Think before you join

I was just asked by a woman business owner what groups/organizations she should join for networking. I'll pass along to you what I suggested to her:

Ask yourself 2 questions:

1. What do my current and potential customers have in common?
2. What organizations are they involved in?

If you want to sell to female senior managers and business owners, I would of course recommend attending Marigold events.

If most of your best customers are in the medical field, ask them which organizations THEY belong to. Most professional associations offer memberships to companies outside of their industry as "supporting members". Then promote your membership to the current membership. Use their logo (with permission) in all of your targeted advertising.You might even create a separate supply of business cards that include specializing in the medical field, or add a title of Medical Industry Specialist.

Taking this another step, what geographical are are you hoping to prospect in?
If you feel that another region, state or city has greater potential, join an organization THERE. Perhaps even in the state you hope to retire or semi-retire to. Make contacts in that area.

Consider what your customers would find appealing in your list of memberships. These associations create a sense of acceptance, credibility and can speed up relationship building.

When I owned a travel agency, I joined the Detroit Producers Association and marketed through their publications and events the idea that we understood their needs for last minute first class travel arrangements for difficult clients. All staff had a set of business cards with Production Industry Specialist. I volunteered many hours at their events and became known as THE travel agent for production companies. This was our most profitable revenue source. How many clients did we have when we started..... one.

Try it out and let us know what happens!

Chick in Charge of Time

Time is money.
Time is money!
Time is money?

However you approach the phrase, it may help you to think of the value of your time as, well... actual cash. I'm not thinking of billable hours or the income you can produce in an hour, but the satisfaction of being alive for that day, hour or minute.

We all have the same time budget, 24 hours each day, 7 days each week, and so on. How do you spend your time? Does your spending align with your values and priorities? Like anything else, our priorities shift with. Have you adjusted your time spending as well?

Routines are hard to change and can become written in stone simply because we are creatures of habit.

Here are two examples:

On the professional side: Sarah has always done the bookkeeping for her pottery supply business. She was told early on that this was a simple task with QuickBooks and that it was extremely important to have a complete understanding and awareness of the business finances. As much as Sarah hates bookkeeping, she accepted that it simply must be done. Over the years, the business has grown and now she finds that 40% of her time goes to managing the books, payroll, accounts receivables.

At home: Sarah has always felt that girlfriend time is sacred. Her work is very draining and she has been committed to keeping up with her monthly book club. She always comes prepared, having read the book selection if she wanted to or not. With the business growing, her girlfriend time is more limited, and the reading time is keeping her up nights, furiously trying to finish each book. Sarah considers dropping out, but she adores the time with her friends.

What to do: If time gobblers are causing you stress, give the situation some perspective. Why are you doing things this way? What do I gain from this? How could I change things and still get what I want? Sometimes, just explaining the situation to a friend, thinking out loud, can bring clarity you were missing.

Poor Sarah! Clearly she needs to either hire a bookkeeper or outsource the work. Every business owner goes through this growing pain and the bookkeeping is the first thing to unload from the owner's list of responsibilities. For many in her shoes, NOT hiring a bookkeeper has stunted the growth of the business because the owner was too busy sweating the drudgery.

As for the book club, she may be surprised to find that her friends feel the same way she does. She needs to try converting the book club into something that works for her. Maybe the restaurant of the month dining club? A wine tasting group? Her club isn't the problem, the BOOK is.

Finding time. Take a moment to consider your weekly or monthly obligations. Are they truly a good use of your time or fruitless routines? Is the annual vacation with your old college roommates really where you want to be each year, or is it one of those, "But we ALWAYS go to Vegas the 3rd week of whatever!"?

What about the morning sales meeting? Could it be 3 times a week? Does it really need to be EVERY day. Are you missing out on your kid's bedtime because of a silly TV show that you USED to like. Old habits die hard. Clean up your calendar!

Chick in Charge of her Nerves!

Ok, ok, I know I was supposed to write this week about time management, BUT...... the Indigo Girls just taught me a lesson.

