Month: October 2020

Female Disruptors: Amanda Hudes of ‘Smiling Through Chaos’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up

Female Disruptors: Amanda Hudes of ‘Smiling Through Chaos’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

I am disrupting the Event Planning industry by being different. I’m not just an Event Planner. I’m not just a Wedding Planner. But I’m also not just a Wellness Coach. I am an all-in-one Planner and Coach, and that can be confusing to those who don’t yet understand me or Smiling Through Chaos. We CAN be more than one thing. We CAN be knowledgeable, and crazily enough, we can have expertise in more than one area.

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Amanda Hudes.

Event and Wedding Planning Expert and Wellness Coach, Amanda Hudes, helps women and couples smile more, stress less, and look and feel their best during their event planning experience. She is the Founder of Smiling Through Chaos LLC, as well as the author of Amazon Bestseller, “Smiling Through The Chaos of Wedding Planning.” Amanda utilizes her passion, experience and education to help people celebrate life to the fullest, focusing on the positive and the solution to any challenge.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

I’ve had an extremely diverse career. We don’t know why we are led down certain paths until we reach a point where we say, “Aaah, this is why.”

Earlier in my career, I worked in Media Planning, Fashion, Office Management, and as a Senior Executive Assistant, and each opportunity allowed me to learn new skills, from managing several projects simultaneously to hiring office staff to focusing on each number in a spreadsheet to the highest level of detail, for if one number was wrong, the entire project would need to be started over again. If I hadn’t worked in the corporate world, I would not have the organizational and professional acumen I have today in order to run a successful business.

But let’s go even further back, back to where the passion stems from. I grew up in a very happy and stable household, with a wonderful support system. It wasn’t until later in high school when I went through a major change. I was in an unhealthy relationship, my friendships were changing, my dog passed away, and my siblings were off to college. I became depressed. As I grew stronger and came out of the depression, I realized how precious life is, and it became very important to me that I help others celebrate life. I did a lot of self-reflection, which I realized will be a lifelong priority to continue doing, and I started focusing on the positive, on the “happy.” I had to go through that challenging time in my life to really appreciate what I had and to go after everything I want in life. Nothing should be off limits. We are here for a reason, so why not “make it happen?”

“Smiling Through Chaos” was developed as I decided to leave the corporate world and focus on using my experience planning corporate and personal events, creating customized and unique weddings and events, along with my expertise in nutrition and wellness, to help people enjoy the experience and release the stress. My clients feel my passion from the first time we speak. And I will go above and beyond to make sure they are excited about their event and confident in themselves.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

I am disrupting the Event Planning industry by being different. I’m not just an Event Planner. I’m not just a Wedding Planner. But I’m also not just a Wellness Coach. I am an all-in-one Planner and Coach, and that can be confusing to those who don’t yet understand me or Smiling Through Chaos. We CAN be more than one thing. We CAN be knowledgeable, and crazily enough, we can have expertise in more than one area. When I first founded Smiling Through Chaos, I had several people try to sway me into separating my business because “Some people won’t get it,” or, “It’s too confusing online.” You see, I had combined my experience in Event Planning and my former business in Nutrition and Exercise Guidance to create one that would help people have gorgeous and enjoyable events while also helping clients feel and look their best, and that isn’t something you see every day. But that’s what I bring to the table. That’s what makes Smiling Through Chaos so different.

When it comes to social media, I’ve also had marketing experts guide me to separating out Event Planning from Wellness, creating different social media handles. But a few months ago I was asked to look internally again, and I brought them back together in social media, because that’s what Smiling Through Chaos is all about, helping people celebrate life. When you view and follow Smiling Through Chaos, you can instantly see that it isn’t like most of the Event and Wedding Planning social media handles. And that’s intentional. If you know me, you know I have never EVER had the desire to be like everyone else. There is only one you, so why try to be like someone else? Smiling Through Chaos is more than just a brand, it’s a lifestyle, so when you follow Smiling Through Chaos, I want you to feel happier, I want you to feel inspired, I want you to feel empowered, and sure, I want you to eat healthier and work with me on planning your next event, but it’s just so much more than that. We all have a reason for being here, and mine is to help you smile bigger.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I remember coordinating a wedding at a vineyard. I was hired only a few weeks before the big day, so I didn’t do a walk through at the venue with my clients, and when we drove in, I realized that it was much colder than I had thought it would be. Coming from a fashion background and education, I don’t dress in the usual Wedding Planner black outfit. I wear an outfit that goes with the theme or style of the event, so for this wedding, I was wearing a long floral dress that was fitting for the setting. My client loved it. But as the night progressed, I started getting really cold! It was an outdoor wedding in the Fall, but I had been so focused on what I needed for my client that I hadn’t thought about what I needed so I could focus on my clients and not on being freezing! I ended up wearing my faux fur coat over my dress, but that wasn’t the worst of it. I don’t drink much coffee (Kale is my coffee), but that night, I can’t even tell you how many cups of coffee I was drinking to stay warm as I moved around the wedding, making sure guests were enjoying themselves and the couple was having the best time.

I realized from that experience that when we consider ourselves in the mix, we can make everyone happier. Now, as part of my list of items to bring to a wedding, I have 2–3 pairs of shoes in case I get blisters, something to layer with so I am not wearing a coat around, and other practical items. If I am not set with the items I need, I cannot be as good to my clients. As in any relationship, we are at our best for others when we also treat ourselves right.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

My biggest mentors have been my parents, without a doubt. I come from a family of entrepreneurs, so I think it’s in my blood that I have a strong work ethic and am self-motivated enough to run my business. I have not met anyone who can match my father. He started his own practice, growing it to be very successful, all while supporting a family, donating his time to charities and organizations, as he continues to do to this day, and always “making it happen.” If I have a business question, I know that he is there to listen, to offer his guidance and recommendations, and to provide constructive advice. My mother is so warm, genuine, and supportive that I get emotional just thinking about the possibility of becoming half of the woman she is. She helps push me when I need more balance between my professional and family life, and she cheers me on through all of my endeavors. I could not ask for better parents, for a better example of a true partnership in life, and two people who prove that nice people don’t finish last.

In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?

Being disruptive in a way that is positive can be very powerful! By standing up for what’s right, helping empower others to be themselves, and being true to yourself, you are helping make a difference. Some companies try to “stay out of it,” which is their own choice, but I am a big believer in, “If you don’t stand for something, you stand for nothing,” and I’d much rather be known as someone who stands for something, especially when it comes to standing up for people. I do believe that some companies have lost trust from clients and customers over the past few months, when so many discussions over racism, police brutality, and mask-wearing or the refusal to wear them have fueled such strong emotions and they have chosen not to take a stand. I also noticed that some businesses chose to stand up for certain politicians over the past few months and that type of disruption was not widely accepted and it negatively affected their business. Everything is a choice, and I cannot say the right stance for other companies, only for my own.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Be open to different ideas.” When I was first starting out, I kept hearing that Event Planners have a reputation of being bossy and set in their ways. When I heard that, I told myself right then and there that I would not fit that mold and I would be different from the stereotype. When I develop ideas and share them to clients and vendors, I do so in a way that does not feel intimidating. I ask for their input and opinion, and if they would like something changed, I am not offended because it’s not about me, it’s about the idea. Brainstorming ideas with vendors also creates a stronger professional relationship and respect for one another, and the developments that form from creatives working together is magical!

Remember, you could have 99 out of 100 people who love you, but that 1 who has a negative experience is the first to write a review and shout their experience to the world.” I know I’m not the norm. When I have a great experience with a business, I promote the heck out of them just because I want to help their business grow and help them succeed even more. When I was told that most people will not give a testimonial, even if they are so thrilled with the results and the experience, unless you give them a little push, I was surprised. I form relationships with my clients, so if there is anything they aren’t happy with, I work to make sure they feel comfortable speaking to me. The last thing I want is to find out someone wasn’t happy by reading a review online. Communication and trust are huge factors in creating great client relationships.

Focus on your strengths rather than looking at your competition and trying to be like them.” I remember, at the start of my full-time career as an Event and Wedding Planner, I did a lot of competitive research. What did each have that set them apart? Why were they successful? I do think it’s important to learn what makes certain businesses successful, but we each have qualities about us that make us unique, and isn’t that so much more fun to focus on? There’s room for all of us, so I say, “Lose the competitiveness and focus on what makes you stand out.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

I’m always shaking things up because I’m just me!

During 2020 alone, I’m launching a new website, I have a new logo, I have developed 2 new services, one for statement-making clients who have up to 50 guests and the other package for couples who want to get married now in a small ceremony and then plan forward with a larger wedding in the next year or two, I am now on the Board of Advisors of a breast cancer organization called, “Evolve Pink,” I’ve been featured in several media outlets and formats, and I’m just getting started during a year when we can just sit around and wait or we can go after our goals! I am choosing to follow my intuition and not allowing the environment around me to determine what I do in my life.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

One of the biggest challenges is disrupting the home life by also wanting a satisfying career. I cannot say this for everyone, since there are definitely families with complete opposite situations, but for so many women, we are still expected to handle all of the children’s activities and school tasks, many of the household tasks, and more, while running and building our businesses, and balance can be very challenging.

Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?

FireBuilders Live is a new podcast that I’ve been following. I have to say that I have genuinely been interested in every guest Josh Koerpel has had on his show. The difference with FireBuilders is this, and I can say this because I was also featured on this show, but Josh shows sincere interest in what his guests are saying. He isn’t trying to have them finish so he can speak. He is truly listening, which you can tell in his follow up questions. He prepares for his interviews, he makes sure to have guests that have inspirational, motivational, and / or educational value, and he is very clearly just being himself, not trying to be anyone else. It’s one of those podcasts that you watch and know you need to have a pen and paper nearby because there are going to be quotes that are said that you’ll want to read over and over again.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

I started a Facebook group called, “Bringing nice back,” and I’d love to get even more people involved. There is so much negativity online that having a place you can go to, like this Facebook page, where everything you read is positive and uplifting, can make such a big difference in your day. Join and add beautiful happenings from your day too!

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Think positively and positive things will happen.” Absolutely nothing good comes from complaining or talking about bad things that “could happen.” It takes the same amount of energy to focus on the great things that can happen as the bad things that can happen, so why not focus our energy towards the great and fill our lives with more joy?

