Community, Curiosity, and playing the Long Game- Emmie Faust, Female Founders Rise

0:15unknown host:Hello and welcome to the Tomorrow Brands podcast where we explore what it takes to build a brand of tomorrow. I'm your host Ruth Vitock and today I'm speaking with Emmie Faust, exited founder, angel investor and the force behind female founders rise. We get into the realities of building something from scratch, from not having a runway to what makes community actually work and how being a mum has made her a better entrepreneur. Hope you enjoy. Hi, Emmy. Thanks so much for joining us today. Before we get into it, can you tell us a little bit more about you and your background and how you got to where you are now?

0:48Emmie Faust:Yes, quite a long story. I'm going to give you a whistle-stop tour. I am a mum of four. I am a serial exited entrepreneur, so I've had successful and failed businesses. Quite a few of both, learned a huge amount along the way. I am a micro angel investor, so that means I invest my own money in early stage businesses. The majority of my portfolio is investing in women-led businesses, and I've done, yeah, about 30 of those. And I also run a community for female founders 10 000 female founders in the uk called female founders rise and what i was thinking about over the weekend actually which is a first i haven't actually told anyone about this but i'm going to tell you ruth because you're one of my great friends i decided that i think what drives me and i'm passionate about is making entrepreneurship more accessible of course a lot of that is helping women in entrepreneurship and that's why I'm doing a huge amount in that space but it's not just helping women it's helping all underrepresented people but also just making it more accessible so that people can understand what it involves I've been thinking that entrepreneurship for many just seems like an unobtainable thing and probably historically has been really hard to get into because if you don't know you don't know kind of thing and one of the things I was thinking over the weekend is just like how can I make it a process or something that is easier to understand yeah that's really

2:22unknown host:interesting isn't it because you're right it's not it's it's obviously not taught in schools it's not presented as a career path in the same way that jobs are you've got 10 ,000 women in your community what's that what is the what is their pathway to that do you think the most common

2:41Emmie Faust:so I would say of course if you've got an entrepreneur in the family you're going to understand it it's going to be a much easier thing to go into if you're connected to entrepreneurs and you whatever it's probably easier to go into I think what's happened with a lot of the women in our community and this is quite well known in female entrepreneurship is they've spotted a problem in the world that doesn't yet have a solution or doesn't have a solution that they think is suitable and they set up a business for that reason because they see a need. I think other situations could be there's a lot of people who obviously have been in corporates and then they have children or they have families and they decide that they no longer want to work in corporates and actually they want to work for themselves they want to have more freedom and then they take themselves and often set up a small business as a solopreneur maybe initially and then maybe that grows in the area of expertise so yeah I think it's just one of those things like you don't know what you don't know and actually if you don't if you haven't got a burning desire to be an entrepreneur it like you said it's not actually taught as something that is possible obviously it's not for everyone it comes with lots of challenges it comes with lots of highs and lots of loads and lots of responsibilities, but it can also be amazing.

4:01Emmie Faust:It also can give you financial freedom. It also can give you freedom as a person to do things. So I just think we need to explain more about what it is and how you get into it and how there are ways that you could test it out on the side to even see if it's something that might be something which you want to explore.

4:20unknown host:Yeah, I think there's also, in order to make it accessible, you have to be able to de-risk it in a way don't you because I think it there's a problem where a lot of founders are from a certain background um yeah exactly you've got to have money basically you've got to have the money and that then means you don't get much diversity of thought business ownership which just because you need and I speak to people who are thinking about going freelance or fractional that's what I first thing I say to them is you just need a runway because it takes time it takes time to build something and not everybody has that freedom or luxury do they of space to create something

