Awesome. Okay. We're here with Maggie
Perotin and I'm so excited. She's my guest today and I'm
going to let you know about a little bit of her background. She helps service
based business owners scale in a way that creates freedom
building businesses that can thrive without them. She's an international
coach and has nearly 20 years of leadership experience.
So you'll find her online as the host of the Diamond Effect podcast
and you're a podcast listener, so get over there and listen to her on
that. She's been featured on some of the network giants
like USA Today, cbs, ABC and
NBC. That's so exciting. Maggie's all about
smart growth. That doesn't affect sacrifice. Excuse me, doesn't
sacrifice joy. And I think that's so important.
Speaking of joy, she lives in Toronto with a blended family of
four, count them, four kids. And she likes the outdoors,
traveling and dancing. And Maggie, that's something that
we share, which is a love of dancing. So what kind of
dancing? You know what, Annie?
I used to do, so I'm immigrant to Canada. I'm
originally Polish, so for many, many years I was doing this like
folk dance in a group in high school and we
sort of traveled with it and we did a bit of contemporary, but
it wasn't at the level that I see my daughter doing now. Right. And
ultimately any dance, I've done a little bit of lessons of,
you know, Latino dance and ballroom dance. But anything
I think dance is amazing in a way. You can brings you joy and you
can express yourself. I love it. That's
one of my favorite things. I started ballet
as an adult. I was young though,
like 18, but still I did ballet and
jazz and hip hop and tap and break dancing and anything I could get my
hands on and get into a class and. And it was my outlet.
So I totally get wanting to dance and using that
as what a great outlet for creativity and
100%. Yeah. There's just so much to it. Travel
or productions, you learn a lot that you don't expect to learn
about yourself. Yeah, yeah, we definitely share that.
Awesome. All right, so we're going to begin.
This is a different kind of piece podcast episode
that you may be listening to differently.
So instead of doing a business interview style, we
are going to be an advisory board mastermind or
thought leadership, thought partnership kind of episode where
we're going to bounce this idea off of it, off of each other. And
we're listening in on Maggie's business and her growth edges
things that she's considering in her own business. So Maggie,
will you begin with the context of where your business is today and what
the purpose of the business is? Yeah. So
the purpose of the business, let's start with that. And my mission is really
to empower business owners, predominantly
service based business owners, to think differently
about their business and grow it in a way that's sustainable. There's so
many business owners that hustle or they think that they have to and
they're working 247 in it thinking, you know, I have this
business, I love what I'm doing and I need to be in it 247
where they miss out on living or living the
personal part of their life. And at the same time I understand
that their passion is one so I want to
help them to sort of create more of a balance or harmony,
however you want to call it. And, and at the same time
as they're growing that business, create an asset that down the
line they can sell. And many service based business owners
don't think that they're like, oh, I'm just gonna fold it down and I'm gonna
retire. Right. So they're saving or they
don't know how to do it. They would love, they love the idea but they
don't know how to do it. And I think it's,
you know, I really believe that small and medium sized businesses
are critical to the economy. They bring a lot of
jobs in our communities. There is more money left
when a small business makes money in the community rather than
large corporation. So I want to empower these people
to thrive in all aspects of their life because then their
businesses thrive and then there's this ripple effect. Right. You hope one person
and then their family benefits and their employees benefit and all those
things. So like that's my mission and purpose. No,
that's fantastic. A sellable asset is definitely something
to consider. And I, I think you're right about a lot of service
based businesses don't think of that or they think of that later as
they're starting to think about getting out and what could they have been
doing the years before to set their business up? So very smart
aspect. Yeah. They, they can be doing that much earlier.
Yeah. While enjoying life and then be more ready rather than
oh in three years. If I run exit, what do
to do in like big panic right now I'm like sweating.
Yeah. Okay, so now we're going to move into.
Where do you see your business going and what is the
idea or opportunity
or question that you have? We started a bit with like
ahead of the episode I'm looking at strategic decisions
because there are so many options that business owners consider. It could be
overwhelming, distracting, all the things, chaos.
So share with us where you're looking to go and a little bit about
what that question or opportunity is. Yeah.