How can our readers follow you online?

Come follow me at @SmilingThroughChaos on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube! I’m also on LinkedIn, Pinterest, and I’d love to get to know you!

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Thank you so much as well!

Female Disruptors: Amanda Hudes of ‘Smiling Through Chaos’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Kirsten Lambert of Beantown Bedding On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up…

Female Disruptors: Kirsten Lambert of Beantown Bedding On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

Kill it in the niche. It’s easy to be tempted by the deluge of opportunities that arise when starting a business. Thanks to an unexpected wave of media coverage, we were pulled into retail and wholesale distribution right out of the gate. As a team of two with a bare bones budget, we were spread thin. An advisor had cautioned that we “kill it in the niche” first. He recommended a grassroots initiative in our hometown of Boston, home to many of the nation’s top colleges where our linens had gained traction for orientations and summer events. It was good advice that we didn’t take. It’s easier to do something really well in a bubble and scale it, than to convert the masses all at once.

As a part of our series about strong women leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Kirsten Lambert.

Kirsten is CEO of Beantown Bedding®, the Boston startup that introduced Laundry-Free Linens®. She and her co-founder, Joan Ripple, turned a college care package idea for their kids into an industry game-changer. Named among “17 Women to Watch in 2017,” their biodegradable bedding has been recognized as “visionary” by industry professionals, international media, and innovation-loving celebrities.

My co-founder Joan and I met when our children dated each other in high school. Once they went to college we learned that, like most college kids, they rarely took time to wash their dirty sheets. As moms, we were concerned about their health and wanted to find an easier way for them to have clean bedding. After more than a year of R&D, we developed a new kind of bed sheet that was convenient, comfortable and compostable. With our backgrounds in business, Joan’s in management consulting and mine in consumer research, we saw an opportunity to change the way people get clean sheets on and off campus. It’s a Swiffer-like concept for beds.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

Beantown Bedding®’s Laundry-Free Linens® are disrupting the bedding industry with an easy and planet-friendly new way to get clean sheets. What started as a college time-saver grew into a go-to solution for hundreds of organizations in hospitality, healthcare and higher ed. These remarkably soft linens, made from eucalyptus, can be used for days or weeks and discarded or composted instead of laundering. The savings of time, water and energy appeals to consumers and businesses alike. It not only cuts out half of the steps involved with managing a linen service or laundry operation, but guarantees clean new sheets for every user. Now in light of COVID, hygiene and infection control are more important than ever.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

There’s a funny radio commercial playing since COVID became part of our lives. It features two women having a conversation in gibberish, and the announcer explains that these are weird times and nothing makes sense. It reminds me of one of our first meetings when Joan and I were starting the business. A global transportation company reached out to discuss our shipping needs. We sat at a local Dunkin Donuts for the better part of an hour staring at two men who appeared to be speaking the same language as the women in the commercial; gibberish. Their tone indicated that they were asking questions, but we didn’t understand a single thing they said as they threw around acronyms like LTL, FCL, HTC and CBM. Once the coffee ran out, we ran out. It was a humbling experience, but serves as a good reminder of how far we’ve come.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

Some of the most meaningful guidance we received was from mentors we met through a global accelerator called MassChallenge. The highly regarded program provided access to world-class experts from academia, industry and government. We benefited from the wisdom of rock star founders, famous authors and revered CEO’s, esteemed professors and impressive investors. One notable mentor was one of the earliest employees at Facebook. As fascinating as his story was, his feedback felt a little harsh. Our first whiteboard session took place in a stylish suite in a swanky New England seaside town. I showed up with my daughter’s hand-me-down Mac from high school. We were rookie founders and it showed. When he asked about goals, we offered safe, achievable projections. He challenged us to expand our vision and own it, however aspirational it seemed at the time. It lit a fire. We began to reach higher and make a plan to get there. As it turned out, we far exceeded the goals written on the whiteboard that first day. Looking back, his advice was some of the most valuable we received.

I believe disruption in the context of innovation occurs precisely because there is room for improvement. By definition, a problem is being solved, but that doesn’t mean every outcome of the solution will be positive. Sometimes disruption is tainted by people with negative intentions. Ride-sharing services have improved safety and convenience in many ways, but there are people who use them to commit crimes. Unintentional consequences can also be less than positive, such as decreased social interaction due to the popularity of handheld devices. Even so, it shouldn’t keep us from continuing to innovate.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Kill it in the niche. It’s easy to be tempted by the deluge of opportunities that arise when starting a business. Thanks to an unexpected wave of media coverage, we were pulled into retail and wholesale distribution right out of the gate. As a team of two with a bare bones budget, we were spread thin. An advisor had cautioned that we “kill it in the niche” first. He recommended a grassroots initiative in our hometown of Boston, home to many of the nation’s top colleges where our linens had gained traction for orientations and summer events. It was good advice that we didn’t take. It’s easier to do something really well in a bubble and scale it, than to convert the masses all at once.
Trust your gut. This was very nearly a company-killer for Beantown. We almost lost our business, because we trusted the advice of experts more than our own gut. It bit us hard when we delegated the sales organization to someone who was recommended by mentors, but set off our internal alarms. By the time we discovered the false reporting, sales had tanked and we lost the peak buying season. Although we eventually recovered, disaster could have been avoided if we had simply trusted our instincts. Lesson learned…painfully.
Fail until you don’t. One of the most true maxims I’ve heard is, “I never lose. I only win or learn.” Perseverance served us well when we sat at a long conference table with executives from a national retailer and a prestigious university. After making our pitch and fielding a few polite questions, we read their silence and facial expressions as our cue to leave. As everyone awkwardly began to get up, I stayed seated and just kept talking. Joan was probably kicking me under the table, but whether cluelessly or comically, I talked until the lightbulb went off for one of them. His enthusiasm grew as he brought the others onboard to his great idea of placing the linens in the travel section instead of the bedding department. Our startup story, like most, includes countless disappointments, disasters and even deaths. Those failures not only make the successes seem sweeter, but keeping pushing us forward. It’s true that whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

New products will pave the road to “help the world live laundry-free”. Working in conjunction with one of the country’s premiere hospitals on leading edge infection control measures, we’re designing a completely “eco-disposable” room.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

After comparing notes with other female entrepreneurs, regardless of education or qualification, it seems that we’re not always taken as seriously. On occasion Joan and I have been asked if this is our full-time job, if we have other “hobbies”, or what our husbands think about our business. I suspect those questions aren’t asked of our male counterparts. While it’s insulting, tough skin is a job requirement for any entrepreneur.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

I’ve turned to “The Hard Thing About Hard Things,” by Ben Horowitz time and time again. Startups are just hard, and it helps to know how other founders remained resilient. If the answer could be summed up in one word, I’d say it’s tenacity. My favorite quote from the book is, “Whenever I meet a successful CEO, I ask them how they did it…The great CEOs tend to be markedly consistent in their answers. They all say, ‘I didn’t quit’.”

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

My dad often repeated a saying attributed to John Lydgate: “You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”. It’s exhausting and futile to try to please everyone. In any business, the most important person to please is the customer. It sounds simplistic and cliché, but if you can do that, everything else will follow. When customers are happy, investors are happy, employees are happy, and founders are happy.

Say No To Status Quo: Things, and by that I mean EVERY thing, can be better. Whether it’s easier, faster, more enjoyable or more efficient, less expensive or less painful, the status quo always has room for improvement. It doesn’t require a high tech innovation; just a little ingenuity. Simple step changes and thinking outside the box can be the first ripples of a tsunami.

How can our readers follow you online?

Web: www.beantownbedding.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/3325953?trk=tyah&trkInfo=idx%3A1-1-1%2CtarId%3A1425350402097%2Ctas%3Abeantown+bedding

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Beantown-Bedding-LLC/265401140172734?ref=hl

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/beantownbedding/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/BeantownBedding

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Female Disruptors: Kirsten Lambert of Beantown Bedding On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Daniela Corrente of Reel On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

I founded Reel to debunk the myth that credit is the only way to achieve our goals, a myth that has caused so much harm to this society. Showing people that they can buy the things they want with their own cash flow is the first step towards achieving a better financial future. Whatever it is, a new computer, a pair of shoes, a comfy couch, at Reel we give the power to the consumer to achieve their aspirations, debt-free. We have taken a different approach to saving, connecting saving with shopping so we can ease people into feeling more comfortable with their cashflow. We have helped thousands of people save millions of dollars and I’m proud to say a high percentage of our users are Latinas like myself.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Daniela Corrente.

Daniela is the founder and CEO of Reel, since she was a kid, she has always been passionate about understanding human behavior, why and how we choose to do things. That fascination led her to start a business that focuses on making it easy for people to achieve their aspirations without going into debt. She is a Latina founder that believes real change and equal opportunity come from investing in not only social, but also economic empowerment.

Ever since I can remember I’ve been a curious human being. I like to understand what motivates people, plus I love fast-paced environments, because they challenge me to constantly evolve. So, it was natural for me to choose a career in advertising and moving to New York City after college. My rationale at the time was “If I left my country to move here, I better be playing in NY.” My interest in consumer behavior led me to work for incredible brands on the agency side at Saatchi & Saatchi and Grey NY. While working there, I had the opportunity to learn more about how consumers thought about their finances and brands. Not only I had personally struggle with my own credit card debt for years, but I also saw first-hand how consumers, specially the millennial market, were growing more opposed to credit cards. That’s when my co-founder, Alejandro Quilici and I brought the idea of Reel to life. Instead of encouraging people to swipe a credit card, we set out to create a new debt-free shopping experience.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

As a society, we have been led to believe that the only way to achieve our goals is to go into debt. The financial system is incredibly predatory, from credit cards to loans at the point of purchase, it seems it’s all built to drive us into a vicious cycle of unnecessary debt. I myself struggled with credit card debt for years. The U.S. has $14.3 trillion in consumer debt. I founded Reel to debunk the myth that credit is the only way to achieve our goals, a myth that has caused so much harm to this society. Showing people that they can buy the things they want with their own cash flow is the first step towards achieving a better financial future. Whatever it is, a new computer, a pair of shoes, a comfy couch, at Reel we give the power to the consumer to achieve their aspirations, debt-free. We have taken a different approach to saving, connecting saving with shopping so we can ease people into feeling more comfortable with their cashflow. We have helped thousands of people save millions of dollars and I’m proud to say a high percentage of our users are Latinas like myself.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

It was my first ever investor meeting and I had no idea it was supposed to be a full pitch. I was so excited the first time an investor asked me to meet up, that I didn’t ask all the details, and it ended up being quite a mess. I learned to always ask details ahead of a meeting, to do full research on the person before I show up, and to always, always be ready to sell when the situation calls for it.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

Running a business requires a lot of mental space and it pays to have someone to guide you along the journey when need it. A big part of being a good CEO is investing time developing your personal skills so you can evolve as your company evolves. The founder you are when you have one employee has to be fundamentally different to the founder you need to be when you have 50 employees. One of the smartest moves I made early on was hiring a business coach, mine is Robyn Ward from Founder Forward. We meet on a weekly basis to discuss everything from hiring strategy, to fundraising, to establishing company values. She was the first person to tell me I should really focus on EQ instead of IQ when hiring, and that has been a huge learning. I’ve also learned a ton from my investors, Will Hsu from Mucker, is a person I highly respect and someone that always pushes for more. He was the first VC to write me a check. I appreciate his ambition; he is someone that will never think an idea is too crazy or too big to go after. I like a good dare.