5:00Emmie Faust:exactly I think that's the thing like I said if you grew up in a family of entrepreneurs you might have a buffer if you're coming from like a wealthy family you might have a buffer where you can explore these ideas and you're still got somewhere to live and you're getting paid I think one of the things that I'm really keen to talk more about in the future not just today but but just generally is the things that you can do to explore entrepreneurship that you can just be doing on the side to a understand if there's a need and a want and if people will pay for it and b to explore if it's actually something that you want to do and I think there are definitely ways that you can do that and I that's what I've done with being my founders rise obviously I was in a privileged position because I had money to do that on the side but actually I was I'd been really poorly and I was recovering so this was never a full-time thing this was very much like a little passion project at the beginning until I saw that it could become a business and I do think that there's things that we can all do on the side whilst we're doing other things to explore if entrepreneurship is for us and if what we think we want to do if there is actually a viable need for it with before we jump in and quit our full-time roles or quit our jobs and explore

6:20unknown host:entrepreneurship because you're right it isn't for everybody because it's really hard and is stressful in a way that in a different way I think to having a sort of proper job in quotes but there's something about it that if you love it then I think once you've it's hard to go back from isn't it you get the bug but I think you're right in that it's offering that out trying to get people to see experience it so you get different types of people leading businesses

6:50Emmie Faust:is really important we definitely want that diversity because as we all know that is so much better for society and the economy and I think also like I've seen I set my bits myself so I've run multiple different businesses employing people and also solo businesses probably my worst one that resulted in probably helped me get ill was running a consultancy business on my own which I just felt very it felt really unfulfilling I was getting paid relatively good money but I was a consultant I was I didn't feel like I was adding value to anyone even though I was I didn't ever felt like I got that sort of recognition so I suppose if you're working in a company you'll have your team around you and you've got the support from them and you give them support and you get recognition from them and you give them recognition but when you're working on your own and when you're being paid to be a consultant it's just expected and it feels like a really thankless task and often your clients don't have the resources to money or budget or team to do what needs to be done so yes that was an example where I definitely wouldn't be encouraging people into entrepreneurship if I was looking at that business that I set up what I'm doing with female I found this rise which is now paying me a salary it's taken a while but I absolutely love it obviously I would definitely be encouraging people if that was a business and then I think I look at other businesses that I ran which was employing people and I had a really nice work-life balance if you can say that I do think it was different because when I set my first business at 25 we left our computers at work it was old school you went to work every day you left your computer at work we didn't we had mobiles but you didn't have anything on your mobile you You didn't have LinkedIn or Instagram or Facebook.

8:36Emmie Faust:All those things hadn't even launched.

8:38unknown host:No, I think LinkedIn launched in 2006, which was the year after we set up our business.

8:43Emmie Faust:People weren't doing that. You weren't on, I didn't even have a BlackBerry. So when I got home, I was just at home with my family, forgetting about work. I think it very much depends on the kind of business that's right for you. and there's so many different types of businesses isn't there and there's so many different ways that you can set it up and it all depends on the individual really like their appetite for risk whether they're that kind of person that even wants to lead they've all got different advantages

9:15unknown host:and disadvantages yeah I remember those days of I had I did have a BlackBerry but me and my friends used to communicate via like email chains so there was no WhatsApp there's no there's no sort of constant streams of communication you send like a group email and then you might write one

9:31Emmie Faust:I don't know it's just yeah I think it's very different now and I think as a founder now it's very hard to switch off I do switch off well I try to switch off I said I do but I'm you know what I think founders it's very hard because your business is part of your life but I think it's harder and harder to switch off now because there's just always something to be done you can always be on another social platform promoting yourself you could always be writing more content or videoing more content or going to more networking events or we didn't really have networking events and stuff when I was we had big conferences that we go to industry conferences we didn't have these you could go to a networking event every day in London if you wanted to

10:09unknown host:we didn't have any of that I guess as well something to which you just alluded to is personal brand actually that there's always more content you can be creating there's yourself out on LinkedIn what do you think are obviously there's a lot of pros to building a strong personal brand but do you think that also contributes to that always on yeah definitely

10:31Emmie Faust:it's very hard isn't it because I did an accelerator personal branding accelerator and the advice is to post every day and I can see that if you do post every day it makes a significant difference and I actually do post most days and I do it because I actually really enjoy it I I actually really enjoy getting the thoughts and the learnings out of my head and getting them onto paper and writing them in a concise way. And I enjoy reading other people's posts and stuff like that. It's pretty full on. And most founders who are probably running their business don't have time to do that. It's also a cost as well because you need VA support and things like that.