So where I am right now, so there's of course where I want
to go, like short term and long term. So where I am right now,
I offer group coaching
for starting business owners. For business
owners who are, you know, just growing. Their
income is somewhere between four
figures to barely six figures. And so that's,
I have a group set up and then anybody who is at
six figures and above, I have one on one. Okay. So that's
where I am right now. My
long term vision, I would love to be this
go to practical business
academy for service based businesses who very
often start their businesses for the love of what they do, how they
help their clients. Right. So I'm a professional organizer, I love to organize, I'm
a stylist, I love to style, I'm a, I don't
know, a therapist. I love to be a therapist but don't
have business background. And, and, and they realize at some point that
that's topping them. But then again, at the same time they're
busy, they're running business, they don't necessarily want to go to business school and all
those things. A lot of those things that are not practical. Right.
So my long term vision is to create this sort of
academy for the business owner that is very practical,
that helps them achieve the goals that they have
in a very practical manner, but also
fills that gap of business skills that they're
missing and that's what's stopping them. So that's why
is it like almost like a,
a replacement for an MBA or school? Kind of like that.
Yeah, right. A replacement. Like instead of going to
MBA. And a lot of MBAs are really. I've done an
MBA. Right. Me too. I'm like, oh, did it really help me be an
entrepreneur? Well, right. So Most of the MBAs
are really corporate driven. There is a little bit of entrepreneur there, but
there's a lot of corporate driven. And when you're an entreprene entrepreneur and
small business
application of that can be challenging. Let's just
call it that way. Right. So it's almost like an entrepreneurial
mba if we want to call it like an mba, like if that could be
really focused on entrepreneurs. Very practical, minimal
theory. Just enough to understand. Right. Where we're coming from, why
we're doing things. We're doing and really
applicable to the point where, okay, I'm learning something I can implement like that
day in my business. Right. So that's my vision.
Okay. How far away do you want that to be
a focus? Well, I would say maybe
within five years. I don't like to put like 10 years. You never know what
happens. But within the next five years, that would be
great. And is it when we think
about the coaching aspect of your business versus this, is
it a move to that or is it a separate
offering or almost like a division or separate business where
there's the coaching pieces on is different than
the school? Yeah, no, I think it's like a merge
and merging of that. So it's more a transformation into
that because I this
school. The challenge with traditional school is you learn and then
you have to figure out how to apply on your own. And you go back
and you're busy and you're like, oh, I don't know how to apply. Right. The
power of coaching is that the coach help you actually
apply. It supports you. It's done with you.
Right. And I see that in the results of my clients where
when I coach them, they get results.
Right. And not because only I teach them and I help them
develop certain knowledge, but because I'm there with them while
they're developing the skill. It's kind of like really having a pro
athlete, having a coach learning this skill set and getting
better and better, whatever sport they're doing. Right. So it's very
powerful. So I would like it to be together now. I might not be
the coach who will coach everybody. Right. If we're scaling that, I might
need to hire and train coaches and so on. But I
really, I like to see the progress and
the results. I don't want to just teach. Teaching doesn't fulfill me
because teaching, I know somebody will just take the knowledge, but I have
no idea whether they're implementing or not. And that's not
fulfilling for me. What's fulfilling for me is seeing the person implement
and grow and make incredible results. And that's for me. I'm so
proud. I feel amazing when I see that.
My, my little, my little tears are coming. I don't know why.
I get excited too, I suppose. Do
you see in the work that you're doing with your clients now,
do you see that you're already sharing some of this
knowledge naturally in the way that you coach them?
Is it an evolution? And because you
have clients that are at different stages, the five figure
versus the six figure stage, maybe emerging Businesses
or some are perpetually small on purpose. So
I don't mean that they all have to be beginners. Yeah.
How do you see this playing into what you're doing now and this
the point at which they would come into your world for the
coaching? You mean at point.
Where would they come in the future?
Let me ask it this way. Do they start with the. Are they looking for
the education and they start with the education and then coaching is
part of that. Um, and. Or
is it something that they kind of do together?