Disrupting just to be a contrarian is counterproductive. Disruption is fantastic when it leads to evolution. I particularly like when companies disrupt a market because they see that the “traditional” way of doing things it’s not enough anymore. Look at Stripe, Square, Amazon, Instagram, Uber, they are all big disruptors, they challenged the way we transact, buy, interact with each other, and even move around (I have not owned a car in a year, and I live in LA). All this companies came to life in moments where businesses, and consumers were looking for alternatives to the norm. In many cases, companies that successfully disrupt a market have convenience as one of their biggest attributes, it might seem simple, however convenience is a big incentive for consumers.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Good stories shape the world: the biggest lesson working in advertising taught me was the importance of storytelling. I remember my first pitches to clients, they were very transactional and solely focused on the idea, I was missing the narrative behind them. Stories forge connections, culture; they shape the world around us. We have the power to create our narrative; focusing on what you have to bring to the table not only makes your ideas stronger, it also makes you mentally stronger. I love listening to stories and crafting stories, making any topic interesting for the listener forces me to stay creative.

You give life to what you give energy to: I’m selective with what, and whom I give my energy to. I learned from an early age that we control more than we think. The concept of reframing thoughts and doing self-affirmation came from my parents. When I was upset about something as a kid they would force me to think, why is what happened so important that you would choose to stay angry over playing with your friends? What can you do to solve it so you are not upset anymore? Honestly, it’s one of the best things they could have thought me. We have the power to be selective with our time and our brain space. Some people say I’m extremely positive, but the reality is that I just like to focus on doing things that fulfill me or finding solutions instead of problems.

Find moments of boredom: I heard this one a couple of years ago and it really got to me, because in an era where we are 1000% connected to a screen all the time, taking a step back and urging the need to be always “doing something” actually opens your brain to amazing ideas and it’s extremely relaxing and disorienting at the same time. When was the last time that you sat down and didn’t do anything for 10 minutes? I have to constantly force myself to step back and do nothing, let just thoughts flow. Some of the best ideas for Reel have come during this moments where I just decide to be.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

My vison is to give people the power to own what they love debt-free, to disrupt the way we shop online and offline. We have amazing partnerships in the works, so stay tuned.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

The book Measure What Matters was a huge catalyst to ignite a better structure around goal setting for my team. It helped me build a solid framework around what we prioritize on. Another book I recommend to everyone is Shoe Dog, Phil Knight’s journey of hustle, learnings and evolution is one of my old-time favorites. It reminds me that most people just see the tip of the iceberg, and thinking about his hustle gives me comfort.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

It’s actually a poem: “There is freedom waiting for you, on the breezes of the sky. And you ask, “What if I fall?” Oh, but my darling, “What if you fly?” I adore that poem, there is no chance of knowing what wou can achieve if you don’t try. That mentality lead me to start my company. I think there are no limits to what we can achieve if we set our mind to it. If you try and fail, congratulations, most people won’t even try. So, I say jump, the worse thing that can happen is that you learn from your mistakes and you move on stronger. Nelson Mandela said it best, “It always seems impossible until it’s done.”

I would inspire people prioritize on themselves. Humans tend to deprioritize their own needs and put themselves second. There is too much goodness being wasted for lack of selflove, it’s truly a shame. Invest in you, get a coach, book the massage, do something at least once a month that is good for you. When you feel good everything is better. always remember, in your world, you are the absolute boss.

How can our readers follow you online?

Daniela Corrente on linked in and @danicorrente on twitter also @joinreel on all social, of course.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Female Disruptors: Daniela Corrente of Reel On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Sahara Rose De Vore of The Travel Coach Network On The Three Things You Need To…

Female Disruptors: Sahara Rose De Vore of The Travel Coach Network On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

I created the The Travel Coach Network to bridge the gap between travel coaches and travel experts with those who wish to travel better, more effectively, and from experts who best relate to their specific needs. It is also a platform for travelers and companies to find and hire a travel coach who specializes in the niche that they are looking for.

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Sahara Rose De Vore.

Sahara Rose De Vore is a Travel Coach and founder of The Travel Coach Network™. After receiving a degree in Hospitality and Tourism Management, she spent over a decade traveling to more than 84 countries by the age of 31. She is the founder and owner of the world’s very first certification program for travel coaches called the Travel Coach Certification Program™. Sahara Rose helps business travelers and corporate employees have more meaningful experiences that improve their wellbeing through her own travel coaching services. She is also a business coach for other travel coaches and entrepreneurs through her various programs, events, and courses. A published author and global speaker, Sahara Rose is passionate about empowering people to take control over their travel experiences and have trips that boost their overall wellbeing and give them the transformative outcomes that they crave. She is a pioneer in the travel coaching industry and has been featured in over 45 media outlets including Forbes, Business Insider, Thrive Global, Yahoo! Finance, Best Company, Corporate Wellness Magazine, USA Today, U.S World News & Report, and Skift. She is also the founder of the #ThriveThroughTravel initiative which inspires people to travel in a way that helps them thrive in all aspects of their life. She was a 2019 nominee by career-changing women in the travel industry for rising female leader, best female coach, and best innovative trailblazer. You can learn more about Sahara Rose and The Travel Coach Network at https://thetravelcoachnetwork.com/

I grew up as an only child to a single mom. We could hardly afford to keep food in the cabinets, let alone see the world. Therefore, travel seemed so far out of reach for someone like myself. Plus, no one in our family or community was a traveler. Our idea of traveling was family road trips from the north of the U.S to the south Texas to visit my grandmother’s family near Mexico but, I was so young that I only remember bits and pieces of those adventures. I had a wanderlust soul and no idea where it came from.

I have always had an artistic eye so every time that I would see beautiful photos of lush green rainforests and colorful tropical birds in Costa Rica and other incredible places around the world, I was simply in awe. I saw movies with sky-high waterfalls and the most stunning white sand beaches. I knew that there was a whole world out there that I needed to explore but, how could I ever make that happen?

Well, I was determined to and I did.

When I graduated over a decade ago from university with a degree in hospitality and tourism management, I was very underwhelmed by the lack of diversity in career options. At the age of 22 I was unsure of the life that I wanted to have and what my passions were. I was struggling with anxiety and bouts of depression and knew that whatever it was that I was going to do with my life, I wanted it to bring me happiness, purpose, and I wanted to make an impact on the lives of others and the world.

I decided to take a very unconventional route and ignore what pressures society and family were placing on me. I booked a one-way ticket to Europe, packed a suitcase, and set off to find the answers that I was looking for.

I wound up falling in love with how much travel was helping and healing me that I spent over a ten years traveling on and off to over 84 countries by the age of 31.

The first half of my worldly adventure was the most difficult. The amount of travel resources, tools, and technology was limited. I remember traveling with a flip phone, paying to use internet wherever I could find a computer, and using a paper map to navigate around new cities.

Throughout the years, I got hands on experience with shifts in the travel industry. Talking with other travelers and having my own experiences, I learned what travelers used, liked, desired, and didn’t like. I also learned what problems, voids, and shortages existed in the travel industry and for travelers. Being a millennial in the mist of the rise of social media, it shown a light on how and why people were traveling as well as the growing desire for more freedom-based jobs.

Despite having a degree in tourism and years of traveling under my belt, I struggled for many years trying to figure out what travel-related career I wanted. I was aware of what existed; travel agents, booking managers, working for a company that paid me to travel for business, becoming a blogger, or growing my social media to become an influencer just to get free trips.

I wanted to do and be some more. I believed that my travel experiences, skills, knowledge, and perspectives were far more valuable and impactful than what I was told I could use them for.

I knew that since I couldn’t find what I was looking for, I had to create it myself.

That is when I decided to become a travel coach and specialize in helping business travelers and corporate employees have better and more meaningful travel experiences while bringing a fresh take on wellness travel

I am also pioneering the path for other ambitious and passionate travelers who desire to become certified travel coaches. I founded The Travel Coach Network™ because I wanted a place for travel coaches around the world to connect with other like-minded travel coaches and experts, list their business and niche, and for people and companies to find and hire a travel coach. I designed and accredited the very first travel coach certification program to make their journey easier and clearer as a travel coach and entrepreneur.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

After graduating from a hospitality and tourism program in university and then spending over a decade traveling the globe as a millennial, I was well aware of the types of careers that existed in the travel industry. Nothing felt authentic enough or worth spending my knowledge of travel on. Diving into the online world, I then became aware of what types of digital nomad or ‘freedom-based” jobs existed as well. I was getting tired of seeing the same things being posted about working from anywhere in the world or having a job in travel as an influencer or other already-done-before options.

I wanted to be something greater. I wanted to do something more authentic. I wanted to make more money doing something that I loved with something that I knew a lot about. I wanted to make a bigger impact.

The online coaching industry was talking about business coaches, life coaches, health coaches, and fitness coaches. I wasn’t seeing what felt right to me which was a way to help others through my knowledge, passion, skills, and experience in travel.

That is when I decided to break the mold of what is possible in a travel career and start a travel coaching business. It is a very new niche in the travel industry but is quickly gaining momentum. I recognized this at a very early stage which is what inspired me to create The Travel Coach Network™ (TCN), a place for travel coaches around the world to learn, connect, and grow.

