year. What one word are you going to choose?
For the past two years we have been living in an upside-down world of the Covid-19 Pandemic, having the rug pulled out from under our solid business foundations, masks replacing smiling faces, and working alone to stay safe. Most women entrepreneurs I know have survived this period but not with a lot of gain.
While staying in a conservative, holding pattern can keep a company afloat; it can’t stay that way forever. Being static eventually produces feelings of failure. Being too conservative in business for too long is like having the flu, if you lay in bed too long waiting out the pain, you lose the strength you need to get back on your feet. The longer you stay down, the harder it is to get up.
I believe it is time for women entrepreneurs to make 2022 reviving the old successful ways of entrepreneurship that worked for them pre-pandemic. Past proven strategies, positive business planning, expansion of safe, live events, and re-establishing old relationships that might have fallen through the cracks the past 18 months, are where we should begin.
The Chinese say people born in the year of the Tiger possess strong self-esteem, are most likely optimistic and enthusiastic by nature, and always seem to have endless energy, especially at work. Even if you weren’t born in the year of the Tiger, I believe we can claim these Tiger personalities to venture into 2022.
We can’t be in a holding pattern forever and either can our businesses. Maybe we need to do what the Chinese do and thoroughly clean our “house” sweeping away ill-fortune and worries in order to make the way for good incoming luck, riches and opportunities as well as acting as fierce as a tiger in accomplishing our new goals.
Wednesday Wisdom: Go Beyond Standard
Wednesday Wisdom, Business Inspiration for Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners, Small Businesses
Just past the quaint West Village of New York City rose The Standard High Line Hotel, where we rested for one night, after ubering our youngest son and his girlfriend back to Manhattan unexpectedly after their transportation back to the Big Apple was altered. The hotel was anything but “standard” starting with its cocked position on the street, kitty corner to the river in front and Empire State Building in back with its bright yellow entrance way.
Their motto “We are anything but standard” was easy to notice with their red logo upside down on their marketing, movies playing in dark elevators, and huge door numbers on the fronts of all hotel room doors. You might also figure out they aren’t standard when you notice the tub, surrounded by all glass walls, sandwiched between the king bed and bathroom sink with the toilet in the closet. It might sound strange but it was quite interesting.
How many average hotels have you stayed in or partied in on past New Year’s Eves? Do you remember them? Where they standard or special? If you looked at Manhattan’s Standard High Line Hotel, you’d notice by their white lit holiday trees on their large patio surrounded by movie screens and tables to fight Covid-19 spacing, and a festive attached Biergarten that they went out of their way to be unique and memorable and attract customers to them.
So my wish for you on this last Wednesday Wisdom blog post of 2021, is to step out of your own standard way of thinking about design, packaging, marketing, and philosophy and take a clue from this West Village’s creative hotel to get thinking about rebranding, updating, rethinking, redoing, or being ultra-inventive yourself working on 2022 marketing ideas and design of all your visual materials, and maybe even business philosophy.
Wouldn’t you rather have someone like me sharing your unique business twist with their friends or not mentioning you at all because you didn’t catch my eye? Make 2022 a new, vibrant, “standard” type of year and see what new rave reviews you gain and who’s head you turn.
Clear Away Your Blocked View for 2022
When women ask me how I come up with my creative writing posts, I simply tell them, sometimes it comes from very simple things – like conversations with others, bike rides by myself, or even snow banks, as witnessed in this favorite blog post of 2010. I still remember looking out my window with nothing on my mind to write about until the snow bank basically hit me in the eyes and fueled my writing. I hope you enjoy this old time post from eleven years ago. It reads like new, except there is no snow outside my window today.
Original Blog Post:
Every once in a while we need to lift our eyes from the work on our desk to look at the horizon to ensure we are heading in the right direction. Sometimes looking up and out to see where we are going is difficult, especially on a snowy Central New York like today. In order to catch a glimpse of the horizon this morning, you might just have to stand up and glance past the 36″ of fluffy lake effect snow that has accumulated outside your office window.
But the snow is a good reminder that sometimes our view gets blocked; either by something physical or something mental. Often the hectic pace of a woman entrepreneur’s business cycles can block the view as she focuses on immediate work and issues. Other times relationships or circumstances have clouded the crystal clear view of ourselves, our work and our future and only by terminating those relationships can we regain clarity. Many times we simply forget that although today or maybe next week’s work demands the most attention, we need to focus on the future to lead us forward.