Meaning. Yeah. Are they learning and then together
they do the power. Right. So I guess the way
I'm doing it now and I see it works is that I teach you
only what you need to get you to the next level and prepare
you for the long term. And I know that because of course we have a
very good relationship. Right. So
then you only learn kind of what you need
and then you apply. Right. So I see it that way
because like I am all. I'm a very
operations is my thing and I'm very a person who
likes efficiency. You know what I mean? Like I don't like
personally, even in my own life waste time to learn something that I
might use and my never use or, or do
something that I don't know how. So I always think about my clients like
how can I give them the knowledge that they need right now in
order to achieve the next goal or prepare them for whatever they're the long
term and then with strategies and help them implement
it right away. So how do you have to be
together? How do you see what you're doing today,
laying the foundation for this, this
like entrepreneurial mba? Is it just that you want to
codify and make it
repeatable what you're already teaching or is this new
curriculum that you want to kind of put your brain on? So
I would say so if I. It's a great question,
I think like if I went to that, let's just call it academy, right?
Or entrepreneur mba and I wanted to help
entrepreneurs at different stages then
with my current group. I'm almost there in a way
where I know what I need to codify. I haven't fully done it
and that's like I've been thinking about the short term goal
of maybe starting that next year and then
kind of having that curriculum and support. Whereas with my
one on one, I still need. I think I would still need a
little bit more Runway with the
Run101 clients to determine how would I codify
what it have to be? Because right Now I have a big span of clients
from like early six figures to seven figures. Right. So,
like, their challenges are different. So I would.
That would definitely require more work and thinking about
do I need to break it down in certain stages
of their growth. Right. Certain sizes and how it
would look like. But yeah, like that. Codifying
that. Creating a system that
then helps people learn faster and then helps me, let's
say, train the coaches to understand it and then support people
in implementing that. For sure.
So cool that you said stages, because as
you were talking right before this, I wrote down stages
of business, stages of
size. Like what applies to different ones. So totally
on the same page. I. I want to check
in. Yeah. Have you
thought a lot about this yet or is this kind of a first
brainstorm for this particular idea? I think it's a
first time I. I've had this vision,
like, but it's been very distant and I think it's the first
brainstorm that I'm doing with you for that long term idea,
which is kind of cool. It's so cool. That's my
favorite point. I love it. So, yeah, I get excited.
Are you starting to see things sort of come together?
Yeah, Yeah. I definitely see
now because I. The way I've been thinking short term
for it, it's like, okay, I, I have an
idea to cut. Let's just call it codify the group. And then I'm like,
oh, I'm still 101, but at some point maybe I want to do a
mastermind. But it's been separate. Right. Whereas now as we're talking,
I'm like, no, no, no. This is actually together. Now, of course, within
that there might be different offers, Right. Depending
on the stage of the business, the client that's coming
in. But now I see it more holistically
together rather than these two separate routes.
Yeah, that's important. I'm. If, if you guys see me, if you're on the,
the video version of this on YouTube and you see me looking down a lot,
I think by writing words.
So that's what I'm doing.
All right, so I think we have a really interesting revelation
here, which is that it's no longer a separate thing
that you're designing. You're in building. It's now
what you're already doing. Now the next step really in that,
the way I see it, and tell me if you agree, is deciding,
almost deciding where you want to start with the stages
or levels. It's getting that out almost like a book outline. But
you're Building an encyclopedia set. Right. Which book of that
set do I. What does the set look like? What is the flowchart or
whatever. Where do I start? And because
you have such a disparate group of folks that
you work with, I wonder what would it be like if
you were to pick your favorite stage of
the current clients you have concentrate on doing some
lead gen of that particular stage to get a
more of a mass for that. I don't mean like 50000 people. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah. And kind of playing with that group with doing
this. How does that. How does that feel? Yeah, no,
that it's actually great suggestion.
It is a great suggestion because you're right. Sometimes
when you're spreading too in too many different
stages, then you know, it's great for me because I love variety. Like I'm a
Sagittarius. But
I don't think as you say, it's not great in
concentrating certain stage to quickly
see the patterns and say, oh, this is how my academy
would work. Right. So for that
stage, this would be that book. Right.
So I agree with you. And that's actually
pretty good idea to do it at that. Those stages.
Would. It's almost like it can be very overwhelming to
be like, oh, I have to create this whole big new thing. Yeah. When really
you could be creating it now as you go
and talk about sellable asset. Yeah.