I created the TCN to bridge the gap between travel coaches and travel experts with those who wish to travel better, more effectively, and from experts who best relate to their specific needs. It is also a platform for travelers and companies to find and hire a travel coach who specializes in the niche that they are looking for.

Within the TCN, I designed the world’s very first certification program for travel coaches called the Travel Coach Certification Program™. It is an accredited program by the International Coach Federation (ICF) that not only helps ambitious travelers start and grow a travel coaching business but it also is an all-encompassed program that focuses on the necessities for running an online business plus a community to connect and network with other travel coaches in a private online group.

Travel coaching not only disrupts the travel career or coaching industry but it also causes disruption across many industries. This is due to the need for experts like travel coaches. Every company has employees, employees have paid time off or vacation days to use. With most vacation days usually going to waste or not being used properly, travel coaches can help teach, guide, and empower employees on how to travel on their desired budgets, time frame, and to have the experiences that they need to thrive in both their personal and work-life. Post covid workplace will include more remote work jobs as well. Not everyone is accustomed to working remotely or traveling while working. This is also a place for travel coaches to come in with their expertise on adjustments, culture, and more. Travel coaches can shift the way that travel is viewed for improving wellbeing, boosting work performance, decreasing burnout, and helping companies succeed overall with happier employees, a healthier workplace, and a more creative and productive workforce.

I have always been someone who went against the grain on things. After college I decided to skip the typical corporate route and ignore society’s and family’s expectations and packed a bag to solo travel the globe for a decade. I never gave into jobs just because others were doing them or because they were already proven to be possible or easy. Therefore, being a pioneer in the travel coaching industry and paving a path for other passionate travelers is exactly what I was meant to do.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

One of the silliest things that I did when starting my business was when I launched a new group program and offered a payment plan, I accidently set it as a one-time payment which meant that I had to contact each client each month for that month’s payment until the three months were over. I learned to double check everything before making it available to my audience.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

One of my mentors, Minna Whitman, the Global Knowledge and Collaboration Lead at American Express Global Business Travel, is someone who has helped me tremendously in my business. I connected with Minna through the Global Business Travel Association’s Women in Travel organization because I was seeking someone to help and guide me through my own business journey. My favorite thing about having Minna as a mentor is how open she is to hearing my ideas and helping me break through my mental blocks. She made such an impact on me because she made me feel like my vision mattered and that I mattered. It’s important as a solopreneur to have adequate and genuine support and guidance. I also love hearing about her beautiful location of Nova Scotia, a place that I have always wanted to travel to.

One of the most successful and most disruptive companies ever is Amazon. Amazon is a great example of a combined positive and not so positive disruption of an industry.

A positive disruption makes people think in a way that is going to provide new opportunities and the betterment of an industry. Amazon changed the way that people do their shopping, allowing people to simply place an order online for practically anything that they need and then receive it at their doorstep without ever having to leave their home. This brings convenience, it saves time, and it lowers stress levels of running one more errand or having to go out in public. Consumers love Amazon for these reasons. The way that Amazon changed the commerce world is a game-changer and can be seen as a positive disruption.

At the same time, Amazon is also a good example of a not so positive disruption as well. It’s not so good to disrupt an industry in a way that is going to bring negative energy and influence over it. With the rise in ecommerce and Amazon came the downfall of brick and mortar stores. These stores and companies provided jobs for millions of people. There are now empty shopping malls and buildings where stores once stood. Companies must compete with online competitors like Amazon in order to stay afloat but most of them fail. Amazon isn’t loved by everyone. Not everyone prefers to shop online, not everyone wants to have an online business or job, and not everyone wants huge companies like Amazon to have so much control.

As industries evolve, innovation and disruption is inevitable.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

My mentor, David Meltzer’s, mentor is Gary V. He shared something that Gary V told him that really resonated with me. Gary told him that if you think you’re putting out too much content, put out more. As an online business owner, posting content is important but it’s easy to feel like you are annoying people with how often you post. Truth is, not everyone will see what you post every day plus, the people who aren’t your ideal clients or your supporters don’t need to be in your audience anyways.
David Meltzer, one of my mentors, always says to “be more interested than interesting”. People tend to try to impress or share their thoughts because they want to prove that they are capable or to convince someone of something. Instead, one of the best ways to really get to know your ideal clients or get the promotion or job that you want is to be more interested by asking questions, doing research, and simply just listening.
Another mentor of mine, Minna Whitman, told me how important it is to simplify the user experience. Although this sounds like an obvious to know and do, it’s easy to overcomplicate things. As a business owner, you might be overly excited and try to fit everything in one spot, or include every idea that you have, or give too many pieces of information. The user experience is what is most important. Keep things simple. Whether that is for a website, program, or any experience that a consumer has with your business. Simplify things.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

I am so excited for the future of my business. My platform is going to evolve into something that has never been done before. It will be a prime go-to place for travelers to change how and why they travel and it will provide opportunities for travel coaches to be hired and for companies to partner with my TCN. I will also infiltrate the travel agent industry with my signature travel coach approach and change how travel is viewed in business travel and the corporate world as well. My vision is big but my heart and passion is even bigger.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

Where do I even begin? Although it is 2020, there is still an imbalance between how men and women are viewed in leadership roles. Some of the biggest challenges faced by women disruptors that aren’t typically faced by men are credibility and being taken seriously. It seems that women need to prove themselves more than men do. What is her background? What are her credentials? What has she accomplished? Even when that is established, it’s still a matter of women being taken seriously enough. Is she as capable as a man is for this opportunity or role? Does she know as much? Will she take control well enough? Will she be as confident?

I love seeing more women in leadership and power positions, especially within the travel and hospitality industries. Those are two male dominated industries but seeing more and more women stand on stages, become decision-makers, and be in control, is inspiring for women entrepreneurs across all fields.

Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?

I remember sitting on a plane flying from Thailand to India in the mist of my aimless solo backpacking journey. Beside me sat a man in a business suit. We sparked conversation and he asked me why I was heading to India. I told him that I had always wanted to visit India but I had no specific reason for going other than I was just traveling for fun. I told him that I was just in Thailand for a month and shared some of my beautiful adventures with him. He said that he had been traveling for business for several years but never experienced anything like I had. He then expressed how envious he was of my life. I couldn’t believe it. There I sat, a dirty backpacking girl in her early 20’s with no direction or structure in life yet and this man in a business suit was telling me that he was envious of my life and wanted to do what I was doing. This was someone who had everything perfect on paper. He had a wife, family, great-paying corporate job, and traveled for business but, he was not happy with his life. This is when I knew that there must be another way for business travelers to have more meaningful experiences than what they were having. I knew how healing, joyous, and impactful having actual experiences around the world had on the mind, body, and the soul that it was obvious that there was a missing piece to this man’s life. This experience of mine made me think about the change that I would one day try to make in the business travel industry and for travelers in general.

It is part of my mission to inspire people to use travel as a way to thrive in their personal and work life. My movement is called the #ThriveThroughTravel initiative and represents the idea that travel can be used to help people do and be their best in all aspects of their life, work, and wellbeing.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

My favorite “life lesson quote” is “everything happens when it’s meant to happen”. The reason that this quote really hits home for me is because it proved to be consistent throughout my entire travel and business journey.

I was never one to have a clear idea on what my passions or my career path was. Even after graduating with a degree in tourism, I still had no clue what I want to do with my life. This sparked my desire to see the world. I began traveling before the fancy travel apps, resources, blogs, and tools that now exist. This forced me to see travel in a different and more skillful point of view. I learned many challenges and really got to see what travelers liked, wanted, used, and didn’t like about the travel industry. My age also came in handy because as a millennial, I had a perspective and experience with the rise in social media and digital nomad jobs than other generations. I was still struggling for many years trying to figure out what my dream career path and my purpose was. I knew that there must be a more meaningful way for me to put my travel knowledge and skills to better and a more lucrative use. I chose to continue to travel and learn even more about the travel industry in the meantime.

When I turned 30, I told myself that it was time to put on my thinking cap and figure out what I wanted to do in life. I knew that since I couldn’t find what I was looking for, I had to create it myself. By that time, social media was more evolved, the online world was booming, and there were unlimited amounts of platforms to learn how to start and grow an online business. It was also when I discovered the surge in the online coaching industry and everything just clicked. I wanted to become a travel coach.

If I was born at a different time in life, if I began my journey around the world earlier or later in life, or if I never pushed myself to keep on waiting, learning, and experiencing even more about travel, I know that I would not have created what I created in business. I was meant to be challenged. I was meant to be the pioneer that I am. I was meant to create my business exactly when I did.

That’s why everything happens when it’s mean to happen. So, be patient, trust the universe, and believe in your own journey.

How can our readers follow you online?

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SaharaRoseTheTravelCoach
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thetravelcoachnetwork/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sahara-rose-de-vore-4b8bb394/

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Female Disruptors: Sahara Rose De Vore of The Travel Coach Network On The Three Things You Need To… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

David Kessler of Grief.com: “Five Things We Can Do To Develop Serenity And Support Each Other…

David Kessler of Grief.com: “Five Things We Can Do To Develop Serenity And Support Each Other During These Anxious Times”

Come into the present. Living in the future or the past can take away the good and safety of this moment. You are okay now

As a part of my series about the the things we can do to develop serenity and support each other during anxious times, I had the pleasure of interviewing David Kessler.

David Kessler is the world’s foremost expert on healing after loss. His experience with thousands of people on the edge of life and death has taught him the secrets to living a happy and fulfilled life, even afterlife’s tragedies. He is the author of six books, including the new bestselling book, Finding Meaning: The Sixth Stage of Grief. He coauthored two books with Elisabeth Kubler Ross, including On Grief and Grieving updated her 5 stages for grief. His first book, The Needs of The Dying received praise from Saint (Mother) Teresa.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the backstory about what brought you to your specific career path? Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?

As a child witnessing a mass shooting while my mother was dying in a hospital, it helped me begin my journey. For most of my life, I have taught physicians, nurses, counselors, police, and first responders about the end of life, trauma, and grief. However, despite my vast knowledge on grief, my life was turned upside down by the sudden death of my twenty-one-year-old son. It inspired me to write my newest book, Finding Meaning: The Sixth Stage of Grief.

