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How to Scale from 7 to 8 Figures with Julie Ellis (She Sells Client Spotlight)

Have you ever been curious to learn the mindset of an 8 figure entrepreneur? Then this interview is definitely the one to listen to. Today’s guest is with my client and award-winning entrepreneur, Julie Ellis.

Julie Ellis is an author, professional speaker and leadership coach to corporate leaders and scaling Entrepreneurs. Julie provides her unique experience and expertise to her coaching clients, gained through 25 years of working first in the corporate world, and then as a leading Canadian entrepreneur. She is a co-founder of award-winning Mabel’s Labels, one of Canada’s greatest small business success stories. Julie’s book, Big Gorgeous Goals is written for women entrepreneurs who want to step out of the small box they find themselves in and set world domination in their sights. In discussion with over a dozen women entrepreneurs, Julie explores their stories of why and how they have achieved great things in their lives and careers, and pairs that knowledge with her own stories of how she built, grew, and sold her business to a giant in her industry. 

 

Show Notes:

[2:59] – Julie built Mabel’s Labels with her co-founder to be an 8 figure business before she sold the company to Avery Labels.

[4:12] – Her background is in financial planning but she decided she wanted to create something herself.

[6:15] – The business quickly grew a following from a grassroots beginning.

[8:10] – Take the best action with what you have.

[10:09] – Julie and her co-founder continued to innovate and grow the team. They caught the attention of Avery Labels.

[11:41] – Julie explains the decision they made to sell the company to Avery Labels.

[13:28] – Due diligence is a lot of work. Julie shares some of the challenges faced and lessons learned.

[15:58] – What was the mindset that Julie had to adopt to get through the rapid sale of her wildly successful business?

[19:35] – Appreciate what happens throughout the journey.

[21:05] – Julie got to the point where she wasn’t happy with working for somebody else.

[22:45] – If you’re coming from a foundation of fear, you hide.

[24:17] – Even the goals you set could be a box you hide within.

[25:45] – A “big gorgeous goal” always has an element that you’re not sure how you’re going to accomplish.

[30:43] – There’s no growth in your comfort zone.

[32:27] – Systems, processes, and people.

[34:22] – What does it look like to be an entrepreneur CEO?

[35:17] – Julie explains how she finds the things to focus on first.

[36:41] – Entrepreneurship means you are constantly growing and learning.

[37:58] – How do we shift our mindset away from perfectionism?

[39:56] – Delegating can be tough, but it is important.

[42:17] – Don’t get discouraged when scaling your business

 

Connect with Julie:

Big Gorgeous Goals: How Bold Women Achieve Great Things by Julie Ellis

Julie Ellis Home Page

Links and Resources:

Instagram  |  LinkedIn  |  YouTube

She Sells with Elyse Archer Home Page

Abundance Mini Course

Join the $10K Club

Apply for the $50K Club Mastermind

 

0:02

Welcome to She Sells Radio have you ever been curious to learn the mindset of an

0:08

eight-figure entrepreneur well if you have you’re going to want to listen into today’s interview with my client and

0:15

award-winning entrepreneur Julie Ellis so if you are not familiar with Julie you are probably familiar with uh her

0:22

company one of her companies that she has founded if you are a parent so Julie is an author she’s a professional

0:28

speaker and she’s a leadership coach to corporate leaders and scaling entrepreneurs she is the co-founder of

0:35

the company Mabel’s Labels which I did not understand the necessity of labeling

0:40

everything until I started sending two little kids to daycare and realizing that everything has to be labeled and

0:47

the concept behind our company is absolutely brilliant so I have so much appreciation for it now as a mom she’s

0:54

the author of the book big gorgeous goals which is written for women entrepreneurs who want to step out of the small box they found themselves in

1:01

and set world domination in their sites and we’re going to have a really powerful conversation today because

1:06

Julie sold her company and I think it was 2016. right Julie so Soldier company

1:12

Mabel’s Labels in 2016 has gone on to form a coaching company that empowers

1:17

entrepreneurs and leaders to scale from seven to eight figures so I know there’s so so many places I want to go with this

1:24

conversation Julie welcome because She Sells Radio I’m so glad to have you thanks Elyse I’m so glad to be here oh

1:32

my gosh well I think we are gonna I want to touch on a couple of different things with you Julie that I think are really

1:38

powerful um it is just because of the Rarity of building and scaling an eight-figure

1:44

business it’s such a great opportunity that we can have you on here to talk about your journey there what you did

1:51

um selling selling to Avery labels I’m really curious to hear about that and then also we’ll talk about you know your

1:57

book that you’ve written big gorgeous goals and the mindset and the some of the commonalities that you see see with other women leaders like you who have

2:04

done really big things in the business world but before we get into all of that I want to share just some of your back

2:10

story with our listeners so you have this incredibly inspiring story of

2:15

creating one of Canada’s greatest business success stories Mabel’s Labels which you did build to eight figures