You know, even if you were just to build one book of that whole
stage one, if you were to concentrate on just one stage of your business and
get that to a point, wherever you would be in the
I guess the life cycle of almost
like education evolution of an entrepreneur, you could start early
on, you could go in the middle, you could go in the end. And
with what you do with selling or not with selling
necessarily, but just posing the idea to
service business owners. Have you thought about selling your business? Have you thought
about building it as an asset? Do you even know where to start? Like that
could be where you begin your curriculum. It could
also be emerging businesses and purposefully helping
emerging businesses that know that they want that as their endpoint.
What does it look like to start with that, with that end in mind
and then as they get there build that curriculum. There's so many places
start like I have chills. It's so exciting.
And you know, I think this is where the options for
business owners to consider that can be overwhelming. Right.
And distracting. I think this is where it comes in. Oh, but where do I
start? So first, how did that
land? And second, if that. If that is kind of what
you're thinking. Where would you start? Where would you want to
start? Where is your heart kind of pulling you?
Yeah. So see, that's the thing. Where do I
start? I definitely love it.
So I think
I, I don't know if I would want to start in the beginning
emerging businesses, because I do know that. I
don't know. I actually know a lot, but, but
I don't think many businesses,
especially service based, start that thinking. Like, oh yeah, I just want
to grow it and sell it. I think that realization
potentially comes later if it comes
and, and just based on my experience working with
them. Yeah. So I think a good start
would be in that stage where
they either are about to start hiring a team or they have
a very small three to five people
team. So they, they're gaining some momentum.
Right. They've gained some momentum and now they're realizing,
okay, I'm still involved in every aspect of my business. Like,
business cannot run without me. I am ambitious, I want to grow
it. But now I'm scared because
I think it means more time, more
work, which I don't have. And then I don't, I feel
stuck in that. I don't know how. And then very often at that
point they realize, yeah, there's some gaps in my skill set. Like
there are some things that I don't have. Yeah. And this is a
great point to actually start setting your
business as an asset. This is a great start to start
systemizing, putting the processes in place, you know,
creating the culture because you don't have a big team yet. This is,
you can start hiring and so on. So I, I think that's great point
to even give them the idea you can actually through systemic processes,
not just like improve the quality of your business and allow it to
scale, but in live a life as well.
But also that can lead to you being able to
sell it on the line if you want it. Yeah, I think that's an important
point is I've had a customer's
like, I'm thinking of Jordan. You guys don't know Jordan, but
let's just say she's in the health and wellness industry.
She's at a point in her business where she is looking
to grow. She has a great life. She's built
enough systems that it's easy to get clients and deliver.
She's got team members in the back end, but she's still
the delivery person. And when she thinks about,
I want to grow to the next level, I want to go and I don't
want to increment from 1 million to 2 million to 3 million. I want to
go to 10 million because I don't want to be doing this for 15 years.
I want to see my new vision right now. And
she has no idea what it looks like. She's never been, she's never been in
a larger business. She's never been in corporate. She's never, she's kind of
started this for herself, hasn't had formal training. And
that can feel so overwhelming. It can again.
Yes. And I think that your idea for
building those systems as you go with the
option to kind of enjoy your life and not feel
overwhelmed and the secondary option of and you can sell it because
we're building it purposefully is so important.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And
you know, as you say, like very often people just don't know
how to go about it and they don't even ask. You know, like there's sometimes
they don't even consider like, oh yeah, I could sell it on the line
because they didn't see it as an option. So yeah, I think that would be
a good place to start in that stage. Right?
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I've steered us down the
path. I feel, I feel like, oh, I'm steering us down the path of
we're. You're going to build curriculum that helps them sell. But let me, let me
check in because I know that you have that as a piece,
like an option in what you can help your clients do. But I
don't want to be influencing you in your thought in this pattern because it's
so it's just forming that that's what your curriculum is going to be
on. So I want to take a step back personally and say,
okay, how do, how does it feel with where you're going now
and what is it looking like? Like what do you think about your next
step, so to speak.
So next, like in that area, right? Like just what
we discussed. Yeah. So next step I would go into
like brainstorm, not, not that
we haven't brainstormed, but actually I like to like talk things through and then
go back on my own and sort of write things out.
How, what it would look like,
you know, narrow down the stage, what they would need and so
on and then
short term decide, like as you say, okay, maybe I just create an offer,
whether it's a one on one and so on for that particular niche
and just focus on that to bring people in to sort of start
working with them, see the patterns, see the components
of that one book, encyclopedia,
I like that analogy.