What advice would you suggest to your colleagues in your industry to thrive and avoid burnout?

Try to balance work and off time. It’s not easy to do and one you must keep rebalancing. Work to live, not live to work. No one’s last words were ever, “I’m so glad I finished that report for work early or stayed at work late.”

Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

How to Stop Worrying and Start Living by Dale Carnegie was one of the first self help books I read, it helped me to see our mind can work against us.

Ok, thank you for all that. Now let’s move to the main focus of our interview. Many people have become anxious just from the dramatic jolts of the news cycle. The fears related to the coronavirus pandemic have only heightened a sense of uncertainty, fear, and loneliness. From your experience or research what are five steps that each of us can take to develop serenity during such uncertain times? Can you please share a story or example for each.

1. Learn what is in your control and what is not. Focus on what you can do. Wear a mask, stay six feet away from others.

2. Come into the present. Living in the future or the past can take away the good and safety of this moment. You are okay now

3. Don’t keep watching the bad movie in our minds. Our mind can picture the worst scenario and scare us. It can be helpful to think of the best scenario. We can stay safe until a vaccine comes.

4. Connect with those who are more optimistic than you. We often gravitate to those who agree with our fears. Try to find those who are more helpful.

5. Go outside. Just being inside all the time can increase our anxiety. Going outside can be very helpful

From your experience or research what are five steps that each of us can take to effectively offer support to those around us who are feeling anxious? Can you explain?

1. Validate what they are feeling

2. Don’t tell them not to be anxious

3. Don’t minimize what they are feeling

4. Let your state of mind be contagious

5. Stock up on compassion

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Do you have a story about how that was relevant in your life?

Be kind, for everyone is fighting a battle you know nothing about.

— Anonymous

You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

Contagious Compassion

What is the best way our readers can follow you online?

www.Facebook.com/IamDavidkessler

www.twitter.com/IamDavidKessler

www.instagram.com/IamDavidKessler

Thank you David, for these fantastic insights. We wish you only continued success in your great work!

David Kessler of Grief.com: “Five Things We Can Do To Develop Serenity And Support Each Other… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Shelli Pavone of Inlightened On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Female Disruptors: Shelli Pavone of Inlightened On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

What makes healthcare so incredibly difficult is its diversity — of patients, conditions, settings (both geographic and urban vs. rural), specialties. There’s a saying in healthcare: “If you’ve talked to one doctor, you’ve talked to one doctor.” So, when an innovator comes along and wants to develop a solution to a problem, and seeks insight/input from 1–2 doctors — which is quite typical of the process — that innovation is still very likely to miss the mark, and subsequently fail. Consider the healthcare innovation rate… it’s as high as 96%!

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Shelli Pavone.

As CEO and co-founder of Inlightened, Shelli Pavone brings nearly 20 years of commercial experience in healthcare, and a history of developing sales strategy and teams from the ground up. Having spent her entire career focused on healthcare, she understands the unique challenges that come with disrupting an incredibly complex market, and founded Inlightened to help innovators do so responsibly (because moving fast and breaking things isn’t always best). She believes strongly that connecting — and fostering collaboration between — clinicians and innovators will help shape the future of healthcare.

Originally, my plan was to get a Ph.D. in Psychology, but I was lured into pharmaceutical sales out of college. It turned out to be the right move for me, as I quickly learned how exciting the clinical side of medicine could be. I loved everything about my job at the time — from the intense and immersive training to hands-on time with patients and clinicians.

Over time, I started to work with hospital administration and gained insight into how decisions are made. I began to see so many disparities in innovation (and lack thereof). I lost count of the times clinicians were left out of the product development process, even if it was being built for their use — to address their perceived challenges. That just didn’t make sense to me; that we could design and develop a product to be used by a physician, without their firsthand knowledge. Consequently, innovations miss the mark far more frequently than they meet it, and that failure can sometimes be enough to end a new company or product before they even launch.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

It’s not easy to change a process that’s embedded in the healthcare “system,” which can be seen in the old school way innovators work with clinical experts; the process has been around and largely unquestioned for decades. For example, a healthcare startup in need of clinical expertise might reach out to its community of investors, colleagues, and mentors to source a couple of experts. No commitment to diversity of thought, experience, or specialty.

But what makes healthcare so incredibly difficult is its diversity — of patients, conditions, settings (both geographic and urban vs. rural), specialties. There’s a saying in healthcare: “If you’ve talked to one doctor, you’ve talked to one doctor.” So, when an innovator comes along and wants to develop a solution to a problem, and seeks insight/input from 1–2 doctors — which is quite typical of the process — that innovation is still very likely to miss the mark, and subsequently fail. Consider the healthcare innovation rate… it’s as high as 96%!

We seek to responsibly disrupt the process. So, rather than “move fast and break things,” we are enabling healthcare innovators to move fast(ish) by facilitating quick and easy access to the clinical expertise that can lead to successful innovation. All of this is supported by a tech platform through which companies can create projects, peruse experts, schedule engagements, and automate payment. We set out to address the pain points so commonly associated with healthcare consulting and expert networks by introducing an unprecedented level of transparency, and access to a community of invitation-only, vetted, and curated expertise.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I’m not sure I’d call it a mistake, but more of a “lesson learned over time.” When you’re a highly vigilant individual, it’s easy to not only notice but take very personally, when people don’t get back to you. And, when you’re starting a company — particularly one built around a network — the silence can be deafening and have a real impact on your psyche.

Whether it’s driven by imposter syndrome, being a female (particularly in a male-dominated industry), both, or something else entirely, I had to quickly learn how to overcome that.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

Kevin Ban, Chief Medical Officer at Walgreens, has been both a personal mentor and champion for Inlightened. Early on in the process of vetting the idea for Inlightened, Kevin provided some incredibly valuable insight: “Ideas are a dime a dozen; the real proof is in the execution.” While he loved the idea, he was clear that just because it had merit — and could make an impact — it would only do so with the right team, attention, commitment, mission and execution.

We emphasize “responsible disruption,” especially in healthcare. Not everything needs to be disrupted. The field we’re entering did. So, we took a very focused approach to designing Inlightened, zeroing in on what others in the field were missing, and building our values on those gaps. We don’t want to break anything, but rather improve the process and system, which we anticipate will have a positive impact on healthcare innovation — or disruption — as a whole.

Disruption for disruption’s sake isn’t always a positive thing. In an industry like healthcare, people’s lives are at stake, so we need to be even more responsible with the innovation we undertake.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Seek out diversity of opinion. If we continue to talk to the same experts from the same institutions, treating the same patient populations, we get the same perspective, over and over. Diversity of thought, experience, background, culture, race, gender — these are all necessary if we want to ensure healthcare works for everyone.
Push through — don’t give up. Throughout the Inlightened journey, we’ve had several people encourage us to push through the lulls, doubts, and disappointments that inevitably come with starting a new company. We used that encouragement to fall back on our mission and stay the course.
Connecting people is valuable and worthwhile. At Inlightened, we live by the Golden Rule. We are focused on helping people and make a difference where we can, and even do our best to make connections and support collaboration that may not happen through our network. We don’t want to lose sight of that mission, so it’s really valuable to know it resonates.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

We want to take Inlightened from a platform to a community, to leverage the collective power of the network we’re building. Our forward focus is creating a sense of community where there is a free flow of knowledge and ideas, and members feel empowered to proactively share their specialized perspectives — all with the ultimate intent of advancing innovation in healthcare.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

A favorite book of mine will always be The Hard Thing About Hard Things, by Ben Horowitz.

There was also something during a webinar with Sarah Knight & Erica Williams Simon that resonated, especially since the pandemic upended life as we knew it, and focusing on our mission became just as important as learning what not to pursue:

“Be honest with yourself about what you want and don’t want, express that honestly and politely, and say ‘no’ to things that don’t serve that.”

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Do unto others.” I grew up in the Midwest, hearing often about the importance of treating people as I would like to be treated. That has stayed with me throughout my life, and is a value with which I designed and launched Inlightened. The way we treat our partners — both on the innovator and clinical expert sides — comes down to this. Respect, transparency, honesty, kindness — these are things we prioritize above all else.

I truly believe if we can inspire diversity of thought in healthcare — having diverse perspectives shared across the industry — everyone could embrace it. I’d be honored to inspire that movement.

How can our readers follow you online?

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shelli-pavone-a729b2/

Twitter: @GetInlightened

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Female Disruptors: Shelli Pavone of Inlightened On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Annette Estrada of Mini Manifesters On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up…

Female Disruptors: Annette Estrada of Mini Manifesters On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

I am currently creating a social justice movement; the name of my company is Mini Manifesters; I am in the research and development phase where I am testing out my youth development curriculum. My curriculum guides youth to create prototypes of their own ideas which in turn will serve their peers and community based on the need. Towards the end of the program our young leaders will release their prototype and test its efficacy with their peers, family, and community.

As a part of our series about strong women leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Annette Estrada.

Annette is working on the final version of her book Mini Manifesters, A Pocketbook for Any Adult Who Serves Kids, scheduled for release Fall 2020, check out Mini Manifesters at www.minimanifesters.com and her podcast https://anchor.fm/annette408.

I am a credentialed classroom teacher, going into my 8th year of teaching. Ever since I was a child, I pretended to be a teacher; with friends, we’d argue about who’d teach and which lessons we would lead. In middle school, I initially had dreams of becoming a Marine Biologist, but I feared math and scared myself out of that career path. I did not receive as much guidance as I needed in high school, and at the end of my Senior year, I decided to attend my local state university. As a Freshman in college, I convinced myself that Advertising was my passion. I liked the idea of impacting so many people at once by stimulating people’s emotions, feelings, and thoughts. The Mass Media program was not inspiring as I initially thought; I tried to psyche myself up, but I went through the motions until graduation. Social interaction was the most inspiring throughout the totality of my school years. I was usually a part of student government, ethnic clubs, choir, mock trial, Greek life etc. The social experiences were a true blessing, as they kept me anchored in academics. My social experiences remind me that some students aren’t academically motivated because there are other needs that need to be met first: The sense of belonging.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

I am currently creating a social justice movement; the name of my company is Mini Manifesters; I am in the research and development phase where I am testing out my youth development curriculum. My curriculum guides youth to create prototypes of their own ideas which in turn will serve their peers and community based on the need. Towards the end of the program, our young leaders will release their prototype and test its efficacy with their peers, family, and community.