Actually, I had to RE-learn a lesson and thought I'd pass it along in case you need a tune-up, like I did. Here's what happened, my producer on Mary in the Morning informs me that I'll be interviewing the Indigo Girls. Just like that. Its true that we interview very famous important people, and I should be behaving like a professional at this point in my broadcasting career (Ha!). Truth is, I still feel like I've been plunked down into a dream and when these big interviews pop up, they tend to happen very fast, maybe an hour ahead of time you get an e-mail that the celebrity is available and you either take it or lose it.

Understand, I am a huge fan of the Indigo Girls, their music got me through a rough patch in another life. But I know NOTHING about interviewing musicians. I'm comfy discussing marketing efforts and municipal budgets, not gigs and riffs.

Here's the lesson I RE-learned. Prepare as best you can and confess your nerves. Emily Saliers (the blond) calls my studio and casually says, "Hi Mary, this is Emily. You ready?". Keep in mind that I am still learning all the knobs and buttons over here and now I have an idol on the phone with me ready for her interview.

I wanted so badly to present myself as a seasoned pro. As soon as I heard her voice I bailed on that. "Hi Emily, I have to let you know that I don't get many chances to speak with rock stars and I'm more than a bit nervous. So, I'm going to do my best here, but anything you can do to help me out would be greatly appreciated..."

... Long pause of beastly silence.

"Hey, no problem, I've done thousands of interviews, we'll be fine", Emily graciously says with a casual tone. We chatted for a few moments and got to work. She was great and in the end said some very nice things to me off air. Whew!

The lesson is that I don't always need to be the Chick in Charge. If I'm going to learn new things, grow, expand, I need to accept the possibility that I might look completely inexperienced, because guess what???? We all are when we are learning.

Check out Indigo Girls at Interlochen on June 23rd!

Chick in Charge of Money

A Chick in Charge of her money. Let that sit with you for a moment and try to visualize her... from her hair to her shoes... her home, her income, her investments. My first question for you is this: Do you like her? Are you envious? Inspired?

If you are picturing a wealthy well-dressed Jane meeting with her broker in a corner office, I now feel completely inadequate. But, if you are seeing Linda, sitting at her kitchen table surrounded by bills and checkbooks, a woman who is having to make hard choices about her spending, now we are in a reality we can all appreciate.

My idea of a chick in charge of her money has a very clear understanding of her priorities and her budget reflects those. She knows that she never wants to rely upon her kids in old age, so she fully invests in her 401k. The tough part is that Linda cannot do that and save for her kids college expenses. She might feel completely lousy as a parent for this, but she has a reason to stick to her plan. If she were completely focused on making more money for the college fund she would be working longer hours and not be able to actually BE with her kids while they are growing up. She also funds a family vacation each year. That money could go to the college fund, but then her kids would never have seen the Grand Canyon or gone to Washington D.C.

She is OK with the plan because it is a plan, not a failure to plan.

For those without the kid factor, the tough choice might be to go on a weekend trips or to fancy restaurants with "better funded friends" instead of sticking to a debt payment plan. The point is this: If you haven't come to terms with what is really important to you, you find yourself making bad in-the-moment emotional decisions about money.

Think about your home. Are you in a big house with big maintenance bills just because you grew up in a house like that and think it is the proof of your success? Is travel more important to you but now out of reach because of your house obligations? Maybe, just maybe, a far less expensive apartment could give you the freedom to travel? Would you be embarrassed to say that you don't own a big home on a nice street?

Do you continue to invest in a business that has become a complete drain on your bank account and spirit but can't stomach the idea of throwing in the towel?

Let me say that I don't have my finances all tied up in a pretty bow, not by any means. I struggle with impulsive behavior all the time. But I am working on being less emotional about my money.

I was interviewing a master gardener for the show and he contrasted American and Japenese home gardens. In America, we plant our most beautiful flowers right up against the front of our houses. A Japanese woman would find this to be crazy, she can't see them from her kitchen window. She plants her most prized flowers AWAY from the house so that SHE can enjoy them best, not her neighbors or strangers driving by. Hmmm... Are you making financial decisions to impress or please others, or are you creating a life picture that you prize?

That is a Chick in Charge of her money.

What is a Chick in Charge? Part 2

As I put forth in my previous post, I consider a Chick in Charge to be a woman who takes personal responsibility for her entire life.