You know, even if it's just next year. Right. Doing it for next
year and then from there go, okay, now
were creating that first part of the academy
with all that data, all that, you know,
knowledge and then turn the
101 into
the first part of the academy. I guess that's what
I'm thinking. Yes. We talked about a lot.
I want to invite you to take a breath with
me for a moment. It's like.
Just kind of let that out.
If you were to reflect on the end state of this
academy. Yeah. What
outcome, direction or curriculum comes
to mind as the most exciting.
Direction? I don't know if I'm fully understanding. So I will reply the way I
understand. But if you don't, then
what's more most exciting for
me is,
can be very. Okay. I would just say it the way I think. Like
what's most exciting to me seeing
a large number of people in, in a room
growing, having success. Like, like truly
so. And just saying like, hey,
I am helping them do that through my team. Right. Because at this
point I'm not doing everything alone and I'm not
delivering everything alone. But we're helping them
succeed. We're actually
empowering them to do what they want in a way
that maybe they didn't think was possible.
I, I wonder because, because
we're talking about a set of books. If you
have this entry point, like here's where they are in their business. You
were very clearly articulated that. Yeah. And here
are some possible paths that they could choose to
go down. Yeah. Directions. And the, the, the general path
of everyone coming in is scaling.
Yeah. Growing in a way that allows them
to not be the only one delivering or over
or pressure or.
I've lost my train of thought. But anyway, they're all coming in, going down this
path and then they kind of diverge into their interest.
I'm interested in staying the course
and selling. I'm interested in
succession through my family. Like I want to hand my business down to
the next generation. I just want to go to retirement and
close my business. Like there's almost different outcomes as
they start and continue. I see that as
a future. Maybe the complexity once you get your
initial offer cohort going to have a
more structured. Not criteria but the
things that you're working on them with have that be more structured in that middle
part of the business when they're just bringing on team and then as they go
they're going to have different interests and it's almost like the group
will start To. To determine and help you determine. What do I
create and develop next? What's the next criteria? Right.
Or you do this again. Well, now I, as you,
I, Maggie, want to really explore this particular
path in the next stage. So building
a cohort out of what you already have to do that and build
that next piece of the academy. Right,
yeah. Makes sense. Makes sense.
That's really exciting. Yeah. And I can see that because,
you know, very often business, that's what happens. Right. Your clients tell you,
this is what I want next. Can you give it to me? Like, I like
working with you and so on. Right. Like, very often that comes.
That comes.
So that's a very good point.
All right, so we have here so far, we have
some revelation. Revelations. It's not a separate
business divide. You can do it with your current business, like start to
correct. Create this academy curriculum.
You've noticed that you don't want to start at the very beginning.
Emerging businesses, because they don't really have the
idea for scaling, they don't have a need for it. And you
really bring a strength there with your operations. Your. The way
you think about operations, efficiency, improving
things in the business in the back end and in. Even in the front end
of the business. And we haven't even touched on team. I know you help people
with teams. Yeah. So bringing that piece
into it and your experience there gives you that starting point
and then even your next step, which might
be. It might be brainstorming. But I
think, I think the brainstorming is really about
getting that group and that offer together and seeing if that
sales like seeing how that feels and
being very intentional about what you want to do with that group, which,
yes, you do group coaching now, but instead divergent.
Yeah. Stages. You have a solo stage.
Yeah. What do you think about that?
Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Brainstorming. I agree.
Brainstorming would be more on the offer, that initial offer,
what it would look like, and then going
and testing it. Yeah.
Yeah. Do you feel how it's different,
the brainstorming activity or next step now versus
earlier? Yeah. Does it feel any different? It does
feeling. It's more, you know, focused. Yeah. I
find that we're all creative and
when someone says, you're creative, bring your creativity to work, and I'm
like, yeah, I have no idea what that means. But if you can
give your creativity a box, almost like a
container, and say, I want you to unleash yourself
around this particular thing, whether it's a problem to solve or a focus.
Yeah. Wow. I mean, I. Amazing things can happen.