2:21

with your co-founders and then sold to Avery labels which everyone knows that name in 2016. now I am guessing and you

2:28

can tell me if I’m wrong but I’m guessing you did not anticipate this necessarily being your Life Path when

2:34

you first got started this is an entrepreneurship so if it was tell us but otherwise tell us a little bit of

2:40

the journey and how you got started and and what led you to this this big entrepreneurial moment that most people

2:46

never experience well I was working as a financial planner so I had

2:53

um you know finished University worked my way through a couple of uh management programs and ended up as a financial

3:00

planner managing a book of clients and I knew that if I wanted to continue to

3:06

climb the corporate ladder it meant you know getting on a commuter train to the city and all of those things and I had

3:12

small kids at the time and didn’t really feel like it fit my life plan and so

3:17

when a couple of friends of mine and I got together to think about starting a

3:23

business that kind of felt like it landed with me um I felt like I wanted more flexibility

3:30

and I wanted to be the owner of my own destiny I think at that point in my life and so we got started

3:37

um and we basically you know set a very had a very limited budget and we made up a

3:44

list of all the people we knew and then we had to cut some of them off the list because we didn’t have enough money to

3:50

send them all our welcome letter and we sat and stuffed envelopes and put stamps

3:56

on them and addressed them with those letters to launch our business and we opened a bottle of champagne and we

4:02

toasted to the IPO we would have one day really so you started with the intention

4:09

of that that’s beautiful okay I love it yeah we did and so you know then we went

4:15

back to our teeny tiny little basement office and started making labels and we

4:21

quickly gained a following and we from a very early point in the

4:27

business uh felt like if we could get some coverage by media that that would

4:32

help us and so we started I want to pause you excuse me super quick too I just want to pause you really quick how

4:37

did you quickly gain a following because this was in early 2000s early 2000s yeah okay social media yeah yeah so we were

4:46

taking our kids places and standing at the soccer field and the gymnastics club and the daycare uh where they said

4:53

please label everything and we were talking to moms and moms share products that they like and our products were

5:00

visible products because you were putting them on the things that your kids were taking out into the world and

5:05

so we we just chatted with people and uh from there we really started to make

5:11

sales got it so very Grassroots I think it’s just so powerful because we’ve got listeners who are at all different

5:16

stages of their journey and so to hear you know you built an eight-figure business from Grassroots talking and

5:23

talking to people and so before the age of social media so thank you for clarifying that so you did that and then

5:29

you said okay we want to get some media and some press to help Elevate this so pick up free stuff there yeah and we got

5:34

a tiny tiny little write-up on a parenting Roundup page in a magazine in Canada like literally like one and a

5:41

half by two and a half inches and it led to us being named the the daily candy

5:49

which was the subscriber newsletter and uh once a week they would say what the

5:55

daily candy was for kids so the daily candy kids came out and they said you must have fables labels so it went to

6:01

all of their thousands of subscribers and suddenly we had all these orders coming in and near the end of the day somebody

6:08

phoned us and said so if you had a busy day today and my sister-in-law said yes what’s like how do you know and she said

6:15

well I submitted you and so she had gotten the magazine she lived in California her cousin in Ottawa

6:22

Canada sent her the magazine and she submitted us because she thought it was so cool wow and that event led to that

6:29

one of the customers who bought labels from us that day was Elizabeth Hasselbeck and about a year after that

6:36

we came back to the office on a Tuesday after it had been a holiday Monday here and we had a message on our voicemail

6:43

saying that they were having a baby shower for her on The View and would we um be interested in having the labels

6:51

featured in that segment and yeah and that led you know very quickly to this baby shower episode

6:58

about 10 days later and there were about 10 products and she went along the line and she stood with a cup that had a

7:04

Mabel’s Labels on it and said I could not live without these wow yeah and that led

7:10

to you know the biggest 24 hours of sales we’d ever had oh my gosh there’s I

7:16

know you’ll keep you’ll keep sharing but there’s this beautiful um kind of theme emerging as you talk

7:21

Julie that I want to hear your perspective on briefly of the kind of the Dual forces of both

7:28

taking action with what you can right in the moment right you got started and you said well what are we going to do we’re

7:34

going to go Grassroots we’re going to go talk to moms and there I’m sure there was no way you could have predicted the

7:40

opportunity with the view or with Elizabeth Hasselbeck and and seeing there’s like this dance that I’ve found

7:46

in my own journey of both taking the best action we possibly can at the moment with what we have and then also

7:53

knowing that when we do that and when we have that powerful intention like you said with the champagne toast we’re

7:59

toasting to our IPO there will be synchronicities there will be serendipities and I I just it it said to

8:07

me that comes through so powerfully when you share so if you want to share anything on that um on that energy of

8:13

creation I just think that’s so powerful to hear yeah I think we did have that energy of why can’t we do it like that

