As a young businesswoman, I analyzed my target market and then squished myself into a very specific box to meet perceived client expectations.

From my logo to my shoes, I made all of my business decisions to send a message of competence – to a predominantly older male decision maker.

Early on, I closed nearly every virtual consultation, but lost nearly every face-to-face client introduction. It took two years of hitting that ceiling to finally evaluate my situation and consider a hard truth.

I had brought precisely what I disliked about my corporate job into my business: a disconnect.

At the next face-to-face consultation, I took what felt like a huge risk: I left the pinstripe slacks and button up shirt in the closet, curled my hair, and slipped on my favorite bright red flats, fully anticipating that I would be judged young and inexperienced.

The actual result? I closed the deal.

And then I continued to close these once ominous in-person consultations over and over, which was convincing evidence of the power of being genuine.

Lida Citroen, a personal branding strategist, confirms, “If you strip away who you are, you lose all sense of self. Companies aren’t looking for generic people, they are looking for people who have a sense of authenticity.”

After 20 years in corporate branding, Lida started her own firm to apply proven marketing strategies to professionals, establishing their unique value proposition and influence.

“I grew up in Hollywood. It was not uncommon for people in that environment to understand that you play someone else when you go to work and when you come home you get to be yourself. I found myself really good at fitting in, until I got to my last job. It wasn’t just the wardrobe, it was a fundamental shift in how they saw the world. I found myself playing the part to the point that my husband stopped and asked, ‘Since when do you wear Birkenstocks?’”

“Taking that costume off was one of the most liberating things I did in my entire life.”

If your outcome is to get the best possible opportunity for you, you have to bring you to the table, but as Lida points out, we sometimes get conflicting direction.

Like what you’re reading? This article is a preview of our premium content found in our monthly magazine.

The post Stop Faking It: Be Yourself to Sell Your Brand appeared first on HER Magazine ™.

“The best entrepreneurs usually have a few battle scars and war stories to tell.”
– Richard Branson, Founder & CEO, Virgin

We know this inherently, but coming back from failure is easier said than done.

After being laid off, closing up shop, cutting losses on a project thousands of hours in…those moments define us: as fragile or resilient.

How do we approach rock bottom business experiences as just that: valuable experience?

Shift into a growth mindset

When looking at business leaders who overcame their failures and those who crumbled, Carol Dweck’s research highlighted one key differentiator: mindset.

“In the fixed mindset, when you fail; you’re a failure. In the growth mindset, when you fail; you’re learning.”

High achievers in every realm, including business and entrepreneurship, focus on effort, rather than an intelligence or talent, believing they can and must always improve.

Look for the lesson that could be your next big idea

Mary Kay Ash resigned from Stanley Home Products after 25 years in sales, fed up with being passed over for promotions in favor of men she had trained.

Her frustration led to writing out an advice book for other women in business – refining her experience into lessons learned, which she then realized was the blueprint for her own business. Mary Kay Cosmetics was born.

“For every failure, there’s an alternative course of action. You just have to find it. When you come to a roadblock, take a detour.”

Fortify your resiliency

Resiliency is the foundational ability to approach failures as opportunities, transforming your mistakes and hardships into unique strengths and value.

This current challenge is a prerequisite for the grit and wisdom that will fuel your next venture.

If you’ve been a practicing workaholic, your resiliency tank is probably on empty, which translates into a lack of the clarity, perspective, and energy required to design and launch a comeback that transcends the vision you had originally imagined.

Revisit your core values and take stock. Commit to realigning your life where it has deviated. Take advantage of the chaos to establish better routines to support your health, well-being, and relationships.

If genuine success is a quality life of meaning and impact, then our measures for success must reflect a bigger picture.

Perhaps the biggest failure we can experience in our careers is that of pursuing business success with dogged single-mindedness, refusing to evolve when we are clearly failing elsewhere in our lives.

The post From Failure to Comeback Legend appeared first on HER Magazine ™.

You use the words, “I’m sorry” and “catching up” way too frequently.

Each day, you add more items to your monster to-do list than you cross off.

Early in our careers and when we start businesses from scratch, the hours are long and your passion fuels incredible momentum.

You’ve seen long, hard work pay off, so why not continue to clock as many hours as possible?

The cost-benefit trade-off quickly boils down to a heavy burden on your health, relationships, and quality of life, leading to stagnation and burnout.

Your time is your greatest limiting factor.

Time management is less about tactics and much more about sacrificing low margin activities for an intentional focus on what will make a real difference. Take ten minutes now to build intentionality into your schedule so that you can accomplish the meaningful in less time and build resiliency for the long haul.

10-Minute Time Audit

Grab a pen and paper. Answer these three questions to quickly shed light on whether your time allocations add up. Then, experiment with adjustments to focus your efforts, trim the fat, and invest in your most critical asset: you.

1. What are your top 3-5 core values?

Examples: Health, Freedom, Love, Generosity, Hard Work, Courage, Adventure, Health

If you’re struggling with this list, it’s time to step back and get clear so that you can align your life with your deepest priorities. SoulSalt, a coaching firm for entrepreneurs and revolutionaries offers a free Be True course on Udemy that will help you do just that.