It's true. It's true. And constrained, you know, and
it's proven right, scientific that constrained
helps creativity. Right. When you constrain yourself
ladder then let yourself lose on everything that you could be doing and
all the ideas. When you constrain that
to certain. To whatever it's important to you to whatever you decide
that actually helps creativity. Yeah,
I think so too because that gives you, it gives you
something to focus. It gives your brain a problem to solve. Yeah, yeah.
Versus enjoying life as things
come into your viewpoint. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Have you ever, have you ever had an
idea where it feels like it's almost like a butterfly that
comes into your peripheral vision and escapes everyone's and you're trying to
be, you're trying to get work done and this stupid thing keeps bothering
you but it really is something that you, if you
turn and pay attention to it. Like have you ever had that happen
to you? Oh yeah, yeah, I, I have. I can't
think of the specific example, but I usually write it down.
I usually write it down. I actually wait
here. There was an idea. What was it?
Oh, okay. So that was just more of a strategy tactical idea for
next year. Like oh, what if I do this type of thing,
right? So I usually write it down and I let it set
and then like with this one, because it's a more of a tactical idea
for next year, I will go back to it when I do a bit of
planning for next year's strategic planning because that's at
least it will allow me to consider the idea because sometimes like we
have. Oh, let's get, just get distracted. Right. I would chase this
idea in front of like. No, no, no. I decided
to focus on whatever, on whatever I'm doing now so that
I write those down. Yeah, I,
I like that. I know you have a. So at
the time of this recording, we're coming to the end of the year, we're in
October and Maggie is going to be playing with an
idea of doing a public vision board
fun co working and I, I love that
idea. I, I know you may never do it again, but the idea of
looking back at a list of ideas you've had or brainstorming about
things to consider going forward into the next year
can be really powerful because I, I think sometimes and I know in corporate
planning we think about what
is the growth target I need to hit next which is usually year over year
growth. It's 5%, 10%, 15%, whatever
the growth is that you're, that you've done before. Corporate wants you to
do it again and better. And that becomes the guiding
force or the direction that you take the business, which is just growth for
growth's sake. And it doesn't give you an
ability to take a step back and imagine what your future can
be. Imagine the change that you can make. And I think that's often missed
where in small business or in privately owned firms,
we get the luxury of really doing that for ourselves.
And having that list that you showed us is, you know, kind of
powerful. It, it reminds us to do that.
Yeah, yeah, I agree with you. I was just even reflecting recently.
I was like, yeah, I started the business
to do things the way I want and
do things that I enjoy. And it doesn't mean
that it's not hard. Sometimes you're not
enjoying 100% of the time. Doing this is not bad.
But if you know, you,
you have an idea, you want to switch things up and so on, you
can do that. Right. It's as you say,
the growth for the sake of growth in the corporate world
that becomes, that can become so soul draining. And I've
lived that. I've, you know, we both been in a corporate world. I've
burned out in the corporate world that I
don't, I don't want that in my business. Right. Like so reminding
yourself, yes, of course I have big visions and so on,
but how I do it, to an extent
it matters. That journey that I'm going through to create
that goal matters to me.
So, yeah, it's funny, people used to say,
stop and smell the roses, you're going too fast. And that never
appealed to me. But the journey,
meaning how you're feeling every
day as you do your work, that's what's
important. And it's all, I think that's
often lost in the. I don't. They're called idioms,
but whatever those things are called, where stop and smell the roses, you know, those
little sayings. I think that's where we, we don't really get what the saying is
about. And you bring it up beautifully, which is
to stop and make sure you're doing it on purpose the way you want,
and you get to change your mind. I think that's.
I think folks will often not commit to a
big goal because it feels overwhelming or scary or they don't want to
destroy what they've done. But then they don't ever get to
feel that next level and they
forget, you know, you can always change your mind. I think that was a lesson
that I really had to learn. Oh, I don't have to be married to an
idea and master it in order to learn that it
was the wrong direction anymore. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah, yeah. I. And you know, I think of. It
happens to all of us. Right? It happens to me. I coach my clients
saying, you can. Yeah, you can set a goal. You can commit to it. Because
you have to commit to a goal to. To. To even have a chance to
achieve. Achieve it. And at the same time,
it's not written in stone. You can change that
if in the pursuit of it, you discover that
maybe that wasn't the goal that I wanted. I thought it was. But
then in the pursuit of it, and I'm giving it my own and so on
I want. It can always change your mind.