"But that's not fair!" you may feel. "There are other forces in charge of my boat!". Here's what I say to that: Only if you put them there. You can't always be in control of every aspect of your life, of course not. But when you grant that control to other people or institutions, you should do it with what I call Reasoned Grace.

For instance, perhaps you can't put 100% effort into advancing your career right now because you have 3 children who need daily bathing, a husband who you adore making dinner for, and a German Shepard that likes to sit on your feet while you watch Two and a Half Men on Monday nights instead of attending City Commission meetings. The problem is when you start complaining about watching Jane at the office get promoted past you because you are a mom. If being home, really home, after 5:30 is your reward at the end of the day, hooray for you!

If you've made a decision with Reasoned Grace, you accept responsibility for the consequences of YOUR DECISION to have different priorities. A Chick in Charge makes deliberate choices and decisions about her life and doesn't feel the need complain or explain because the only place to go is the bathroom mirror. She gives herself the power to frame AND responsibility for her lot in life.

This is not easy. Women who achieve this have a crystal clear sense of their core values. You lose your confidence when those values become murky. What is really important to you right now? This is why transitions in women's lives are so tough. In one decade, your children are first on your list, a few decades later your aging parents make an appearance at the top. Where did my yoga go????

Your Chick in Charginess is reflected primarily in two ways that you can measure: money and time. Where do you spend your money? Where do you spend your time? If you have a clear sense of priorities, decisons of time and money become so much easier!

Next week we will explore Chicks in Charge of their money...

What Is a Chick in Charge? Part 1

Are you a chick in charge? Do you know one? I started the Chick in Charge
brand message a few years ago and found that the words made some people just downright uncomfortable while others flocked to buy any merchandise I
created. I am fascinated by the various interpretations of this little 3 word phrase. Some assume that it is meant for female bosses or business owners. I've been told by a few men that it simply warns them of a *itch in their midst.

To my senses, here is what defines a Chick in Charge: A woman who makes the most of her personal assets, understand and battles her flaws and never puts her head in the sand. She is in charge of....... herself. What does that mean? She takes personal responsibility for her entire life.

So what does it really mean to take personal responsibility? Think about the women who strike you as Chicks in Charge. She is her own source of power, her own source of happiness, she responds to her circumstances not reacts. I have always marveled at women who have been victimized and somehow seem to overcome all odds and move on. Or the minority youth, raised in poverty, rises above society's expectations and graduates from Yale. These are women who refuse to live a lesser life than the one they dream of. Nobody is going to dictate the boundaries of their potential.

At the other extreme, are women who have been given every advantage in terms of heritage, financial support, education and opportunity who have manufactured their own boundaries: living to meet others expectation instead of their own, buying into put-downs, following a parents dream instead of their own, accepting her culture's diminished view of a lifestyle, finding comfort in a blanket of fear and lack of confidence. These are definitely
NOT Chicks in Charge.

Realistically, we each have a toe in both profiles. Do you get that intuitive gut feeling when you are not being true to yourself? Do you negotiate with yourself? I'd love to hear your comment! E-mail me: mary@goMarigold.com and let me know if I can share your thoughts in a future article. More on this next week....

When I grow up...

Do you remember certain milestones of growing up?

• Riding the school bus
• Getting your ears pierced
  
• Wearing pantyhose
• Driving a car alone
• Preparing your first tax return
• First day at college
  
• First NSF notice from the bank
• Getting married
• Giving birth
• Death of a friend
• Buying real estate
• Getting divorced
• Earning more per year than your age X 1,000
• Death of a parent
• Death of another parent

After a certain age, (for some, this is in your 30s, for some your 60s!) the milestones of growing up seem to be more a matter of changing your perspective and giving yourself permission to change.

• Completely changing the course of your life, by choice
• Ending bad relationships
• Not giving a hoot about what other people think about you
• No longer trying to control everything
• Comfortable with giving Plan B a chance

Interestingly, these later developments of growing up, seem to come in an instant of clarity, not over years. It is like leaping over a bridge. Once you are on that far side, you look back at your old self and give a big sigh of relief. This is, in my opinion, when you know you have truly grown up.