2. How do you actually spend your time?

We all have the same 168 hours in every week. How did you allocate yours last week?

Pull out your calendar and do a quick and dirty estimate.

Start by subtracting out the hours you spent sleeping.

Now, total up your work hours – including those emails you checked on your phone everyday before bed.

Outside of work, how many hours did you spend:

• Exercising?
• Reading?
• Eating?
• Cleaning?
• Engaging in hobbies?
• Interacting with loved ones?
• Attending to your spirituality?

Add in any categories you need until you account for all 168 hours, and don’t forget meaningless internet browsing and Netflixing.

Did your time mirror your core values and priorities?

If learning is one of your core values and reading came to 1% of your entire week, an adjustment might drastically improve your impact.

3. Which work hours make a difference?

Continue using last week as your example. How many hours did you spend commuting? In meetings? On calls? Emails? Meetings?

How many hours were dedicated to meaningful projects that moved the needle? Did meetings impact the bottom line in the right direction?

Armed with the data, use your core values and time insights as a guideline and sketch out what an ideal week should look like. Challenge your assumptions. Try reducing your total number of work hours while accomplishing more at work and beyond work.

Avoid the temptation to build in time for everything back-to-back. Not only is this unrealistic, it’s the quickest way to get behind and start sacrificing all priorities that lack an external deadline.

Start with your core values and priorities. If health is on the top of the list, schedule your exercise classes or morning runs first.

After your core values are present in your schedule, move on to better utilizing your time at work.

Make sure you (and your team) are dedicating each morning for the big picture and creative projects. Try moving all meetings and calls to the afternoon when solo creativity and focus naturally wane.

Start saying no.

Break out your to-do list and calendar. Review the tasks you’ve given yourself, assignments you’ve committed to for others, and recurring activities that have simply hung around long after their purpose was served…cut out anything that is not aligned with your current priorities – both personally and at work.

Each time you review your tasks for the day, start asking yourself:
• Will this move big picture projects forward?
• If not, can it be deleted, delegated or delayed?

Create a hidden parking lot of ideas and opportunities that aren’t relevant to today so that they can stop distracting you. Remove negotiable deadlines from everything that isn’t a priority.

Finally, be fully present for every activity that passes muster and makes it onto your calendar. Practice “voluntary simplicity,” an anecdote to mindless multitasking described by Jon Kabat-Zinn in Wherever You Go There You Are:

“Going fewer places in one day rather than more, seeing less so I can see more, doing less so that I can do more, acquiring less so that I can have more. Choosing simplicity whenever possible adds to life an element of deepest freedom which so easily eludes us.”

168 hours. You do not have time for every opportunity.

Focus on what’s important to you, what you’re passionate about in business, and you will find more than enough time to create a meaningful life and rare impact.

“Sometimes a 2% swing in the way you spend your time can have a huge impact on your happiness and success. Always look for that 2%.”
– Gary Vaynerchuck

The post Why You Should Work Less (and a 10-Minute Time Check-Up) appeared first on HER Magazine ™.

We desire freedom to create, to push the boundaries, and make an impact.

Only a few will actually do so.

When we breakdown the business success stories that inspire us – whether it’s Barbara Corcoran, Oprah, a parent, or a friend…it’s clear that what sets them apart isn’t about degrees, luck, timing, or any specific skill.

It comes down to resiliency. Every success is rooted in hardship.

From difficult childhoods, to painful losses, to repeat failures in business- those experiences either strengthen or handicap.

Adversity is a prerequisite for the character necessary to lead, but only when we recognize it as such.

Too often, we compartmentalize our challenges: box up the ugly divorce, delete that failed venture out of our bio, grieve the loss of a loved one behind closed doors.

Tragedy is universal. Failures are frequent.

Those who rise utilize those experiences to realize their own inherent strength and ability, feed their passion, and come back from the unimaginable.

Having faced down their personal dragons, they become fearless in business.

They take great risks, continuously push themselves beyond their own expectations, and expect setbacks with an eye to the opportunity to learn and innovate.

To be leading edge, we must be comfortable living and working on the edge; knowing that we could fall at any moment and yet still confidently step out onto that edge every day.

The stakes can be quite high, and it’s likely that we will fail repeatedly.

So how do we nurture such resiliency that we can approach our businesses firmly grounded in possibility rather than fear?

First, resiliency requires a shift in mindset.

Carol Dweck keys into this shift from a place of fear and pride to that of humility and lifelong learning:

“The passion for stretching yourself and sticking to it, even (or especially) when it’s not going well, is the hallmark of the growth mindset…True self-confidence is the courage to be open – to welcome change and new ideas regardless of their source.”

Research demonstrates that anyone can nurture a growth mindset.

In fact, you can shift your own mindset at any time by simply reminding yourself that your goal is to learn, rather than to win, and by opening your perspective, so that you can recognize weaknesses and seek out the feedback you need to course correct.

Second, resiliency is built through experience. Some lessons must be learned the hard way.