8:22

that you know people would say well you can’t do that we’d say why not and so then we would go and find a way to do it

8:27

we didn’t really listen to the to the you can’t

8:33

um and I think that we were very determined to create a product that

8:38

number one actually did what we said it did um and you know I meet people today who

8:44

are like those things won’t come off they’re still stuck on and and that’s what we actually wanted and you know we

8:51

had a no questions asked money back guarantee we we did all of these things to really stand behind the product that

8:58

we offered and so the combination I think of this like high intention

9:04

setting and also like standing by what we were doing came together in a really

9:10

beautiful way for us wow wow that’s so powerful so take us okay so let’s let’s take us

9:18

from The View then so you had you said most orders ever in 24 hours from that right and then take us to the the point

9:25

where Avery came in and wanted to purchase and yeah so we continued really from there

9:32

innovating and growing and you know growing our team

9:37

um we opened a retail line of products that we sold in Target in the US and Walmart and Canada and we just kept

9:44

innovating um as we went and uh thought of new fun ideas and continued to sort of push that

9:51

envelope and I think particularly probably our presence at retail really

9:58

drew the eyes of Avery labels because when they called us they said they’d been watching us for years which was

10:05

super interesting because um you know we were very intimidated

10:11

when we went into retail and we went up against them but the thing we brought was you know we brought the moms who

10:18

knew our brand and wanted to buy a product they could have on the fly right they didn’t want to wait for a custom

10:23

printed shipped by mail product to come to their mailbox all the time they could

10:29

wait sometime times but sometimes they needed a quick solution and they needed it right away right so I think that

10:35

really you know helped Elevate um and we were you know we were doing

10:41

well in terms of our sales and retail outlets so we one day got a phone call

10:47

and just you know asked if we could uh speak with them and they asked if we had

10:54

ever thought about selling the business and I think one of the crossroads you hit as you get to eight figures is that

11:01

getting to you know mid eight figures and up towards nine figures is another

11:06

huge climb and another Hard Road and after the founders had been together

11:11

we’d been together for about 12 years and I think you know

11:16

we all were in slightly different places about what we wanted for the future and I think that happens it’s a totally

11:23

normal thing and you know you start together on a path and ever so slightly

11:28

people’s dreams and wants and needs start to just just do this a little bit but by the time you get many years down

11:35

the road they start to widen even farther and so their call really came at a time when we were contemplating how we

11:42

wanted to run the future business and so it really made sense to talk to them at

11:48

least and hear what they had to say yeah I think that’s a great um and that’s like with any relationship

11:55

right that’s going to happen whether it’s a co-founder whether it I mean it can be with our romantic relationships

12:00

with friendships and just tuning into you know based on how we’ve grown and

12:05

evolved what’s the best and highest path to take next so

12:11

um so yeah and and so with the sale if there’s anything that you want to

12:16

share from that I’d love to hear because I think it probably for most of our listeners they haven’t been through

12:21

something like that yet so if there’s anything you want to pull out that you think looking back it’s like wow that would have been really good to know

12:27

where I learned this big lesson from that would love to hear that yeah it you know best and highest path with our

12:35

share how hold her hats on was definitely you know looking at the

12:40

acquisition uh but it is a very hard Road of its own uh due diligence is

12:47

filled with like detailed detailed work and Gathering of the million documents and you know I ran around with my 20

12:54

Page spreadsheet that had you know between 6 and 12 points on each page of

13:00

things I needed to gather and um so I sort of was the point person for

13:06

that I had help with the Gathering from other my other co-founders and then we had one co-founder who was sort of

13:12

facing the negotiation side so we did a real divvy up the work and

13:18

try and try and get as far as we could but it was a lot of work and it was a race like we sold very quickly in about

13:24

five months which is unbelievable really I think we’re fortunate because we ran a business that

13:31

had good systems and processes so I say it was a lot of work but we came from a good Baseline yeah

13:37

um and and it’s wildly distracting to sell your business it’s wildly distracting from focusing on growing

13:43

your business and so we you know landed at the Finish Line somewhat exhausted

13:49

and literally by day one the requests for we need you to you know

13:56

produce this change this forecast this like started to fly in and we realized

14:01

you know there wasn’t going to be a break it was sort of uh you know we we thought we had reached a Finish Line but

14:08

really it was a start line wow how much longer did that continue after to that

14:13

point it took a while and because um the parent company company of Avery

14:19

is a publicly traded company so the reporting requirements are high and they’re fast you know and so for a small

14:25

Finance team and you know you get you’re an eight-figure business great but you

14:30

get bought by a you know five billion dollar printing company and and the requirements are high and so like

14:36

adjusting to some of those things and making the changes uh was definitely a challenge

14:42

um that we met and and we did but it took a lot of effort more than we expected

14:48

um and that for me is where I think things really started to change in terms

14:53

of what my trajectory was going to look like right right absolutely which I want to I want to come back to I want to ask