Cold snowy days like today, when you might not be able to travel too far due to hazardous road conditions gives you the perfect opportunity to think about what blocks your view and needs to be removed. It might require ending unproductive business relationships, hiring a business consultant to help fix corporate problems, restructuring your pricing, or focusing on additional education to make you more knowledgeable.
The view may have also gotten cluttered if you haven’t paid attention to your business plan, financial situation, or the marketplace in awhile. Often times we really don’t want to see what is standing in our way, we want to just keep trudging through.
Today’s inspirational blog entry is to make you realize that 36″ of snow sitting outside your front door, in your driveway or on the roadways, can be a reminder that your business view may be barricaded and you must take time to remove it. You know what’s been impeding you. It’s been there for awhile.
Remember life’s limitations are the ones we make. Grab your business snow shovel and clear the path right now. Look beyond the shroud of white and make concrete plans to get to where you want to go in 2011 (or 2022). If you can’t see the horizon from where you are seated, stand up, seek support, motivate yourself and do what you know you have to do. I promise a crisp, clean exhilaration and sense of direction will guide you to the horizon.
Wednesday Wisdom: Just Plain Love
Wednesday Wisdom & Inspiration for Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners, Small Businesses
For many of us, the last few peaceful days before our houses are filled with children, grandchildren, parents, in-laws, and siblings, can provide the gift that doesn’t come wrapped – a deep breath here, a cup of hot tea with cinnamon toast near the beautifully lit pine tree, and reading old recipes in the handwriting of ones we loved who aren’t here anymore.
As I walked out the door in my light blue jacket to go to daily morning mass, I grabbed my bejeweled “LOVE” hat that had some matching light blue gems in it. Typically trying to hide my bald head discretely in church, it felt right to wear this one not knowing our priest’s sermon was going to be about “love” matching the readings’ theme.
As I got out of my car, I noticed the priest looking through the window at me for longer than normal. I assumed he wondered if I have cancer since so many strangers do, but after listening to his homily, I realized my hat, as brilliant as a billboard, might have been the reason. For once, I felt divinely blessed to have that hat on my head to be extra aware of the homily’s message.
It’s amazing that every time I wear that hat, strangers talk to me more or comment on the hat. I’m not sure if it’s the bling or the word, but it gets noticed and I receive the pleasure of nice conversations and acts of kindness. If only everyone had a “Love” hat to wear around every day, than perhaps the world would be a kinder, more lovely place to live.
Today’s Wednesday Wisdom is to inspire you to see everyone you meet with a “Love” hat on their head this week and weekend as you hustle around because sometimes in the madness of our to-do-lists, just like everyone else, we lose perspective of the season. If you end up in a long line, consider saying a blessing for those you love instead of being angry. I bet you can’t get through your entire list before you are at the cashier. Or bring your focus on what makes you happy, transporting yourself out of the literal commercial world, into a favorite, old-time peaceful one. Or rock a little, like you used to when you carried your babies or your pets, bringing you calm (other mothers in line will understand this one).
One of the best gifts to give ourselves, that no one else can wrap for us, is the gift of calm emotions, peace in the frantic moments, and gentleness accompanied by self-love. Please know I wish you a Merry Christmas with an abundance of love.
New Mint Business Ideas
Tuesday Thoughts, Holiday Ideas for Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners, Small Businesses
A mint Hersey kiss sits on my desk a sign of business ingenuity. This season the shelves were lined with a multitude of choices from this candy icon – kisses filled with almonds, raspberry filled options, sensational peanut butter varieties, and white chocolate too. Next to this shelf of chocolate varieties were assortments of multi-colored, multi-flavored candy canes. I wonder why and when the producers of these two traditional confectioneries decided it was time to change it up. The change in color and flavors of these staple holiday candies didn’t stop me from buying the brand; it just gave me scrumptious new options.
Every year, women entrepreneurs were announcing additional service or product developments, even in a continuing Pandemic year. A cookbook producer added an exquisite line of cookie products shipped in a beautiful golden tin to capture a corner of the gift buying market. A woman who sells coffee, started offering other coffee products from other businesses, for additional sales. The creator of a personal organizing business added new services and workshops to capture a corporate audience. Why did these female business owners decide to change it up?