11:07Emmie Faust:So I would say building a personal brand is amazing. There's lots of reports and research that shows the value in that. and we can all see people like Ben from Gymshark who built his personal brand and like how much benefit that's given him and my favorite menopausal brain has forgotten all of their names but who's the lady that runs Tala?

11:26unknown host:Grace Beveley.

11:27Emmie Faust:Yeah exactly Grace Beveley so we can see that building a personal brand really helps I think it's and I've seen that obviously like I've grown female founders rise to 10 ,000 members I don't think we've done any paid ads it's all come through word of mouth from my members it's all come from my personal brand and it's all come from my network and connections and relationships where people have said I know Emmy and I rate what she's doing and you should go and join or people are saying I find part female funders rise and you should join word of mouth and personal brand has been basically built the whole community it's also got sponsorships and partnerships with the likes of HSBC British Business Bank shoesmiths founder catalyst google it's probably helped the partnership that we had with london business school so i i massively see the benefit it's not just being on linkedin it's personal brand is more than just like your content isn't it it's actually what people say about you when you're not in the room it's about your credibility authenticity it's about everything about you and therefore it's going on podcasts it's speaking at events it's what you're like at networking events it's what your comments are on LinkedIn it's the way that you treat people at events it's all of those it's your expertise your authority it's so much but I do think that creating content is definitely definitely helps and is a big part of that yeah do you think I

13:02unknown host:totally get everything you're saying and I've seen the benefit of it too for my own business do you ever feel I feel like there's also quite a lot of pressure with that when everything's linked to you as a person you know it's that everything on with personal brand when everything rides on your reputation in a sense it's really interesting I've only built a personal brand

13:23Emmie Faust:since I've been running a community of female founders and I've been talking about my journey doing that my journey from recovery my journey investing in other females and stuff like that yeah I think it is really it is tough and also yeah if you're building a personal brand where does it stop because say for example you're running a consultancy a bit like you are Roos and say that you end up hiring more people in time everyone only wants to work with you they want you there and I see that a bit at FFR like I sometimes find it really overwhelming like events and things like that because everyone knows me everyone's read my post and they want to see me or meet me because I'm the founder of female founders rise and of course I love meeting all of them and it's amazing when it's a small event like 20 people I can chat to everyone it's quite relaxing but when it's a big event and it's 200 people I find it really overwhelming

14:20unknown host:yeah it's a lot of your energy isn't it to maintain and then hold yeah and I think it

14:28Emmie Faust:comes with a responsibility as well like I keep noting I'll get tagged in posts like whenever anyone writes something about someone being awful to a female founder or something about you know enough funding to female founders people tag me and be like what do you think as if I'm the oracle in this space which I'm not like I have I'm not like an expert at all it's just something I'm passionate about and sometimes I feel myself getting like dragged into conversations that I'm like I actually don't I'm not an expert I don't know the answer to this so I think people put not put you on they don't put you on a pedestal and they don't put pressure on you but they it's in between those things as in you are expected to answer on things because you put your hat in the ring and said I'm passionate about this and I care about it so you've got 10 ,000

15:20unknown host:members now it's grown well it's when did you set it up 2000 I set it up two and a half years ago

15:27Emmie Faust:I actually set the LinkedIn page up nearly three years ago my first event was with 10 people in December in the snow and I'd never run an event in my life and I was absolutely petrified and that kind of went well and everyone was like when's the next one and so then I was like oh okay we'll do one in January and then I think about 30 people came to that and then in February there was 60 and then in March it was International Women's Day and there was 130 or something and then before I knew it we were hosting an event at Google in May with 170 founders or something. There's obviously