14:59

before we do what was the mindset that you had to have Julian those times where

15:04

it’s like this is okay it’s a lot of work I know where I’m going I see I feel like I see the finish line but this is

15:11

feeling it could feel overwhelming or it can feel I would imagine there’s a fair amount of resilience that had to be

15:16

developed during the process so what was the mindset that you developed that allowed you to navigate through this

15:22

whole big transition as smoothly as you did uh head down one foot in front of the

15:29

other keep going um I had people I talked to every day

15:34

um the accountant the lawyer and our operational advisor every morning I would sort of start out by talking to

15:39

all three of those people um about where we were at what everybody was thinking what were the next steps

15:47

where was I stuck anywhere and did I need any help and that Rhythm sort of

15:53

ran my life for about four months so presence one step at a time they

16:00

focused which is yeah powerful mindset for anyone to have so um so yeah so talk to us about the

16:06

transition from there so you got some clarity okay maybe I’m going in a different path

16:11

I did I got some clarity that that path that I thought I was on

16:16

wasn’t going to be the path that I wanted to be on and that was sort of

16:23

um Revelation to me um like I was going to be one of those Founders who you know stayed forever

16:30

went back and visited the office after retirement took over a boardroom and you know drank coffee and chatted with the

16:37

staff and and and that sort of thing and you know instead what happened was after six months I I did leave

16:45

and I think you know part of that head down one foot in front of the other let’s get this done attitude

16:52

um allowed me to be somewhat unemotional which was useful at that time but in the

16:59

after part of the sale might not have been that useful to me uh because I hadn’t contemplated really

17:06

what I would do and so I sort of was trying to cast a few different

17:12

opportunities and options about where I thought I could be really useful to the business but ultimately it seemed like

17:20

what I wanted and what was going to be available because you know

17:27

not being an owner not being like giving away you know taking off your owner hat and the responsibilities that goes with

17:33

that you know sort of left me feeling like it was the part of the business I liked the best that’s what I you know

17:40

and and so I was sad that that part had sort of gone away from being within my control yeah yeah it’s so interesting I

17:48

was just talking before this interview um with a client of just navigating endings and how we always look back and

17:56

we can say gosh like I’m I’m so glad that happened right I can’t think of an ending in my life as as hard as probably

18:02

most of them have felt at the time especially when I was less conscious about what’s going on can’t think of an

18:07

ending where I didn’t look back and say I see exactly how that was teeing me up for what’s

18:13

next but in the moment it feels crappy yes

18:19

yeah and I think there’s something about entrepreneurs where we are highly driven

18:27

people who believe in ourselves and we climb we like to climb for Pinnacles and

18:33

and we very rarely like I think about my experience at Mabel’s Labels and I mean

18:39

we won some amazing Awards we had some amazing things happen and our reaction would often be well okay but we we

18:47

didn’t actually sell as much as we wanted to or we didn’t actually get this we didn’t like you know it was a little

18:53

bit like we couldn’t Revel in it because we felt we had more work to do and and I

18:59

think there’s a lesson in that about about appreciating what happens on the

19:05

journey a little bit more uh but I think it also created a scenario for me where

19:11

when I hit the very natural plateau of selling the business and then deciding to leave

19:17

I struggled because that wasn’t what you did you didn’t really sit on plateaus right

19:24

right how long was the transition period from when you you left until obviously

19:29

now you’re you’re doing incredible work coaching and Consulting helping Founders scale to eight figures and you’ve

19:35

written your book big gorgeous goals but how long was that transition kind almost like that I call it a lot of times the no man’s land or the no woman’s land

19:42

that in between period so I was off for just over a year and then doing a little

19:49

bit of Consulting and work um and then I went and landed a gig uh

19:56

working for somebody else and running their business and so there it was really interesting I had about 135

20:03

people that were reporting to me and I reported to the owner who wanted to step out of the day today and it was an

20:09

amazing experience great business great team and at the end as I started to get

20:15

to the 18 month Mark I was kind of like huh something’s happening for me here and I

20:21

think it said I don’t want to work for somebody else and it really took me getting to that

20:27

second point of working for somebody else where I was like wait a second I want to go build something for me yeah

20:34

and so in early 2019 that’s when I started this phase of the journey that

20:39

I’m on now so it took me sort of two and a half years after leaving Mabel’s to really to really find the path

20:47

beautiful beautiful and that Clarity is so important and I think for those of us who I I don’t I don’t know about you I

20:53

personally don’t think everyone is wired to be an entrepreneur I think it’s there’s different paths for different people but if you are wired that way

21:01

it feels you did not say this word I will put it could feel crippling or

21:06

boxed in to be working for somebody else which I know is actually it’s something I want to ask you about your book

21:12

um big gorgeous goals that you wrote Because I know you you talk about helping women get out of this small box