There are diverse reasons for sprucing up or adding on to one’s business staple offerings. The top reasons are to create additional revenue streams, to answer consumer needs, to expand into a new market, to utilize existing resources in a new way and maybe even to delight customers with scrumptious new varieties of a popular product they didn’t even know they wanted yet. Entrepreneurs must be inventive to begin their ventures, it only makes sense they remain ingenious during the life of their enterprise.
Today’s post is to encourage you to remain inventive in your entrepreneurial endeavors. Make sure you are tapping into ways to keep your company fresh and interesting not only for yourself but for consumers. Before this year draws to an end, contemplate additional products or services you could add in 2022 or twisting a current offering into something a little more exciting to market and sell. Look around and notice what others are doing and spin off something unique of your own.
Scrumptious new offerings aren’t always found wrapped in mint green coverings, they can be draped in our own ingenuity and creativity and offered as a delightful new revenue source and creative new spark for ourselves and our customers.
Monday Motivation: The Entrepreneurial Gift of Flexibility
Monday Motivation for Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners, Small Business Owners
Looking out over William Penn’s statue, high above the street, as light snowflakes dropped from the skies, I contemplated my first Christmas as a 21-year-old working woman. Having joined a Philadelphia Investment Banking firm in August, there wasn’t enough vacation time accrued to allow me a trip home for the holiday. Long before computers and phones gave flexibility for staff to work from afar, being tied to a desk as a recent hire, meant traveling to my hometown for Christmas wasn’t possible.
When I think about the entrepreneurial life I choose nine years after that sad holiday, I wonder if the big lights of a city I loved, wasn’t enough for this sentimental girl from a large family where holidays were truly special? The buzz of Wall Street figures, planning events at the Five Seasons Hotel, having international clients grant me gifts, and being treated to the Opera, were pretty exciting for a 21-year-old business professional looking to climb the corporate ladder. But home always tugged at my heart.
Most women start their own businesses to make more money than they could corporately and not to answer to a permanent boss, but what they also love is the flexibility that comes from this type of career. Flexibility to set their own holiday hours, take off time if a child is ill without using their own sick time, attending holiday school musicals, and bringing cookies to their kid’s classrooms. Yes, we have to be able to maintain work commitments during the holidays, but we have the choice to set the boundaries.
As you start, or even take off, this bustling week for holiday shopping, cooking, and parenting as a female business owner, remember one of the gifts you give yourself is the gift of working whatever hours you choose, 24 hours a day, seven days a week to accomplish your work and goals. If you have planned wisely, and your business industry allows, put those feet up on your desk, peer out the window for fresh falling snow, bake those holiday cookies, attend those musical performances, and pat yourself on the back for creating an entrepreneurial work gift for yourself.
Wednesday Wisdom: Make Change Your Friend
Wednesday Wisdom, Hump Day Inspiration for Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners
A recent survey on LinkedIn revealed that 9 out of 10 people believe their lives will be very different in five years. In that same study, 1 in 3 people said they would avoid change if they could. These statistics leave us assuming most people understand modification is necessary in life, (and also in business) and we might not like it; but transformation in any area of life can be perceived as good or bad depending on the circumstances combined with your mental outlook and preparation.
If most of us believe the LinkedIn survey statistic that life is going to be very different in five years, how prepared are we for those changes. Do we have a flexible mindset or life plan? As women entrepreneurs we know in business, it is advised to revise our business plans at least annually. We can do that by beginning with an old plan and revising it or starting fresh. Talking to customers, reviewing your value proposition, seeing how the market has changed, and understanding what problems you are solving for clients, is a good place to begin.
Another way to confront change, is to create the change by shifting offerings, segmenting the market differently, creating different pricing, or even starting an exit strategy. Nothing lasts forever, so for those of us who don’t like change, ending an entrepreneurial endeavor might not feel good, but necessary, especially as the Pandemic lasts.
So, today’s Wednesday Wisdom, a couple weeks before 2021 ends, is to remind you that change doesn’t agree with most of us but its necessary. To be prepared for any change, you need a plan and the right attitude. Grab the bull by the horns for once if you are a procrastinator and do the necessary work to get moving onward. Strike out boldly knowing you aren’t alone in the process. Call a sister or sister entrepreneur to help or get a professional to advise you.
If you need true belief that change becomes adaptable in life, just look back personally 5 years ago and see what transformations you’ve gone through and how well you eventually did after the changes were done. You survived and modified plans to be where you are today. The same will happen for you again. Believe it and make change your friend.
Women TIES 