Okay, so as you mentioned, culture early on, and I want to
take what you just said and kind of stretch it out.
When you Think about serving 50,000 people through your
program, I think that was the number and having other
coaches to support your clients and your business.
What does that look like? I don't know if
50,000 people was a number. It says carry number, but maybe that should be my
group. That's your new number. It's 50,000. Okay,
okay, okay. Five years from now, let's keep it in
five. 50,000.
The culture.
And given that I haven't given it that much thought, but
I would just take it from what's important to me and what
I love.
Well, respect is like first. Okay. So
that's always respect of the other human being, of
their goals and what they want and
their ideas, their innovation. And that comes towards the
clients, but also towards my own team members. Like, I always loved,
you know, in my own corporate world to help
my team members, like, bring their ideas, bring
their things to what they thought was good. And I
always was surprised what amazing ideas they would come up with. But
he's like, oh, that's so good. I never thought of it. So having that
culture in my company and helping
that clients instill that and always think, you
know, yes, we're there as coaches or experts to support the clients, but
they also have knowledge and experience where they. We bring
that out and together, like, that's when the magic happens.
So that's first. With the respect comes also like the
innovation and growth. Growth is important to me. And of course,
with US Academy helping clients scale, that growth
comes. But it's not necessarily just growth in.
In numbers, like in. In money. Right. But it's growth in
the skill set in how we think about
Things growing as a leader, as a human being.
My core belief is you cannot outgrow your business.
Meaning you need to grow as a leader first of your business
in order for the results, like tangible money results to catch up.
Right. Like that doesn't. So that growth, that's what it means.
Another thing would be service.
So in service to our clients, serving the communities
that we are in and our clients are in.
So service, giving back. I'm, you know, I find myself very
lucky throughout my life and I always been grateful
to people who helped me and so on. Were never
achieving anything alone. So there's giving back and
service
and fun. And fun. Having
fun because business can like
we get. So when we, especially when we're ambitious and highly achieving.
Right. Which I am and my clients are, I'm sure Tori, you
are as well. So we can lose sight
of it and we can be so focused on like you know, like
achieving the goals. Achieving a goal that we forget to pause and
smell the roses or even laugh and have fun as we go.
So not forgetting that fun
would be. How do you, as you, as you think about like the values that
you're instilling. How does your role, how do you see your
role evolving and maybe,
maybe we take that five year view first and then pull it back
to a year from now.
A year from now. So are
you, are you still delivering? I'm definitely
delivering, but not 100%. So I
would start bringing and figuring out. Yeah.
What type of support and other coaches would
I need to deliver. So I am
involved a year from now. Realistically I probably
be majority of it involved but with support.
I mean if you, if you go out to that final kind
of where you have the team. Yeah.
How do you. I can see that you would, it seems like
you'd be now their coach. Investing in the coaches.
That and their evolution as leaders in your company.
Yes. So then they can support the clients. Some
people, some people, that's what, that's the role they want to
have. That's their nurturing role. That's where their coaching takes them. And other folks
want to hire that in and they see themselves
still creating curriculum or being in touch with a
subset of their clients or, or even,
even still others want to kind of live beyond or work beyond their
business, which is thought leadership. Being
the head of a non profit or really focusing on a
charitable contribution or starting another business.
Maybe it's their second or fifth. So there's so many different
ways that you can grow in your role. Which of
those. Or something I didn't mention feels like a right fit
for you right now. And you know, that might change. Talking
about changing your mind, you never know. Yes.
But right now, definitely, I see myself
empowering my team members to help the clients,
if anything, still developing like thought leadership
together, brainstorming on curriculums,
being involved in one way or another. I, I don't know to what
extent, but that, and if anything, like I have this
definitely I would love to do some events, whether it's once
a year, whether it's things so like being involved in that and
maybe participating, being a
little bit more with the clients, maybe during the events, maybe not
in like the day to day. So that's where
I'm seeing myself right now. I
might have ideas five years down the line, but for now,
okay. Yes. And
for the listener, the reason I ask Maggie that question
is as overachievers as I am,
and she mentioned she is as well, we can hone in on
a goal, an ambitious goal that's a project and
go full steam without considering our own
identity and how we fit into that. And we just kind of fall into
one of the roles and forget that
it's not de facto, that might not be the right
word, but it's not the given that that's, that's what has to happen. We get
to choose. And I, I find a lot of
technical owners, like I advise technical business
owners and they are programmers or
rocket scientists or some kind of inventor at heart.