21:18

that we find ourselves in so I think what will be really fun is let’s let’s talk a little bit about some of the

21:23

concepts from Big gorgeous goals and then we’ll tie it into scaling and building from seven to eight figures but

21:29

when I read that I was like okay I can relate to that I can think of so many times in my life when I felt like I

21:35

found myself in a small box I’m guessing most people can but what is this box and how do we even find ourselves in it I

21:41

always start there well I think the box is you know the

21:47

limits that we put on ourselves ultimately that’s what builds the box right and so what happens when we think

21:53

about doing something really big is one of the first things we feel is fear and

22:00

that so that sort of sets your foundation if you’re on a foundation of fear what you do is you hide behind

22:05

things so you hide behind your busyness you hide behind your to-do lists you hide behind the things that you know

22:13

bring you some amount of comfort and some amount of well I you know I’m just

22:19

so busy that I don’t have time to to actually go after that right because

22:26

it’s convenient to to feel that you you know you don’t have to be in that afraid

22:33

zone or that unsteady Zone where we get to when we start getting into a growth

22:38

phase I just want to pull out something you

22:43

said it’s so important I’m like I want to write this down the foundation of to me this is such a

22:49

key and it’s a tell if you’re in fear or not are you hiding behind the busyness are you hiding behind the to-do list and

22:55

I notice in my own life I know those have tended to crop up more and feel like more and more when I’m in a

23:01

transition time that maybe the next phase feels scary or feels uncomfortable so I just want to like make sure everybody got that because I think we

23:09

would not even be aware that that was what was going on it was I’m just busy like no like are you on a foundation of

23:16

fear right now so thank you keep going but I think that’s it’s so important it is important and it’s where you have to

23:24

watch a little bit like strategies that can be really useful strategies like thinking about a smart goal where you

23:31

where you box it in and contain it that can actually be something to hide behind instead you know well you know it’s

23:38

achievable and it’s measurable and it’s specific and all the things it’s supposed to be but it can also be a you

23:43

know one of those small boxes that you end up hiding with them because the fear of reaching into the unknown the fear of

23:49

stepping into your own magnificence drives you to safety my gosh I hate smart goals side note

23:55

I’ve told people like I will know I used to teach them in corporate I’ll never teach them again I disagree with there’s

24:01

I think they can I think they can have a place as a small piece underneath a big

24:07

umbrella goal where you need to move something forward and you want to measure that I think they can have a place but I think you’ve got to get

24:13

Beyond you’ve got to reach beyond in order to really look for the things that allow you to step into your magnificence

24:20

yeah absolutely so okay so beautiful so so keep going so you were talking about getting out of this box foundation and

24:27

so those goals that you make when you’re in that in that Foundation of fear really close the box and make it small

24:33

and so in order for us to top that lid open and you know look to the stars look

24:40

to the things that are going to help us you know we need to think about reaching and climbing and growing and opening up

24:48

to all the things that you know scare us a little bit and I think that that’s

24:55

part of you know the figuring out I think a big gorgeous goal always contains an element that you don’t know

25:01

how you’re going to get it done whether it’s a skill set a financial gap

25:07

um a knowledge Gap a gap of a connection so you don’t have the right people in

25:13

your circle to help you get there you know there’s always a missing ingredient when it comes to a big gorgeous goal and

25:20

so I think that’s part of what drives the fear like how could I ever do that how would I learn that who do I know

25:26

like I don’t know the right people to help me with this how would I finance it how would I like it’s always those

25:32

pieces where you and and sometimes it just feels like oh too hard yeah yeah

25:39

how do you coach yourself through it when you are working on a big gorgeous

25:44

goal in that fear crops up what do you do uh so often that’s where I use people so

25:53

is it a mentor is it a paid advisor or coach is it

25:58

um I have a really amazing group of women that I call my privy Council and you know is it it workshopping some

26:05

ideas with them getting somebody to spend you know an hour or two with me the Whiteboard or just generally being

26:11

with the whole group and you know talking about an idea yeah

26:17

um and so that piece of it like it’s for me it’s using people

26:22

um that’s my primary go-to the second go-to I would have is to clear some time in my calendar and try and get out into

26:29

nature or some other place where my mind can wander a little bit I find that in

26:38

order to really move things forward I need some time and some space where

26:43

it doesn’t feel necessarily productive I need to allow my mind to wander and and

26:49

think things through and mull things over in a way that I used to deny myself

26:55

a lot because it felt so unproductive and um but I need that I need that space and

27:01

then suddenly I can come from all of that swirl and crystallize something and then I feel like I can move and then I

27:08

can move quite quickly actually so much power in that there’s so much power and just

27:14

being having conscious awareness of where’s my energy where’s my mind and

27:19

this is something I said to myself today I was like okay what are my intentions for today my intentions for today are

27:24

and I use some Abraham Hicks type language so someone could choose whatever they want I was like I’m gonna be in the vortex or you could be like

