Don't Let Your Business Ruin Your Life

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1:33There's no safe like SimpliSafe. From Entrepreneur Media, this is Problem Solvers, a show in which entrepreneurs do what entrepreneurs do best, solve unexpected problems in their business. We were completely wrong. And I'm just like, it's not selling. It was like we have to start from scratch. I'm Jason Pfeiffer, the editor-in-chief of Entrepreneur Magazine.

1:58Starting a business is in some way the easy part, because the hard part is how it takes over your life. And what does that mean exactly? Well, here's someone who has seen that firsthand. The more you step toward that vision, the more people also start to fall off who aren't comfortable with how much you are trying to level up in your life. And so you start to lose those people. This is Kathleen. I'm Kathleen Griffith, and I am the founder and CEO of Build Like a Woman. Build Like a Woman is a platform for women who want to build businesses and lives that they love. Also, that happens to be basically the language of Kathleen's new book.

2:42It is called Build Like a Woman, The Blueprint for Creating a Business and Life You Love. I've known Kathleen a long time. She is just such an insightful person about this difficult balance that needs to be struck if you're going to build something and put your all into it and not lose it all at the same time. I wanted to talk to Kathleen as her book was coming out, Build Like a Woman, because I wanted to explore this question of this balance. What does it take to make this balance? And I had asked her, what's the hardest problem that you see people grapple with? Kathleen, she consults with Fortune 100 companies.

3:28She works with so many entrepreneurs. And she said, it's this, it's this downward spiral where throwing yourself into the business means that it starts to absorb energy from the rest of your life. And then you start to lose some of the people who don't understand that, don't understand why you're putting so much energy into this business. And this just makes you more isolated and thrown more into the business. And if you do not, if you do not think hard about where this spiral leads you, then it leads you nowhere good. And she says, it doesn't have to be bad. The more unique your vision is, by proxy, the more unique and distinct your life is going to become.

4:16You are going to start to have a very unusual, unconventional, uncomfortable life because it's carved, it's bespoke to you. It is unique to you and you alone. So how do you embrace that uniqueness? How do you make that a central feature of your life, a driving force of excitement and ambition, and make a life and a business that live in harmony together, where one isn't stealing from the other. That's what we're going to talk about today on Problem Solvers. It is Kathleen Griffith on how to build like a woman, which she says, very importantly, even though she uses that phrase, doesn't mean that what she's talking about is only relevant to women.

5:01It's fundamentally a model at this point, which is half mindset and half skill set, which I think has application to anyone who's trying to build. So let's start building a better balance coming up after the break. The pace of change today can be overwhelming. What's the most important thing to pay attention to if you want to be creative, successful, and innovative? Well, I want to tell you about a podcast that provides the answers to those questions. Rapid Response is a podcast that cuts through the noise, featuring candid conversations twice a week with top business leaders who are navigating real-time challenges.

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6:00All right, we're back. So I'm talking to my friend Kathleen Griffith, author of the new book, Build Like a Woman, about this balance and about how getting into business can just consume your life. And it can start chasing people away. And you have to watch for that. Or else, well, you're not going to be left with much on either side. And as we began this conversation, and Kathleen had laid this problem out in front of me. It reminded me of my own experience struggling with this and discovering this problem. And so that's where we're starting. For me, there've been a number of different moments.

6:42A big one was I left like all of my friends and a long-term girlfriend in Boston and I moved to New York to pursue my magazine career. I moved here for a magazine job and a lot of people thought, But a lot of people thought back home that I was crazy for this and I lost touch with a lot of people and I had to rebuild and it was hard. And one of the things that was most important to me along that journey was to build a new network of people that thought like I did because then they understood my priorities. They understood when sometimes I had to prioritize something career-oriented over something personal-oriented.

7:22I ultimately started dating and then married someone who has a similar career aspiration. So we understood each other. And I would love to hear your thoughts on how to stabilize this situation. Because what you're describing sounds very unstable for a lot of people. The bigger the vision, the bigger the discomfort, the bigger the destabilization. You have to start somewhere. I throw it to you. My own solution there, which was one of the big things was network. And maybe you can speak to that. But I'm curious where else you drive people towards as they try to find that stabilization in a life, not just a personal path, but a full life that has suddenly started to feel unfamiliar.