I’ll also be creating a curriculum for adults with kids in their life. The adult curriculum is for people who want to take their leadership further, with the kids in their life, by creating an environment conducive for young creators to help our young leaders create a new reality, a new world; the adult curriculum will have many of the elements from my book, Mini Manifesters A Pocketbook for Adults Who Serve Kids, to be released in Fall 2020.

Many change-making organizations charge to enroll students and parents into their program, it will be my job to figure out how to help families and their young leaders access this material for FREE! Many of the changemaker programs are marketed to families that can afford an opportunity like this, but our most vulnerable communities cannot be forgotten with all the pure energy of love and intelligence they hold, all of this goodness needs to be tapped into! What are we waiting for? Why only offer this way of life for people who can afford to pay? What about the families who can’t afford it?

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

The funniest mistake I have made thus far is how I’ve anticipated a huge rush of events happening once I revealed my project however, people can’t be interested if there isn’t enough data and if people aren’t aware of what I’ve been developing. With this, sure and steady is the pace I have had to accept while simultaneously piecing together all the moving foundational pieces and developing the heart of the organization. My excitement and acknowledgment of the need for a paradigm shift such as this will have to move at a steady pace during its developmental stages. If I release too early, there may be some crucial details that could be overlooked, which will open up my organization to a vulnerable unsteady state.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

Along the way, teachers from middle and high school guided me. My parents’ unhealthy relationship taught me the importance of safety, stability, and loyalty. My current mentors are, my partner, my own children, and my students; all three entities, on a continuous basis, teach me so much about pure potentiality and the use of energy which has given me the ability to shift my own reality for the better. Before my partner and I got together, I was a free spirit doing as I pleased. Teaching and parenting my children, dating and going out; during this time, I was blessed to have witnessed the magic that occurred when children were given the space to create and be free to be themselves. This freedom, in turn, helped me be a free spirit and enjoy life!

Amidst the magic, I observed an important element was missing, I wasn’t evaluating, fast enough, the wounds that impacted my daily interactions. Once my partner and I got together, accountability on both ends skyrocketed through the roof, and I started to recognize how I would easily go into autopilot if I was triggered. To this day, we continue on this journey to self-betterment. There are many times when the journey seems bleak and heavy; I’m slowly practicing not to take things personally, the interactions with my partner remind me how taking things personally makes the journey unbearable. My partner teaches me what I need in order to have a healthy relationship; he teaches me that I have to put up tough boundaries, so I don’t become a doormat: One of the best and biggest life lessons yet.

Disrupting a system that hurts humanity in any way, is positive! The negative aspect of breaking up an old system are the supporters of the old idea; they’ll come with guns blazing; there is little room to advocate for new ideas or a new way that will benefit all because as we know from experience, many systems are used to protect and serve certain groups. For example, if we refer to the impactful study, Savage Inequalities, by Jonathan Kozol, he illustrates numerous accounts around the United States of the huge disparities in education and the difference in the quality of education based on socioeconomic and racial differences of pupils in neighboring communities. To this day, the disparity between affluent students and marginalized students impact the quality of education, a long-standing issue. However, the charter school movement was created to break away from this long-standing disparity! Charter schools were created to give EVERYONE choice regardless of your zip code. Key phrase, CHOICE FOR EVERYONE!

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

“This too shall pass”, “If you build it, they will come”, and “Don’t worry what other people think.” Creating Mini Manifesters this past year was easy in the beginning. Maybe because I had the full support of my entrepreneurial group, The Powerhouse Academy. As my book ends its last round of edits, my pilot program ends in several weeks, and my podcast continues on its way; I wonder in this first phase, what’s to come next, fearing my momentum will somehow die. When times seem bleak, when I doubt Mini Manifesters will lift off the ground, when ideas are constantly bombarding me in addition to the daily rigor of being a partner, mother, entrepreneur, and teacher; I think about the aforementioned advice which centers me. It is rare but through this journey, it is easy to freeze from fear, but slow and steady has been my best friend and celebrating the wins reinforces the good work set forth.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

I am not done yet! Releasing my book in Fall 2020, Mini Manifesters, A Pocketbook For Adults Who Serve Kids; piloting my curriculum to many more youth groups; collecting data that reflects the good work my curriculum produces for adults, youth, and the community! Lastly, spreading the word and making connections to position this social justice movement as a necessity to nurture our young leaders of the NOW!

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

The biggest challenge women disruptors encounter is the inequality between women who have young ones to take care of versus all others who don’t need to worry about this detail. Women disruptors with family have the same challenges all other disruptors encounter in addition to the daily ups and downs of taking care of a family, especially young ones. Many counterparts, without little ones to take care of, have readily accessible energy, time, and resources to push their cause through. There have been many studies that show, in any given industry, that many working women who prioritize family care leave give up their chance to elevate from their position; allowing all others without childcare responsibilities a chance to accelerate their growth and possibly take over positions left by people, mainly women, in this predicament.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

TEDx, Bertice Berry’s Walking With Purpose. She talks about the importance of working on ourselves, when we focus on ourselves, in turn, we’re working on everyone else. I believe in the idea that we are all connected; the pain and happiness one experiences can be felt; which reminds us all of the importance of being the change we wish to see. She talks about when you walk with purpose not only are you taking care of yourself, in turn, we are taking care of others, in addition to colliding with destiny! Walking with purpose reminds us that we all have a choice to live life through love impacting the UNIVERSE! Can you imagine, if on a global level we all lived every moment of our life with pure intention and love, how different humanity, the world, and our universe would be. It would be a different place; it would contain the richest energy: Love. It all begins with us, beginning within is the key to making this change. I believe it is during this time of the pandemic, racial tension, and all other injustices happening around the globe where we are forced to sit in our own “stuff”, reflect, and change for the better, in the end resulting in the betterment of humanity! It all begins with the love we have for ourselves, which is walking with purpose.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

A life quote that impacts my life daily is “If you want to be trusted, be honest. If you want to be honest, be true. If you want to be true, be yourself. In a world full of lies, opinions, truths, and half-truths, in the end, the only thing we ever have is ourselves. If we are not true to ourselves, becoming the best version of ourselves will come slowly. If we aren’t true to ourselves beginning within will be difficult leaving the void within unexamined and not allowing ourselves to walk with purpose. If we’re not walking with purpose, there will be nothing to disrupt, all we will encounter is the superficial reality that has been created for us; without purpose, we will follow blindly and follow the reality that have no plans for us all to meet our purpose.

It would be my Mini Manifesters, a social justice movement. Imagine harnessing the youthful energy and power of our young leaders and all the people they influence. Imagine adults nurturing an environment for young ones conducive to creation and social change! So many of our young ones see and experience injustices, pain, and cruelty inflicted on our natural environment, their community, and their world. They want to be a part of the change! They are not the leaders of the future! Our youth are the leaders of the NOW!!! This is the exact movement I am working to bring to light! With the bombardment of technology, our young ones are being sucked of their creativity! This movement is progressing, and it will help make a difference in our unjust world!

How can our readers follow you online?

Readers can start at my website www.minimanifesters.com. From there, Mini Manifesters has a Facebook page featuring weekly updates regarding my book and other creations I’m cooking up. If you are into podcasts, my pilot youth group helps host our podcast Mini Manifesters: Small Talk Big Minds at https://anchor.fm/annette408. The podcast showcases the journey our young leaders encounter as they build community serving prototypes using social-emotional, restorative justice, and design thinking practices.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Female Disruptors: Annette Estrada of Mini Manifesters On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Sonia Khemiri and Sylvie Giret of Beautyque NYC On The Three Things You Need…

Female Disruptors: Sonia Khemiri and Sylvie Giret of Beautyque NYC On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

We are altering the traditional way for brands to sell through e-commerce: they have an innovative, high quality store-like place where they can showcase their products. We are giving them the opportunity to tell their story and engage with consumers in multiple ways including though live events, where they can interact directly, through embedded video content where they pass their own messages and more

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Sonia Khemiri and Sylvie Giret.

As beauty brand founders, both Sonia and Sylvie, who are French-born and US-based businesswomen, understand the complexities of taking a product to market. It was when discussing their own needs as indie brand founders that Sonia and Sylvie created Beautyque NYC: a space that would mix the benefits of a tradeshow, of a showroom and of a retail store, where they could safely engage with customers and take the time to explain their products and brand concepts. They created Beautyque NYC as a disrupter for the beauty and wellness retail industry to elevate the digital platform for independent and emerging brands.

When we look at the definition of disruptive it’s either interruptive by causing a disturbance or drastically altering the structure of something. We are definitely the second one. We are altering the traditional way for brands to sell through e-commerce: they have an innovative, high-quality store-like place where they can showcase their products. We are giving them the opportunity to tell their story and engage with consumers in multiple ways including live events, where they can interact directly, through embedded video content where they pass their own messages and more. Our community, made of several thousands of beauty enthusiasts, likes this new platform, although it’s also very new to them. Pretending it was in our plans since the beginning would be lying, and COVID was the trigger to what Beautyque NYC is now. In a way, we had to disrupt our own vision of our own model, which was an omnichannel platform focusing around a physical store. But since we couldn’t do it this way, we had to find another way to execute our vision in a very short amount of time.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Before COVID, we were having appointments on the phone with brands to talk to them through our model and encouraging them to join us. We were expecting to do one of these calls in our shared space at the wing that is unfortunately closed now and we had an appointment with a bank before that but we did not plan it right and the appointment at the bank took more time than expected. We did not want to miss the call. In the middle of a noisy space, we asked the bank representative if we could use one of his offices for the call. He was surprised by our request, but he allowed us to use their meeting office for the appointment. The call lasted 30 minutes and the bank representative even brought us some coffee. That was a very funny moment.

We learned to plan our week ahead together in order not to find ourselves in this situation even if it was funny in hindsight.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

Sonia: I did not have direct mentors but definitely one of my ex-bosses in my early career had an impact on me. He was a successful real estate developer and he was always telling me to never assume, and always work with method and discipline. My parents were indirect mentors by example. My dad did not tell me much, I just saw him doing and talking about his own experiences. I always saw courage in his actions facing adversity with strength and I have never seen him depressed or complaining. This had a huge impact on personality and who I am today.