27:29

I’m going to be tapped in I’m going to be tuned in I’m going to pay attention to my energy I’m going to be conscious

27:34

and then I’m gonna just get whatever else done I can get done from there because ideas that come from outside of

27:40

that place it is the swirl it is that I don’t know it’s the it doesn’t help move you forward and I want to I want to also

27:46

just ask about one other thing you said so you said getting past the fear you use people I’m assuming you tell me if

27:53

you approach this differently you use people who are at the level

27:58

of either of the goal that you’re looking to achieve or they have the mindset of someone who wouldn’t look at

28:06

this and be like you should be in fear right because I know sometimes we’d be like oh well I’m I’ve got this big

28:11

decision to make let me go talk to my I don’t go talk to my mom let me go talk to my brother let me talk to my best

28:16

friend from high school and it’s the way I always look at it is do they have the results you want and if so yes lean into

28:23

them and if not you’re going to get feedback at their level of Consciousness which may not be what you want to yeah

28:30

so is that how you approach it too yes yes and in some ways it’s one of the

28:35

things like uh that you have to get over as you level continue to level up

28:41

because what happens so I wrote a book and became an author and I started circling in you know I changed brace

28:48

courses so you know you pick a new horse for a new Racecourse and uh I was

28:54

circling with all these people who were successful thought leaders successful authors and and then you know you’re

29:01

gaining The Toe Hold and you’re going to start to work your way up through that level and you also have to have like a

29:07

little bit of a mindset of not being intimidated by that because suddenly you’ve moved to you know the bigger the

29:14

bigger fish pond and you’re the small little fish in there and and so you know how do you find supporters within that

29:21

new group that you’re circulating in and how do you kind of Leverage that to help you feel more comfortable and it is

29:28

finding groups with people that are doing what you want to be doing yeah and

29:34

trying to you know because that’s when the voices in your head get really loud right is when you feel small in a new

29:42

group where you feel inexperienced and uncertain yeah for sure for sure and I

29:48

know so many people listening they’re used to being top of the pack whether it’s leading their company being top of

29:56

the leaderboard in a sales role and that can be our comfort zone but I love there’s no growth there right so I I

30:02

love how you said it’s like let’s get on a different horse let’s go that requires a level of humility and willingness to

30:08

lay the ego aside and say okay feels uncomfortable but I’m willing to be new I’m willing to be the the brand

30:15

new author in this group of established authors and that’s where that’s where the growth Edge comes right yeah

30:21

um what were some of the I’d love if you could speak Julie to maybe just one or two of the commonalities amongst I know

30:27

you interviewed over a dozen successful entrepreneurs right with the book and talking to different women who had gone

30:33

out and set and achieved these big gorgeous goals what were a couple of the key commonalities you found amongst them

30:40

I found it really interesting because I thought I would get very different answers depending on how people you know

30:46

you get the like big Visionary person filled with ideas you get the person who’s more of a builder who can take the

30:53

ideas and actually make them live and breathe um and so you know when you have two

30:58

people coming at something from completely different perspectives you don’t always expect the same answer and

31:04

the thing I found was that invariably they say it’s systems processes and people that allow them to do big things

31:12

so one of the motifs that I use in the book is the iceberg Motif because you

31:18

know 10 of an iceberg sits above the water that is the Fantastic things we see that people do

31:25

90 of it is hard work and we don’t see that you know it’s like social media

31:30

right it’s a highlight reel so we’re seeing the good things and so you don’t

31:35

understand what’s how people build things underneath them in order to

31:40

sustain them they have a scaffolding that they have built that is allowing them to reach these Great Heights and

31:47

its systems its processes and its people interesting is that so systems processes

31:54

people are those the three things that you really look at when you’re coaching because you work with a number of clients where they’re scaling from seven

32:01

to eight right so we can talk about that a little bit here too and I know that’s you coach a lot of different clients but from what I

32:06

understand that’s one of your sweet spots is that the biggest difference when going from seven to eight figures or

32:13

what’s tell me how those things fit in in that growth Journey I think they are the biggest things

32:22

um because things happen you know so you get to seven and you have processes that

32:27

are working and you probably have some people that work for you but to go go to eight

32:33

um the people part the roles are going to get more specific you’re going to hire more

32:39

you’re going to turn into a manager of people and less a doer and some the

32:45

reality unfortunate reality is that some of the people who are with you from the earliest days may not survive that

32:51

transition up into the kind of formalization and systemization your business is going to need to to survive

32:59

and thrive at eight figures so that’s a hard that’s a hard path and

33:07

it’s a hard path for some entrepreneurs who feel um like people start businesses women

33:14

especially I believe start businesses because they see a need in the world and so there’s an endlessly fascinating list

33:21

of people who have started businesses because of that and that doesn’t mean that I imagine you

33:29

know being being the boss lady and having a lot of people reporting to me and so it’s really like this big