16:01unknown host:there was a big gap in the market for this that people responded so well to it so quickly in such huge numbers and now you've got 10 000 members in two and a half years and to your point about being seen as like the oracle of female founders it feels amazing that this didn't exist before

16:21Emmie Faust:doesn't it yeah it it does and this idea has been tapping me on the shoulder for a long time and I was always too busy doing my consulting and felt how would I give this I just never had the opportunity to actually do it and it's only because I was ill and I had to quit my consultancy and I literally had a blank sheet with nothing that I could bring this idea to life I don't know if you've read Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert but basically this book is all about all these ideas floating around the universe and they're waiting to be brought to life and they keep tapping people on the shoulder and they keep tapping you on the shoulder if you're the right person to bring it to life and it will only tap you on your shoulder for so long if you're too busy you just ignore it and you're continuing on and I think for so long I couldn't hear that tapping and then obviously because I'd been ill I was like I'm gonna take I'm gonna listen to this little tapping on my shoulder and I'm gonna do it because if I don't do it it's gonna find someone else to bring it to life of course there's lots of other people bringing that idea to life but it meant so much to me that I was like I'm going to take this idea I'm meant for it and it's meant for me and the idea and me have found each other and we know that we're a perfect fit and and it was like that because everything I've ever learned and everything I've ever done has led me to this place to be the right fit to deliver this support to founders because I've fell businesses scale businesses sole businesses, raise funding, been on Dragon's Den, had to give angel investment back.

17:49Emmie Faust:So I've understood all of that. I've also worked in marketing and media for 20 years. So I understand a how to do marketing and media and run a business, but also how to grow a business myself, like the community. I'd also run quite a few communities as well before Be My Founders Rise, which hadn't worked, as in they hadn't really grown, but I'd learned a huge amount, which gave me the confidence to be able to like host virtual events host virtual networking and to understand like the back end of how it all worked so when I set it up it was actually pretty a pretty easy process and none of it scared me it just all came very naturally and it just grew organically and as I got better and was able to give more time to it it just naturally grew.

18:33unknown host:I love so much about what you just said I feel like I've been thinking recently that in life sometimes when you're in the wrong thing easy things feel hard and when you're in the right thing hard things feel easy and it's like sometimes we talked a bit about entrepreneurship and people getting into it and giving it a go on the side and that I think if you've done something and it's not worked so often that is the learning that you're going to apply later and you don't see it yet it's so rare that something is wasted like that and I think you see it all as a learning and then when it all comes together like it has for you with this all of the pieces sort of slot into place and you're like oh that's why I did

19:18Emmie Faust:that and that's how I'm using it now it's a really nice interesting because you'd look back and you'd be like oh you tried to settle all these communities and they all failed none of them went to plan which they didn't by the way where you look back and you'd be like oh you set up so many businesses and some have failed and some haven't and you've done I've done just so many different things and worked in so many different spaces and then I did some terrible consultancy jobs and but when I look back and I feel like that's why I did that that's why I worked in that industry as much as I hated it it's because I then did X, Y, Z so I think what I'm really trying to do with Female Founders Rise is have the growth mindset and just be everything's a test everything's a learning even with my LinkedIn as well like just always be exploring and be curious that's my word of the year like how can I be more curious I remember someone saying that was one of the top traits in leadership and it got me thinking god it really is if you can just be curious about everything and be like okay that flopped why did that flop what can we learn from that why was that good why is that not good if you can I think the more you can have that growth mindset where you're not saying oh god I did really badly I really messed that was so bad I shouldn't have done that I messed up I wish I hadn't done that it's just actually that was great because I met some amazing people through that and all your connections that you've ever made they're all connections and learnings that you're going to take into the next thing which at some point is going to be the ideal thing I feel like growth

