One of the on going business activities, for myself and most others, is the requisite follow up with networking contacts. It’s one thing I rock. I make the phone calls, send out the texts and get coffee dates. I’m good at it. Cool conversations with amazing people is my reward. Last week I had the gift to spend time with some frickin’ phenomenal women.
Monday Katie.
She stepped into her first “big girl” (her words) corporate job. A well salaried professional position. That over time sucked her soul out with stress, work load and politics. She made a really big girl decision to step away. She now is leading a new initiative with a small university to partner with businesses. It is fresh, exciting and rewarding. I asked Katie if she had taken a reduction in pay with the move into her current work. She had. She gave up a substantial margin to leave the corporate job. I look at her radiance. I see a woman who is inline with her values. A woman who did not allow the almighty dollar to short change her happiness.
Tuesday Kristi and Kim
Kristi
Is a copy writer and a one woman marketing company. She has worked for several different companies. She began doing freelance work along side her full time positions. Much of the time she was a one woman marketing department. Her free lance business grew. She recognized she could do for many companies what she was doing for one company. In 2017 she jumped ship from the last company and in to full time entrepreneurship. With less then two years under her belt Kristi has seen business swell and ebb several times. The first time the ebb came she went to work as a temporary employee. The second time the ebb came she worked harder for herself, rode it out and gained confidence as well as grew her business. It is so easy in the first few years going solo to shrink, to allow the head talk to convince us we don’t have what it takes. Kristi saw the hours working for someone else were better spend working for herself. She is a champion in the making.
Kim
Owns and operates a retail store. A doughnut shop. I knew that exceptional quality was standard. What I discovered was a woman of heart and tenacity. Kim shared with me in open matter of fact terms: That it did not make sense to her to work for wages for someone else. So she went in to business guided long distance by a cousin who knew the ropes. How at the store in Texas her baker up and left. Her husband stepped in and learned how to make exceptional donuts in 6 long days. The year gap from selling one store in an adjacent town and opening the current store were we sat. The new shop is in a developing area. When she and her husband knew the location of this new shop it was just dirt. Construction delays stretched what was supposed to be a few months in to a year. The money from the sale of the old shop ran out. She took jobs to get them through. She and her husband encourage each other daily. It is what carries them through. They provide opportunities for their employees to lead and have a culture of respect. The doughnut shop is just the first leg of a long term plan. Kim is a mighty woman in a small frame.
Thursday Emily and Jen
Emily
Answered the call in her soul. As an ultrasound technician she was not in her element. The work did not provide the fulfillment she had imagined. How many of us have gotten into a job we thought would be the “our thing” only to have it not pan out? She and her husband followed a financial fitness program. Got a handle on their relationship to money. Live by a budget and are debt free outside the mortgage. In the process Emily felt the call to provide for others what she experienced going through these changes. She stepped into entrepreneurship as a financial coach. Walks beside people to make and then hold to their commitments around money. Emily is living in her purpose.
Jen
Jen is a woman of business. Strong, sure. She is also in the midst court proceedings. Having filed charges: Breach of contract and of assault. There are threats from the perpetrator and family of the man. It is hard to imagine Jen being in this position. I am confident she has a hard time believing this also. She tells me that now, in hind sight, she can smell a sociopath. She knows the patterns. Jen has steel. Her metal is being tested as she sees that through while still showing up in work and for her family. She’ll survive and will be stronger for all of this.
Friday Breanne and Gisselle
Breanne has a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration. Been with her current company for five years. Married for 17 years. Has great kids. Is doing work with the city chamber on the side. Plus she has a small online t-shirt store. Breanne is together, confident, relatable. What speaks to my heart is where this amazing woman came from. Breanna grew up in and out of homelessness. She probably was, what we now call, food insecure. She had her first child at age 17. I know whatever she accomplishes in this life, what ever she does, has, and becomes is icing on the cake. She has already shifted her perspective and over come the odds. Breanna is a gladiator.
Gisselle
Vivacious, energetic and fun. She transitioned from full time military to full time mom. She was gone a lot on deployment and didn’t like that she was missing her kids growing up. Gisselle openly shared with me how overwhelming being a stay at home mom was and is. Totally threw her. I love this. My view of military is that it is tough. I also know too many women who down play their child rearing and home keeping roles as unimportant or “not real work”. It is real work and it was fun to hear Gisselle talk openly about the challenges.
Each of these ladies is a phenomenal woman. If you are a man reading this, you know phenomenal women. If you are a woman reading this YOU are a phenomenal woman.
Your challenges, spirit, belief, strength, passion, heart, tenacity, value make you the authentic amazing woman you are. Celebrate that!
For Your Best Possible Self,
Coach Christine Clark