33:36

transition to you know what does it really look like to be a CEO entrepreneur CEO as opposed to you know

33:43

the person at three in the morning who stayed up late because we’re trying to get something launched and you know

33:48

you’re closing up the Loose Ends and that sort of thing like when you have an eight-figure business you really want to

33:54

try and not be in that position because it means you don’t have the right systems and processes in place

34:00

how do you start to fill some of those gaps and I know you work with client you do intensives and VIP days and longer

34:07

containers to work with clients on that but if someone is they’re saying okay I’m aware like I’m yeah I have this

34:12

Vision I want greater impact I want greater growth I still I love your your point of you don’t want to be the one up

34:18

at 3am fixing things if you are that person raising your hand where do you start to even get aware of some of the

34:25

gaps with systems and processes do you is it like I know it like I’ll feel things intuitively in my business like we gotta change that or we gotta fix

34:32

that is there an assessment that we do how do we start to get a handle on that yeah we work our way through an

34:38

assessment it’s not super complicated uh it takes you know less than half an hour

34:44

and that is a good indicator for me of where the biggest opportunity areas are

34:50

to focus first um because I think it’s one of those things like

34:56

um any closed system will have you know if you have a bottleneck and you clear that

35:02

bottleneck you you are inevitably going to create another bottleneck somewhere else right and so working on problems in

35:08

your business is like that it’s not like you’re gonna ever have everything fixed right you’re gonna fix something and

35:14

it’s going to show another problem in a different part of the business and you’re going to work your way through that problem and and then and you may

35:21

even come back around to the first problem that you fixed where you’ve scaled up enough that now it’s a problem

35:26

again you know or some version of it that seems almost familiar

35:33

um and so I think that taking that mindset of okay like this is how it

35:39

works like we’re you know we’re not stagnant the world’s not stagnant our business is going to continue to grow

35:44

and so we’re going to continue to have problems we need to solve that is just the way of it

35:50

um in fact I always feel like if you ever really actually are sitting there thinking you know what you’re doing you’ve got a big change coming and it’s

35:56

probably right around the corner because that’s entrepreneurship it’s constant learning and growing so true oh my gosh

36:03

I was listening to an interview with Tony Robbins the other day and I don’t listen to a lot of his stuff actually

36:08

but I for whatever reason I was tuning into it and he was talking about I think he’s got over over a hundred companies

36:14

now so many people reporting him across the world and he was like at any given time if I look at my phone there’s going

36:21

to be a lot of things I could get worked up about because there’s going to be a lot of people talking about problems

36:26

doing things not the way I would do it but that’s part of growth and scaling is you have to be okay with that and it

36:32

made me think about dropping perfectionism so I want to speak for just a moment to how you’ve seen that

36:37

play into your own growth the entrepreneurs you coach I know a lot of the women in our community who I work

36:43

with in particular they’re not consciously aware of it but they have a paradigm of perfectionism and we’ve been

36:49

taught that as women especially to be safe in the world you have to look a certain way you have to present a

36:55

certain way you can’t make mistakes especially that with money God forbid you make a mistake with money or and so

37:00

we get caught up in this probably a very small box of perfectionism right but to

37:06

your point there’s always when we’re growing there’s always going to be things that feel like problems so how did you notice perfectionism crop up in

37:13

your journey and or did you not but either way how do we work around that how do we shift our mindset away from

37:18

that because I think it’s a very limiting belief system it is I think perfectionism breeds a culture of

37:24

control as well potentially right like you you you want everything to be perfect so you hang on really tight and

37:30

you want to control things and that leads to things that are you know less than good in terms of outcomes because

37:36

then you have micromanaging your team’s not going to like that you have you know

37:41

you become you become the Block in the system to getting anything done because everything’s running through you you are

37:49

Beyond capacity you can’t make that many decisions all of those things yeah and

37:54

so the only way to scale is to relinquish some of that control and some

38:00

of that perfectionism it’s figuring out strategies

38:06

for how to do it in a smart way that makes sense and that you have the right amount of of

38:15

controls around like especially when you’re letting go of like Financial things let’s say you build a finance

38:21

team you need to let go and all of those kinds of things

38:27

that means you know getting the right advice having the right checkpoints

38:33

having the right monthly um routines that you follow in order to ensure because you don’t want fraud in

38:39

your business that’s that nobody wants that and so you need the right controls in order to make sure it doesn’t happen

38:45

but it means you also need to relinquish the work to the people who are experienced and who are going to do it well for you

38:52

and so I think things like that are so so important like delegating delegating

38:58

well so that your employee really understands what it is you’re asking them to do how you’re going to check in

39:04

about it and what it is you expect to have upon the completion of the task nobody teaches us how to do that I was

39:12

just gonna say what’s your best tip for how to do like how do you teach people how to delegate because it’s so like

39:17

stuff gets so gunked up in communication there I’ve seen it in my communication tour like man I didn’t even talk about