And now they have a company and they're mired in management.
And I have one guy who's a cryptologist
and he bought another business to do a
training arm and now he's mired in the merger
and not knowing what to do and personnel issues. And he
thinks that he has to have that as his next role when
that's not the case. And in fact, because he bought another
business, he's got employees and leadership that he can
bring in to take over some of those roles and he never even thought of
it. So I find it's important to consider
your own identity. And so Maggie, you've played along with that very
well. Thank you. Because your identity, you get to choose and
change your mind and evolve with the company
and evolve how? What service and what your
role gets to be with your new team. Because your team is going to
surprise you. Yeah. 100. Whatever skills
they bring and interest they bring to enrich the pot.
Yeah. Yeah. And that you can never predict. Right. That's why
staying sort of open to that. Yeah. Like that can evolve. That can
change is so important and not like locking yourself completely. And
it has to be that way or highway thing. Right.
Because of that, as your business
grows and your. Your team, you never know what
they will bring and that. That the value that they will
unlock in a way in your business for sure.
All right, as we get toward the end of our episode, I
want to check in again first. We're going to take a breath
because I'm excited. So let's just.
Yeah, okay. And as we're now grounded
and kind of calm, what stands out to you
as the most surprising thing that you kind of learned about
this new vision you have?
So couple of things. One is
just thinking of it as a one piece
cohesive, like with certain parts. Right. And not like these
two separate paths that I've been thinking just based
on my right now. So that was a great revelation.
The second, just you helping me narrow down. Okay, where do I start?
Which is the hardest part? This is the hardest part.
So that was great. And then thinking
about it or just even expressing it. Yeah. Like, where do I see myself?
What's my role? Or how do I see my role
in five years? Being open to it,
potentially being a bit different, but like having at least a vision for
that. I think those were three most
powerful pieces. Excellent. And
what are you going to do as a deck step? Like, what can you
feel comfortable? Commitment is hard, especially after a brainstorm,
because there's the vulnerability period afterward where you're like, oh, did
I just commit to something? So I don't mean that. I mean,
what is the next almost journal exercise, thought
exercise or action or just going out for a
walk kind of thing that you want to do to
solidify what we talked about and to come up with a game plan. So
definitely offer so that, like that first
offer to think through that and like
think through journal, kind of create something. Right. Like the first
draft of. Of the offer. Oh, I love that because
it's so concrete. It went from thinking
about it, brainstorming on it. I'm going to have a first
draft of an offer that can make this thing go forward.
Very powerful. Thank you. Thank you for
bringing it out for me. My favorite thing to do. So
thank you for having fun on my podcast with me because it's like,
handy. All right,
so we have put a bow on this conversation, but we're not done.
I would love to know what can the listener
do to stay in your world to learn more about you, to
take this journey with you on what this offer ends up evolving into.
Like, what can they do to get in your world next?
Yeah, so social media
on Instagram and LinkedIn under my name, Maggie. Maggie.
Or you can just, you know, check the links on my
website, stowwaytoleadership.com I will probably
talk about it in my podcast, so you can tag
along in my podcast.
And, Tori, by the way, if you are gonna share with me this
recording, I will put it as an episode in my podcast. So that would be.
That'll be great. So, yeah, so those
in those series, I'll try to kind of unravel and
share my thoughts. And as the journey.
Yeah. Progresses, that would be fun. And, guys,
that's the host. She's the host of the Diamond Effect
podcast. Yeah. So get over there. And I'll have links, of
course, in the show notes so you guys don't have to worry for driving. We
will get these things out to you. You can come back in. Press that
button. All right. Well, thank you, Maggie. It's been
fabulous having you on the podcast today. Yeah, thank you, Tori,
for having me. It was a lot of fun. I appreciate it. I didn't know
what to expect, but I have to say, I had a lot of fun. Well,
it's an experiment, as always. I'm always doing experiments, so it was
awesome. That's awesome. Thanks.