8:05So much of that comes down to foundation, in my view. So what you describe, which is also needed and necessary, are those external tentacles of where you're connected and who's within your broader orbit. I think one of the, I know one of the most important things that needs to happen to drive that stability is your internal sense of self and foundation. And so there are two things that I think are particularly helpful. One is the 60 minute prime. So that is kind of every morning having, whether it's meditation, exercise, nourishment, so eating really good foods, meditating, exercise, that's my method.

8:52It could be different for someone else. You figure out what roots you and stabilizes you. And that becomes an immovable object on your schedule. No matter how busy you are, you have this time for yourself to really get silent and still and strong and strengthen that resolve around your vision. Regardless, so as you're going out into your day, no matter what comes and goes and how the winds blow, you're really kind of rooted in your truth of what you're here to do while you're here on this planet. I think the second piece is because I loved Warren Buffett always says a reactive life is a horribly painful life and there's so much that's going to fly in during the day.

9:38I practice something called a 60-minute pause, which is just really this idea of when something flies at you, it could be a new opportunity. Do you want to go to the speaking event? Do you want to partner with this group? Are you comfortable taking that lunch meeting? Whatever it is, no matter how big or small, just really putting it into your body for 60 minutes, 60 seconds to see whether it feels hot and warm and juicy and like something you want to pursue or it feels cold and agitating and scary. And so it's not for you. But those are kind of two ways that I really find you can center yourself as you're going out into the world doing big things it's like the great oak tree right your root system needs to be wider and deeper than the tree canopy up above and that enables you to then reach higher and higher i love hadid also who's a great architect and how she built and she created these structures in new york city if you know you're familiar with them that kind of seemingly defy space.

10:44And they're more horizontal than they are vertical and don't even seem to have buttresses supporting them. It's so interesting, but it's because of what she built and how deeply bolted that is into the ground beneath the pavement. And I think it's a great analogy for anyone who's trying to get up to big stuff in the world. You know, Kathleen, we've been talking somewhat abstractly about this. And I wonder if given the number of people that you've worked with, you could, you know, without giving away anybody's private information or naming anybody, but maybe just think of a person or think of an avatar or think of a real world example that you've seen of someone who started a business.

11:25And then this thing that we're describing happened where the chaos of the business started to reorganize and reorient the rest of their lives and maybe what that looked like for them and what it took to help them get stable. I mean, I like what you were just describing there with the kind of prime and pause. In that way, what you're talking about is really just creating some breaks on what can otherwise feel like a just fast, speed, no time to think kind of life, which I think every entrepreneur relates to, right? That's everything's coming in, you got to react so fast, you suddenly don't think that you don't have time to think anymore or to focus on yourself.

12:04And so you're creating those pauses and those breaks. but I wanted to see this a little more holistically. So can you take us into like a case study? Yeah. I mean, I think I can probably take us even into a case study using myself to just delve a little bit more personally. So two years ago, I made this tremendous life switch. I moved from New York City, which is where I knew you and was going to start moving into doing more work in television. So bought a place on the West coast. It was the fourth night in my new home. And in the middle of the night, I fainted. I hit the side of my head. I hit the back of my head coming up.

12:46I was unconscious for longer than anyone should ever be unconscious for. And I'd like to say it all happened Formula One racing, but it was really very unglamorous how it all went down and ended up, you know, after SATs, after a test that kind of eclipsed the SATs and MRIs and all that good stuff, the neurologist told me that I had acute brain trauma at a traumatic brain injury. And so my prefrontal cortex that manages CEO executive functioning was not functioning well. And you can imagine when someone's brain is their business. And for anyone who works in a service business and is not selling their labor.

13:31That is a very terrifying state of affairs. And so what I really found to be really helpful was team. So 70 % of businesses are owned and operated by a single person. And not to digress, but I think one of the things that you do really well is you highlight regular small business owners and solopreneurs and not just the glossy IPO unicorns, kind of fed ad nauseum in the world of entrepreneurship, which is just not the reality. Most people start their businesses with$3 ,000. Like you are hanging on by your fingernails. You're on a razor's edge most of the time with your business. And this was just such a powerful lesson for me in how much you need to enroll team.

14:24So I think that is an example of kind of going further out where I needed to bring on a Jacqueline of all trades to help me with my business. I needed to go out to my network and ask for support to make introductions. I started making more outrageous asks to the world and actually enlisting support in what I was doing. And so I think that is kind of the next phase of building is once you're kind of solid in yourself, you really need to shift your gaze externally and know when it is time to also start enrolling more people and kind of building your crew. Had that not happened, honestly, Jason, I don't know if I would have gotten there because I took such pride in being able to do it all for so long.