39:23

how we were gonna make sure this was done well or circling back because I’ll just I’ll be so candid with everyone

39:29

listening part of me I just want to release stuff and be like I’m moving on I’m the very like Visionary entrepreneur

39:35

I don’t want to get stuck in the weeds and that can create a lot of opportunities for things to be missed or

39:41

just support communication so what’s your strategy for delegating Julie

39:46

so my strategy is to outline the task and depending on the size of the task

39:54

um ask them to go and sort of frame up their solution to the task and so I

39:59

think there’s a process in having them frame it up because initially you know they might come with

40:06

a couple of options and ask you what you want to do so that’s still not delegation because

40:12

you’re still the decision maker right so so there’s a first step but then the next step is how do they come up with

40:18

those same ideas and make a recommendation to you and then how do they come up with those same ideas and

40:24

say I chose this one this is why and here’s how it’s rolling out right so there’s like there’s like a

40:30

journey I think and using the um using a bit of a framework around

40:38

checkpoints so that you can understand that you’re on track because there’s

40:44

seriously nothing worse as an employee than them putting a project together and delivering it and feeling very proud of

40:50

it and having it not be what you were asked to do yeah yeah right so as a leader you have to be very careful

40:56

because you don’t want that scenario to turn up with your staff especially if it turns up over and over and over again

41:02

it’s demoralizing and then you risk losing that person yeah that’s a great Point that’s such a great point yeah I

41:09

love that so kind of working that ladder of progression to eventually getting your team so empowered to where they

41:15

they can come to you and say here’s what we did and here’s how it’s rolling out and so really being in that mindset yeah

41:21

as well yeah beautiful yeah share with us Julie this is so good and gosh we could go we could go for hours here

41:27

because there’s so many more places I want to talk to you but I want to be mindful of time so final tip word of

41:35

advice for someone who’s wanting to scale from seven to eight figures is there anything I haven’t asked you about that you think is important for someone

41:41

to be conscious or cognizant of along that Journey I think not to get discouraged because

41:48

it’s a journey and you will have you know a couple of resistance points

41:54

at least in the in the journey and figuring out how to you know push

42:00

through them get around them change your strategy a little bit like nothing is you know a straight line when you’re an

42:07

entrepreneur right it’s about setting up a great process for evaluation and re-evaluation and continued

42:13

recalibrating as you go through this journey and putting people around you

42:19

that can help to support you in the journey because one of the other things that happens is you know you grow into

42:26

this CEO that is leading a larger team

42:32

and wants to feel like you’re you know looking more professional and and not

42:37

looking uncertain we don’t want to you know be uncertain in front of our team and so it’s you know putting the right

42:43

people around you the right framework to support you and lift you up and help you

42:49

along that path I think it’s really important to build that in

42:54

beautiful it’s a a team effort right support right people around you yep yeah

43:00

that’s beautiful Julie tell everyone um where they can go to connect with you I I think this is so powerful and I

43:07

think you’re doing something really rare um and unique and valuable in the world too so someone wants to learn more

43:13

either about your book big gorgeous goals or if they want to learn about coaching with you working with you how

43:18

can they get connected you can find me at Julie ellisandco.com and there’s a form there

43:26

you can fill out if you want to reach out to me you can also find me on LinkedIn or Instagram on Instagram I’m

43:32

the Julie Ellis so awesome yeah if you didn’t mention LinkedIn I was going to say I know you

43:38

do regular trainings and I think lunches and like like learning experiences for

43:43

people to come and connect so I see a lot of that um on LinkedIn when I pop on and look at what you’re doing so I know there’s a

43:48

lot of great opportunities for Education someone can get um as well yeah I’d love to see I’d love

43:54

to see people come out to our our lunch and Series yeah amazing amazing thank

43:59

you so much this was so fun like I gotta get my notebook out here and start writing this stuff down because this is

44:05

gold so um your journey is inspiring and also I just so appreciate how you’re using it

44:10

to now help other people Elevate and experience what it’s like to set and

44:15

Achieve big gorgeous goals so thank you so so much for your time Julie thank you for having me I really enjoyed our

44:21

conversation yeah absolutely absolutely and to you my listener thank you so much

44:26

for tuning in go connect with Julie again I think both from reading her book and then also getting connected with

44:32

what she’s doing online um she is just a wealth of information and such a big

44:38

thinker which I love because that’s what we’re all about here in the community so with that if you are ready to go deeper

44:44

into your journey in She Sells world uh you can head over to elysearcher.com to learn more about our coaching and

44:50

programs designed to help you elevate your sales step into a greater level of financial abundance and truly transform

44:57

into the person that you know you are meant to be I hope you enjoyed this episode this powerful conversation with

45:02

Julie I want to encourage you to go listen to another one of our podcasts right now for continued inspiration and

45:08

I will see you on our next episode bye for now

 

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