20:49unknown host:mindset is the sort of flip positive flip side of imposter syndrome that if you can when you feel like that which everybody does especially if you're starting something new and you're building something new it's if you can start to see it as okay I'm feeling like this because I don't know enough about this so what can I learn or who can I speak to teach myself rather than oh I don't know this I'm stupid and I can't do it and I want to give up I see them as two sides of the same thing

21:19Emmie Faust:it's just yeah I think it's really interesting if someone gives you the opportunity grab it with both hands you might make a mistake you might think you don't know what you're doing and you probably don't know what you're doing but you're blurring on the job and when I set up my first business I made 60 grand profit in an afternoon I was 26 I'd never run I was we were running a media agency and I hadn't booked I hadn't booked a lot of media I don't I had experience in the digital space and and one of our clients said we want to be the lead sponsor for Casino Royale the film they were a poker company and they said we want to do it in the UK and Europe and we were their UK agency and obviously they were just going to ask us because they didn't know anyone else and I was like okay I literally do not have a clue I've never booked a cinema campaign in my life but I'd met this guy called Peter a couple of weeks before who worked for Pearl and Dino and so I called him up and I was like Peter I've got this massive potential campaign can you help me and bless him he took me under his wing he helped me with the booking and the planning and I booked a 450 grand campaign got it signed off and paid by the client in literally no time at all and we took 15 margin so I think in entrepreneurship there's a lot of being like I literally don't have a clue what I'm doing I don't know what I'm doing but I'm gonna you know we're not brain surgeons are we so we're not putting someone's life at risk we're just gonna say yes and then we're gonna find someone who can help us we're going to find a way to do it and we're gonna learn on the job and there will always be people that will help you and I think the more that you can have that mindset the better really and just of course things are going to go wrong but it's never going to be disastrous and you'll learn so much so yeah I mean I look back and I think god I probably don't I probably it probably takes me about six months or eight months to earn that much now and I entered in an afternoon and I was 26 just having the time of my life and just basically got lovely Peter to

23:26unknown host:do it all for me dreamy no outgoings either that age just spend it all on fun exactly and also no

23:34Emmie Faust:outgoings on actually booking the cinema campaign because it's just it was just me brokering a deal yeah nice um those are the days so let's talk a little bit about raising because i know that's

23:48unknown host:something that you really focus on with female founders rise and there are a lot of inequalities in the funding landscape what do you think has changed and what do you think hasn't

23:58Emmie Faust:tricky question there's so many stats and the stats are always changing like every day like the other day i heard that something like 50 of funding going into founders came from female

24:10unknown host:angels i'm constantly which i'm i need to chase that stat up because there's so many different

24:16Emmie Faust:stats my understanding was 14 of angel investors in the uk female that might have changed but that was the last big study two percent approximately of funding is going to all female teams it's a little bit more to mixed teams but 80 percent plus is going to all male teams and those numbers aren't really changing so generally the numbers aren't changing they might go up a bit they might go down a bit but the grand scheme in the grand scheme of things there's not a huge amount of change the government has just brought out some initiatives like the invest in women task force and there's this a new thing that literally came out on friday where they're gonna there's 500 million pounds that's going into a new emerging fund manager so this sits above the female founders it actually goes into the vcs because the belief is if we give more money to women in venture capital they it will trickle down into more female entrepreneurs this does annoy me

25:07unknown host:because it's not a woman's problem to sort out it's not like is that why can't the no no this

25:13Emmie Faust:well there are there are stats to show that women are more likely to invest in women like for example I'm investing in women because I want everything to be I want there to be equality and I want I'm trying to help even the playing field as they say but there are stats that show that women are more likely to invest in women but then I hate the way that we're like okay so let's funnel more money into women investors because they will invest in women it's why can't we also get the men so it's one of those things of course it's great that we're giving female and underrepresented LPs more money in their funds because they're probably more likely to invest it in underrepresented founders so that's really good and I love the fact we're doing that but I'd also like to see the male VCs also looking to invest in more female founders as well and not putting the pressure always on women to sort out the problem because it's a societal problem oh completely and it