15:18and I think women in particular have a really hard time asking for help. It's really uncomfortable because it's exposing the fact that your superpower maybe isn't your superpower. Your ability to do it all, juggle it all, manage it all isn't necessarily there. That is a story I have heard so many times, which is that there was some kind of personal tragedy. sometimes it's a injury an illness or a loss of a family member or something that became a forcing function for someone who thought that they had to do everything themselves to start to trust others sometimes it was others that they already had but they hadn't put into full leadership positions sometimes it was solopreneurs who then had to find other people and nobody has ever told me that was a bad shift everyone has always said that was a transformative shift what was it for you i just i'd love to unpack that just a little bit more because i feel like so far right if we're going to track this issue that you're talking about which is you start a business and it starts to impact your your personal life step one here is grounding yourself a little better and then step two is to organize people around you one of the things you had just said when you were describing creating teams was that your asks became more audacious.

16:46What did you learn from building a team? And what did it even mean to build a team? When people think of a team, they just think of hiring people. But I bet a lot of people think, you know, I don't have the money to hire people or I'm not ready. I don't know what I would do with three employees. So what did that mean for you? And what did you learn about how to create people around you? Team for me was always, again, very reactive initially. It was, okay, what do I need in this moment? Assemble, disassemble, full-time contractors. It was a real freaking mess. Like I was a person running around with two sharp scissors.

17:25It was messy and dangerous, honestly. And I think what was brilliant about this and the real silver lining to your point was that I took a step back and I really thought about mindful leadership. It's what I call mindful leadership. Like what sort of leader do I really want to be? And now how do I own that? So you look at someone like Elon Musk, right? Like, like him, love him. He is unapologetic in his style. You know what he stands for. He's gonna burn you out. It's gonna be churn and burn, but you know where you stand. And I think part of where people get into trouble is they espouse certain things publicly.

18:08And then privately, it is a very different operating system within their business. And so I really took a step back and I said, okay, what are the things that I want to stand for? It's like positivity, professionalism, and performance. That is what my team is going to be about. That is what I'm going to center in terms of the value system of this company. and I'm going to be really honest about it. Performance does mean you are going to work really, really hard on this business. Performance means it's not always going to feel warm and fuzzy, which I think is the association again with women owned and operated businesses, that it is always going to be kind of that state of affairs.

18:50And to your point, that organizing principle and kind of those values, which I was then able to define after the accident, because I'm really beyond tasks needed to have an organizing principle since I was not going to be able to be as hands-on as I was used to and kind of in the weeds, so to speak. I found that that really helped even with contractors or people who were coming in on a temporary basis. So for someone who doesn't have money and who is just starting out and bubble gum and scotch taping this thing, that can be a really nice way to still create a sense of culture and clearly define what you stand for as a leader within the team that you build.

19:35What would be the next rung out? And I realize that your book is not organized this way. I'm kind of creating this organizational principle here as we go. But I love the logic that we're building. We have the personal, we have the people around you. Where would you drive people to think about next is they try to create a sense of control in a life that might have been disrupted by the work they do. Yeah. So I think if we were to fan out, we'd start with self, right? It all starts with self. And you got to get, it's so trite to say, but you got to really freaking know who you are if you are going to be running something.

20:16You got to know thyself, like get into therapy, work with coaches, do what you read, listen to Jason, do what you need to do. but like know thyself. Then you're going to want to build out your core group. So that can be friends, family, Beyonce enrolled her mom. It could be the local church who have a lot of time on their hands. Whatever it is, like those aren't necessarily people that you pay, but it's kind of your tried and true core group, people that you can rely and depend on who are going to ride with you. And often they're not paid. That's how I kind of tend to think of it. From there, you're going to want to kind of build your day-to-day team.

21:00So day-to-day team would be really where you're bringing in that value set. And that's who you need just to get everything that you're doing done. I would say that they have kind of that consistent presence on your business and they're helping you with the day-to-day. Again, those can be full-time. Those can be contractors. And then the next ring out are subject matter experts. So these are people who are really accomplished at what they do. They tend to be more expensive, but you use them surgically and intentionally for specific tasks like a publicist, a lawyer, an accountant, people that you're going to bring on and bring off, but they save you ideally from making costly mistakes in your business.