Ever heard of Virgin Brides or Virgin Cola? These were just two of Richard Branson’s many failures that paved the way to a portfolio of more than 400 companies under the Virgin Group umbrella and a net worth just shy of 5 billion dollars today.

“You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over.”

Intentionally lean into your fears, to the extent that you actually do fall sometimes. And then get back up and persist, learning down to your bones that mistakes, accidents, and losses won’t end you. That, in fact, they hold the power to peel back the layers of insulation that have suffocated your potential.

You can shift into a resilient mindset and venture outside your comfort zone frequently, building that competitive edge that will allow you to boldly take the leaps of faith that transform your life, your career, and your impact.

The post Do You Have the Ultimate Competitive Edge? appeared first on HER Magazine ™.

And yet, there are many examples of business leaders, especially women, who not only turned their passion into career success, but often intertwined multiple passions to stand out in their niche while deriving even greater fulfillment from their work.

Online business entrepreneur Marie Forleo generally gets credit for bringing the term “multipassionate” into mainstream entrepreneur lingo, while others refer to this combination of creativity and ability as “multipotentiality.”

Whatever you call it, as humans we are undeniably multifaceted and many businesswomen reach this inflection point where the calling to feed our careers with the energy that flows from our deepest convictions surpasses any desire to play it safe.

Whether you might consider a more authentic approach to your work by bringing your passions out of the shadows, or you’ve already taken the plunge of putting them front and center, the potential upside is undeniable, as are the potential pitfalls.

For those of us who pursue a passion-driven career in business, we can look and feel scattered, disorganized, or simply uncommitted. It’s common to feel plagued by indecision and a sense of failure as we play with models, ideas, and products. While most of us can agree that failing fast and (hopefully) forward are prerequisites of success, experiencing that process, often solo and as a woman in a male-dominated business world, can feel like we’re simply failing.

The question isn’t, “Is it possible to combine your passions with your business?”

Women have long set the bar for breaking through any perceived boundaries.

The question is:

“If you are a multipassionate businesswoman, what’s the best way to pursue your interests and succeed?”

I sat down with three passionate businesswomen to find out.

Carmell Clark has combined multiple passions into her business as a transformation coach with an emphasis on international adventure, which also lends a broader perspective from her experiences helping other business professionals take those same steps:

First and foremost, embrace and love your unique combination of strengths and passions. Frame this combination in your own mind and in how you communicate your pursuits as a POSITIVE that gives you a competitive advantage.

“When confronting a potential pivot, instead of asking, “Can I do this?,” ask: “Do I want to do this? Why do I want to do this? Is this aligned with my core values and what matters most to me? Will this option still be available in 5 or 10 years, or do I need to act now or never?”

At the end of the day, you are the one who has to answer to you. Are you happy? Are you fulfilled? Who cares what other people think. Follow your intuition and surround yourself with role models and supports who have proven it’s possible.”

Amanda Jones is a former journalist and a meditation and yoga instructor who followed her instincts to the recent convergence of her passions in a new business, Yoga Experiences. She shares her perspective in looking back at the process:

“The best advice I got was from my teacher, Deepak Chopra, who said, “First find your passions.” Your passion, in his opinion, is something that you cannot fail at. What is that one thing you know you can do, and then where does that intersect with what the world needs? How can I serve?

The philosophy as a business owner has to be: nurture your own well-being first. When you’re happy, that shows up for your clients, in your products, and in your brand. You want to put your best, whole self into your business pursuits.

All of my past experiences have been absolutely necessary to come to this harmonious business that I have now. It’s a puzzle piece pathway that has come together. You absolutely can include multiple passions within one business, but don’t be afraid to step outside that business and follow something for your own personal growth. Maybe it becomes a hobby or maybe a new business organically grows from that pursuit.”

Lyn Christian became an “accidental coach” in 1998 and took her passion for entrepreneurship and career reinvention full-time in 2004 through her business, SoulSalt. Lyn simultaneously weaves in her focus on movement in her messaging, from competing in triathlons to the mastery of fencing:

“You have to define success for yourself. Become aware of your core values. Practice being curious. Start by doing rather than agonizing over options in your head. Try things on for size.

When you’re in that ambiguity zone, there are several tips that can help sustain you: focus on self-care and getting adequate sleep, a good diet, and exercise; engage in learning; connect with sources of support and love to help you persist and evaluate your blindspots; take risks and be open to opportunities; and engage in creative activity, such as art, music or doodling.

Often finding our path in business is akin to being a sculptor, where we start off with the large block of clay and, little by little, we pull parts away to reveal the art within.”

In the pursuit of a sustainable and fulfilling business/life, there are no rules; no black and white criteria to follow. Only you decide whether your passions are private pursuits, unique strengths that lend to your messaging, or at the core of your work.

We can all start by unboxing ourselves as businesswomen and championing the whole, uniquely capable woman who shows up everyday to get the job done better because of her passions.

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The post Yes, You Absolutely Can Embrace Multiple Passions In Business appeared first on HER Magazine ™.