One day I came back from school crying because I had received a 90% on an exam that I was expecting 100%. My dad surprisingly was home and was worried about seeing me crying — he probably thought someone bullied me or something like that, but when I told him he laughed out loud. It annoyed me and he saw that. Then he stepped back and told me something I will never forget: If you want to succeed you will face failure many times and without that you won’t succeed. I did not understand right away what he said but it made me think each time I face a result lower than my expectations.

Sylvie: Two of my bosses in my early career helped me a lot. They had one common principle that they kept repeating, and I still remember it fondly and I use it every day: Make decisions every day and get things done. You’re going to make bad decisions and good decisions, but at least there will be good decisions in it.

Being disruptive is pretty much what many brands would like to achieve. When we look throughout the times of human history, disruption is what made us evolve as human species. Everyone would like to be the pioneer of a change to something new, easier, more convenient and different that makes a real impact in people’s lives. If a system or structure has withstood the test of time it is probably because it’s convenient, comfortable, or classic and when it’s like that there is probably no reason to disrupt that. For example, if there was no pandemic, there wouldn’t have been a good reason to force the retail industry to change as long as people wanted to go to stores. The technology was already evolving in a way toward change slowly to enhance digital space commerce.

On the other hand, when we disrupt a space because we want to change things that are not convenient for a particular reason, and if that reason resonates with enough people, the disruption can only be positive. Also, as in our case, the disruption came from a crisis and a way to do things differently because the circumstances are forcing us to survive a challenging situation. In this case, it’s only a positive thing as it’s a solution to a particular problem that serves a purpose.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Sonia:

1. If someone can do It, then I can do it. This comes from my dad. For example, when I identified what is not working for my beauty brand I wanted to know what other successful brands are doing that I was not. I was reading articles, magazines, stories, but it was not enough for me. Then one time I spent two days in a CEO summit where all the big names of the industry were present. My brand did not belong there, but I was determined to meet and understand what was going on. I met several interesting people that were open to tell me their own stories and I even spent the whole two days with the founder of a company that was sold for $900 million dollars. Some people questioned my presence, but for me it was very insightful as it helped open my scope of analysis and allowed me to see other opportunities for my brand and brands like mine.

2. Know your industry as if it was a PhD. Since my background was not in beauty, I needed to understand it well. Then I went to networking events, took classes in formulation, took classes in FIT, subscribed to all of the beauty magazines and attended trade shows. Sometimes I felt it was too much, but when I look backward it served me to learn things I didn’t know and see opportunities I did not otherwise.

3. Do what you want, not what others want. Where I come from, women are meant to be well educated, professional and married. Some saw me as a future doctor, a bank executive — both great professions but not an entrepreneur. I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur and I did not share it out loud, not even to my family. I was not hearing what people thought about what I should be or should do and I am glad I did not listen.

Sylvie:

Make decisions every day. When we launched Beautyque NYC online, we didn’t spend time drafting plans and thinking about the things we would need to achieve. Sonia and I are both very pragmatic and we kept it very ‘hands-on’. A few times it happened that we started talking about implementing an idea on Monday, and after a very quick evaluation of the risks and the process, we would launch the task or the program by the end of the same week if not earlier. Of course, we made a few mistakes along the way, but very small and much smaller than the positive outcome that was gained. The launch of Beautyque NYC itself is an example. The launch of what we call our Brand Evaluation program, the launch of our live events — all these ideas were discussed.
Learn from the ones who have done it successfully, and don’t waste time listening to the rest.
Follow your gut.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

We want to bring our knowledge and expertise to other retailers — to help them pivot and adjust to these unprecedented times. With this perspective, we are developing our own code to be able to push the technology to its maximum and fully customize the experience.

In terms of technology and helping others, for us it’s important to build our own platform to help other retailers in these very unpredictable times. We are planning to have a platform that is totally customizable and a perfect replica of the real store, with enhanced and easy shopping experiences.

We are also creating a community of brand founders and a community of women. We want and we will be creating a market share for brands that are worth being seen and not only the ones the biggest retailers want. We are building a community of women where they will have the freedom and comfort to learn about their beauty, sexual life, skincare and make up and the ability to purchase great products under one digital roof.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

Sometimes women in beauty are thought to be in the industry just because they like cosmetics and makeup. For example, Sylvie And I are far from being makeup junkies. We do not see it this way really, even if we are aware of women’s challenges, because we are one of them. We prefer to focus on the things that we have to do in order to succeed. It’s already challenging to succeed in a disruption because you may be bothering some established structures. In our case, we are responding to a problem that we are all facing. It will take time because whatever we knew before is gone, there is so much uncertainty that some still hold in the old way to feel secure. However, whether we like it or not, things are changing and focusing on our gender challenges may be very secondary in this case. We may treat it as we treat racism, or islamophobia or anti-Semitisms. We won’t fight their beliefs of who is facing us, but we’ll get through it to get what we want if needed.

Access to funding is still very sexist and even if it’s changing, it’s changing slowly. More male-founded businesses receive funding from VC’s and investors in general than female-founded businesses.

There is also a general inclination to doubt female disruptors capabilities: does she mean it? Is she capable of it? Does she know what she’s doing? How is she going to manage? That tends to get many women to hold back and not necessarily give their best. Overall, ambition is more often perceived as a negative quality in a woman when it would be positive in a man.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

Sonia: The last book that had an impact on me was a book from Yuval Noah Harari. I was at the airport and bought it for my flight and I actually finished it on the flight. His point of view as a historian resonated with me when he was talking about the difference between us and animals and why we were at the top food chain — it is our capacity of telling stories. Stories are used everywhere from religion, to politics, to marketing. It’s all about stories and how well you are telling your story. It resonated with me because telling a story was not my natural thing and I learned to pay more attention to it.

Sylvie: I have many, but Sheryl Sandberg’s book “Lean In” is the one that I learned a lot from. Among the many aspects of women leadership that she deals with, I like the idea of the jungle gym versus the traditional approach of the ladder. It particularly resonates with me since I changed countries three times in my adult life, and my career at least as many times. There was no way for me to climb a ladder since my cards were reshuffled every time I moved to a new country, with not only a new job, but a whole new industry.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

Sonia: If someone can do it, then I can do it! That comes from my dad. It was relevant for me as I learned to study what people do to get where they are and I do the same if that’s what I want, but different in my way. It just gives me the confidence to do it.

Sylvie: Do not let anyone decide for yourself.

We are all surrounded by people who want to give us advice and “help” us. Listening to the right people is as important as making sure we don’t listen only to what we want to hear. At the end of the day, we are the ones making the decisions.

#Beautyquefest a festival celebrating beauty in all colors, age, sex, religion… a party where everyone will put themselves at their best. We help them do that and party together. A semi-annual event where thousands of people come to celebrate and enjoy their life and celebrate their beauty.

How can our readers follow you online?

On Instagram https://www.instagram.com/beautyquenyc/

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/beautyquenyc

Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/company/beautyque-nyc

Website: www.beautyque.nyc

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Female Disruptors: Sonia Khemiri and Sylvie Giret of Beautyque NYC On The Three Things You Need… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Sheri Atwood of SupportPay On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Female Disruptors: Sheri Atwood of SupportPay On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

SupportPay is disruptive because there has been no solution on the market for divorced, separated or single parents to manage child support and share expenses directly with each other. We are the only solution that helps coparents with sharing their child(ren)’s expenses. Ultimately, our mission is to get all children the financial support they deserve, from both parents.

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Sheri Atwood.

Sheri Atwood is the Founder & CEO of child support payment platform SupportPay, and a former Silicon Valley executive. Atwood is a child of a bitter divorce who also went through her own divorce and created SupportPay when her search for a better way to exchange and communicate about child support payments with her ex-husband proved fruitless.

Fast Company named Sheri one of the 100 Most Creative People in Business in 2017 for her work on inventing a digital solution to the child support payment process. Prior to starting SupportPay, Sheri was a successful marketing and product executive with Fortune 500 experiences, and has also been named “#5 of 50 Women in Tech Dominating Silicon Valley” and “Top 40 Under 40 Executive in Silicon Valley”.

SupportPay is the first-ever automated child support payment platform, poised to transform the complex, time-consuming & stressful process that impacts nearly 300 million parents exchanging more than $900 billion in child support & child expenses worldwide. With SupportPay, today’s modern families can spend less time managing and arguing about child support, and more time focused on raising happy, healthy children.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

Prior to SupportPay, I had a very lucrative career as a marketing executive in Silicon Valley, including being the youngest Vice President at Symantec. I was a divorced single mom who was busy juggling a career and raising a child, and I quickly realized that you get a bill for everything in life but you don’t get a bill for child support. I searched high and low for a solution and was shocked to find out there was nothing available. At the same time, my daughter had to have emergency brain surgery which really forced me to look at how I was spending my time. I realized then that if I was going to spend so much time away from my daughter I wanted to work on something that made an impact in the world. I decided to quit my job and start SupportPay — giving parents who live apart a solution to manage their child support and share expenses.

To read my full story, visit: https://bit.ly/sheriatwoodstory

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

SupportPay is disruptive because there has been no solution on the market for divorced, separated or single parents to manage child support and share expenses directly with each other. We are the only solution that helps co-parents with sharing their child(ren)’s expenses. Ultimately, our mission is to get all children the financial support they deserve, from both parents.

Can you share the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

“Don’t talk about it, be about it” — This is my personal motto I learned a long time ago and try to live by it. There are a lot of people in this world who will tell you what they are going to do — but very few that actually do it.

How are you going to shake things up next?

I think through my comeback story — it’s starting to shake some things up now. The next step is to be incredibly successful and expand my company to not only help parents support their children, but to take the same platform and help siblings support their parents. Our goal is to be the modern family finance platform.

Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?

I have a few favorite books that have had an impact on my thinking including “Blink”, “Multitasking is a Myth” and “Understanding Their Myers Briggs”. “Multitasking is a Myth” is interesting because it’s all about how modern technology and all our communication platforms are making us less productive, not more productive. “Blink” helps to work on gaining enough experience to trust your gut when making decisions. “Understanding Their Myers Briggs” was insightful to read because most people who do Myers Briggs or other personality tests are simply looking for information about themselves. However, where these are powerful is being able to identify other people’s communication type and then communicate with them in that way. This also helped me realize that it is imperative to have people on your team that are different types — and allow for those types to thrive in order to get the most out of your team.