21:51And then kind of that final ring that I like to think about are advisors. And so those are people who are really well known in your industry. They could be executives, other entrepreneurs, celebrities, whomever you have, who just help you, who've kind of reached the summit you seek and help you drive greater exposure to your company and what you're up to. But that's how I really think about building a crew once you're at that phase where you're ready to fan out. And if we're to think about applying that to the core problem here, your professional life destabilizing your personal life, it sounds like what the value of that is, is that if you can bring sanity and clarity to your professional life, if you can create organized structures, which sometimes people think of as restrictive, But the great discovery is that structure actually creates freedom because the more structure that you have, the more you can use your time more wisely.

22:53You can explore more because you're not scrambling. I guess you start to create time and space to focus on your life. I don't know. Take me to the next step here of what it means to solve this problem of the professional tugging at the personal. So you've got the structure to your point, the foundation in place. And then I think that actually allows you to become free again. You're able to roam free. So I am a huge believer in approaching business. Also, like it's a creative endeavor. It's an artistic endeavor. And I think once you have that foundation in place with the structure, you're then able to get out in the world, meet other people, find things that inspire you, whether it's going for a drive and listening to music or going for a hike in the forest or sitting down with someone who's 95 years old, who's experienced a lot of life.

23:53Like that to me is really the juice of when you know you've really hit your stride in what it is you're building because there is a deep stability and a deep sense of structure. there is a deep sense of internal knowing and strength and now external team and so you're then free you're really free to create in a way that it becomes in my experience and the experience of some people that i've been fortunate enough to to know who have done extraordinary big things in the world it you're playing you're just then all of a sudden playing again. You're also probably reversing some of the issues that we described at the very beginning, right?

24:41You had said to me, I just paraphrased this when we were starting, but you had told it to me before we started recording that when your professional chaos starts to impact your personal life, you start to lose things, you start to lose people, you start to lose access to the things that you love to do. In a way, what I just heard you say is the reclaiming of that stuff. It's an interesting way of almost reverse engineering the problem, right? Which is if the symptoms of the problem is that you start to lose people, you start to lose touch with the folks that matter to you, or you start to not be able to form the kinds of relationships that you want, then you almost have to reverse engineer backwards from, well, what would it take for me to be able to regain that, for me to have that, for me to be able to retain people, for me to add new people to my life, to be able to do things that I really want to do instead of always having to give them up because, because, because.

25:37And how do you do that? Well, the way that you do that is that you need to create a structure. How do you create a structure? Well, you need people. How do you get the people? Well, you need to know what those people are organizing themselves around, which means that you need to reflect upon yourself. That's how to take the conversation that we just had and kind of put it in a rewind. But I put it to you to see what you think of that because it feels like, in a way, interestingly, what you just described as freedom is just literally the opposite of the problem that we started with. That's right.

26:08And most people don't know that. Most people don't know that that, and that is why they quit because they don't know that they're going to be able to get to that juicy state because the beginning with the lack of alignment between your personal and your professional life, when you are just starting to carve out what you want to do is there is such conflict and there is so much disharmony between those two worlds initially until you truly start to build toward what is in your mind's eye that people stop because it is horribly painful and there's there's kind of this very long period where you are walking that road and you are wildly alone.

26:58But the message, you know, as we're talking that is now coming to me that I think is so important is for people to know that if you stay in it, that like the juiciest life you cannot even imagine that is so uniquely yours, like is what is on the other side of this whole thing. Kathleen I feel like we've gone on a journey here in the last 30 minutes how can people find you find more information find the book so for more information you can go to www.buildlikeawoman.com the book will be available June 4th on Amazon and wherever books are sold it is also called build like a woman and I look forward to connecting with all of you and rooting you on in your journeys.

27:49Well, thanks, Kathleen. I really appreciate it. Thank you. And that's our episode. I would love to hear what you think and maybe even about a problem that you solved. You can find me at my website, Jason Pfeiffer dot com. J-A-S-O-N-F-E-I-F-E-R dot com. Also, I have some more useful stuff for you. I write a newsletter about how to future-proof yourself and become more adaptable and optimistic. I would love for you to sign up. It is at jasonpfeiffer.bulletin.com. Also, check out my other podcast. It's called Build for Tomorrow. In each episode, I take on some belief that we have that holds us back from progress and show you why it is not as bad as you think.

28:31Problem Solvers is a production of Entrepreneur Media and comes out every Monday morning. So make sure you're subscribed so you don't miss an episode. Thanks to Deepa Shah for production. My name is Jason Pfeiffer. See you next week. Thank you.