I’m also a huge documentary buff and recently watched “RBG” and “Seeing Allred” which have helped me see how women can actually make a difference, especially since it has never been easy.

I have so many but to narrow it down:

True equality between men and women, especially when it comes to startup funding as women still only get 2% of the VC funding available.
Educating our children on our true history. They say if you don’t learn from history it is bound to repeat itself. However, I never realized until having a child and seeing what they are teaching her, how much of our history and the way it is told is completely controlled by white men.
Educating our children on finances. I grew up very poor and was raised by a single mom. I was never taught what a credit score was (or why it mattered), how to balance my bank account or what an APR rate is — just to name a few. I am astounded that even today, many years later with my daughter in high school, that young adults are not taught these basic personal finance lessons. How can we expect our children to be ready for the world and be successful if our education system isn’t teaching this?

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

Besides the one I previously mentioned, my favorite these days are:

“It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.” — Babe Ruth
“Discipline is just choosing between what you want now and what you want most”
“There is no elevator to success. You have to take the stairs”
“If you really want to do something you’ll find a way. If you don’t, you’ll find an excuse.” — Jim Rohn

How can our readers follow you online?

Twitter: @sheriatwood or @supportpayapp

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/sheriatwood

Facebook: https://facebook.com/supportpay

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Female Disruptors: Sheri Atwood of SupportPay On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Salima Vellani of Kbox On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

…What makes KBox special is our AI and machine learning technology that enables advanced analytics. We help kitchens find the right set of food brands for their local market, and then we future proof them by keeping them current, through a sophisticated mix of data evaluation — but without the need for a data scientist. Using our AI, we can also forecast demand for each kitchen, which in turn minimizes waste, improves staff utilization, and morale, and thus improves the profitability of each host kitchen.

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Salima Vellani.

Salima Vellani is the founder and CEO of KBox global and Absurd Bird. A fascinating mix of business acumen and foodie passion, Salima used her background in strategy consulting and corporate finance to move into the restaurant space over 10 years ago and has since been a serial founder in the F&B industry. She has co-founded, invested in, opened and advised several internationally acclaimed high-end lifestyle brands including the restaurant group Bagatelle International, which as co-founder, she has helped establish 10 locations globally.

Previously Salima was a Partner at an investment advisory boutique where she was responsible for Cipriani, Nikki Beach & Resorts, Buddha Bar, MGM Resorts amongst others.

My friends always joked that I would only last in a job for 4 years before I would figure everything out, get bored and need to move on to the next thing. I love to learn and challenge myself and so over the years I have been involved in corporate finance, strategy consulting, venture, investing and then food.

I have always loved Warren Buffet and Charlie Munger’s approach to investing — read everything, all day every day, corral more and more information until patterns emerge and you’re enticed into action. It was this approach that led me into the food and hospitality industry.

Food is where my passions and skills align most neatly, but even within the food space, I have worn different hats — investor, operator, franchisor, franchisee, creator, brand builder, fine dining, lifestyle brands, casual dining, fast-casual and now virtual.

I learnt so much from my time advising, strategizing and then investing in and operating brands created by other smart and passionate entrepreneurs. This enabled me to spot trends before others saw them and in turn gave me the confidence to create my own brand, Absurd Bird, when I felt 6 years ago that premium chicken would be a hot trend. And while we were growing Absurd Bird, delivery was heating up and through a series of serendipitous events (some of which didn’t feel positive at the time to be quite honest, as is the nature of running a business), I had to pivot swiftly as casual dining changed tack.

I unconsciously took all I had learned over the years, redefined what I thought the traditional restaurant was — one brand, one location — and KBox was born.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

The food industry and the restaurant industry in particular, has been one of the few sectors that up until two years ago really looked the same as it has for the last 20 years. The quality has improved and it’s gotten fiercely competitive, but structurally and culturally, nothing has truly changed.

The reality is that most restaurants and commercial kitchens, be it in hotels, pubs, gyms, catering kitchens or supermarkets, are underutilized. The model is outdated. One very expensive location with one brand that cannot evolve as food trends change. The result is ambitious and successful food providers not being able to capitalize on the soaring delivery market. So, we’ve fixed this.

On the demand side, we’ve created a multi-cuisine range of delivery-focused food brands, so kitchens can serve more local people, more easily, with the ability to adapt swiftly to demand flux and taste changes. And on the supply side, our tech platform digitizes kitchen operations to make them efficient.

But what makes KBox special is our AI and machine learning technology that enables advanced analytics. We help kitchens find the right set of food brands for their local market, and then we future proof them by keeping them current, through a sophisticated mix of data evaluation — but without the need for a data scientist. Using our AI, we can also forecast demand for each kitchen, which in turn minimizes waste, improves staff utilization, and morale, and thus improves the profitability of each host kitchen.

The result is kitchens are busy and profitable; local consumers have access to what they fancy, and food entrepreneurs get to expand without enormous up-front investment in bricks and mortar.

This is how we are disrupting food delivery and the wider hospitality Eco-system. We’re using advanced technology to shake up the traditional economic model, for everyone’s benefit, and I’m really proud of it.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

My parents have a strong ethical disposition, and my father in particular hammered home to us as children that we need to live by 3 guiding principals: true happiness only comes from helping others; lifelong learning — use your intellect to help advance society, and be kind to others.

My father was a true risk-taking entrepreneur — he graduated from the London School of Economics and moved his young family from a town in Tanzania to Oxford where he taught and researched at Oxford University. We then moved to Vancouver, Canada where my dad felt there were more opportunities for business, and he could satisfy his entrepreneurial bug while working a full-time job. He would buy a hotel one day, a supermarket the next and a carwash in LA after a weekend trip and then care homes — all with very little capital but a lot of gumption and determination and always looking for the next venture. This all came to a halt when he decided to move into the not-for-profit world after a life-changing call from the office of the Aga Khan Development Network and he got an opportunity to move back to London to work for the Network. Literally, overnight my dad sold all his assets and dedicated his entire life to the project, and he has never looked back nor been happier.

My backers and investors in Absurd Bird, Shiraz and Nadeem Boghani come from the same ilk. They are very successful entrepreneurs who have built a multi-faceted empire and devote a large portion of their wealth to charity. They invested over £10m behind me based on my vision for Absurd Bird over a 2-hour meeting. I believe they saw in me the three principals I was taught to live by and knew I was someone they could trust. That trust continued and it is because of them that I was able to bring KBox to life.

For me, it comes back to learning from every experience. As human beings we survive and thrive from learning, adapting and continuing to progress. Ongoing adaptation and development are as necessary for business as they are for individuals. But that development is sometimes about making small tweaks to a model or process that is working, and underlying it is a premise or offer that is standing the test of time. Wholesale change shouldn’t be an objective in itself. Disruption for me is about the scale of the required change which as long as it’s done as a result of careful consideration, informed observations and is evidence-based, will be positive.

For example with Kbox, we are shaking things up but by addressing a long-standing challenge, and for the good of all industry players. Our offer is the product of years of experience and will absolutely have a positive effect. Believe me, making change for changes sake would be too exhausting!

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

There are no failed companies only failed leaders. Not quite three words, but certainly a sentiment I keep in mind when making big business decisions. I came to create KBox because my business wasn’t in the place I’d hoped, and the entire casual dining sector was on shifting sands. Absurd Bird could have been another restaurant failure as a result of market conditions, but I refused to give up, and I refused to allow these wonderful people who backed me to be let down — I fought hard to reinvent it, and learned a lot about myself, my leadership style and my approach to business as a result.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

We are only just beginning — I have so many ideas around the food ecosystem and marrying food with entertainment, fashion, retail and sports on the fun side of things.

And on the more serious side — I absolutely believe that what Hippocrates proclaimed all those years ago — Let food be thy medicine — rings true now more than ever. What we eat not only has impact on our health but on the health of our planet. Many of the challenges we face as a species, obesity, food allergies, climate change, and disease, can be addressed in some way by our relationship with animals and the food we eat.

If we can enable tens of thousands of kitchens around the world to run at the optimal level of efficiency, with zero wastage, giving them the agility to stay profitable as trends evolve then we will be in a position to transition them to healthier, greener more sustainable food offerings. We can counter the forces of the junk food operators and the beauty is in our model we don’t need to break the bank to get there. Our model is collaborative — it’s a win-win for all parties involved. What can be better than that?

Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?

I am an avid reader and consumer of podcasts so it’s really hard to name one or even five! I’ll choose one of each.

The Ted Talk on Blue Zones blew my mind — I highly recommend it to everyone.

The term refers to 5 geographic areas where people have much lower rates of chronic disease and on average live much longer than anywhere else. The fact that whole foods, plant-based diets, meaningful connections, exercise as a way of life and solid sleeping patterns can determine how long we live and how healthily we live was articulated in such a powerful way.

How not to Die by Michael Greger — I got this book when my best friend was diagnosed with cancer — actually I got about 10 books on cancer but this one is special. Food really is medicine and when we realize that 80% of non-communicable diseases can be prevented or even in some cases reversed through food and lifestyle, it astonishes me that the medical establishment is not shouting this from every rooftop.

Both have had a deep impact on the way I live my life and the way I hope KBox can evolve in a meaningful way to impact society at large.

Honestly, if each of us devoted 10% of our time and resources to helping others and giving back no matter where we are in our lives or how much we have — the world would be a significantly kinder place. True wealth is not measured by how much money you have but how much you can inspire, educate, motivate, support and lift those in need. Now that would be a movement, I would be proud to lead.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I am going to cheat again and give you two of my favourite Albert Einstein quotes which are written on placards on my desk:

You never fail until you stop trying

Try not to become a (wo)man of success. Rather become a (wo)man of value

I think those two sentiments sum up my journey so far — there have been so many times when things have gone wrong — be it a business, a partnership or a relationship — and the easiest thing at the time would have been to walk away. But when you realize it’s not always just about your own needs or personal ambitions but also about supporting those around you — that there is a bigger, higher purpose — then one simply can’t ever stop trying.

How can our readers follow you online?

https://www.linkedin.com/company/kboxglobal/

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Female Disruptors: Salima Vellani of Kbox On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.