Successful Female Founders Give Advice to Young Entrepreneurs #WomenInBusiness

Key Takeaways

[Music] hi i'm sophie i am the founder and chief brand officer of mama made we are a direct consumer child and infant nutrition company with a particular focus on supporting parents i am the managing director of raising partners raising partners angels and runway we are an investment firm that specializes in working very hands-on with entrepreneurs to raise investment anywhere from pre-seed their first 150 000 pounds all the way through to large-scale series b funds and yeah that's what we do i'm the ceo and founder of career masterclass and careermaster class is a career development platform that is focused on enabling the career growth and democratizing career progression for people from a black and ethnically diverse background my name is chloe and i'm the ceo and founder of asea.com the online vegan marketplace for fashion and beauty i am a beauty blogger myself and i launched my brand as part of what i do as a beauty blogger the brand is called b beauty as you see behind me bu literally stands for be yourself as i wanted this brand to be inclusive for everyone and you know keita for everyone no matter if you're a female or a male i think like beauty products is just in general for everyone can be used by anybody yeah this is what i do hi i'm liz needham and i'm the managing director for ffs beauty so my name is lindsay sudan trahan i am a multi-business owner i've been in a fitness space now for over 12 years so i have a few businesses in the fitness space as well but i was also recognized in 2021 as a clubhouse top creator and have a business in a social media space targeting businesses that particularly want to be present on social media such as clubhouse hello i am cynthia johnson i am co-founder and ceo of bell and ivy we are a personal and employee branding agency based out of santa monica california but also remote and virtual [Music] just go for it step out of your comfort zone and go for it nothing happens magic doesn't happen in a comfort zone you know magic is out there so if you're brave enough to step out and face it there's magic in there go with your gut and trust your gut and understand that not everybody is going to be with you on that journey or understand your journey so this is where you have to really know yourself and know your gut and know where it is that you are striving to go failure isn't something to fear failure is something to learn to seek in a way because you really do learn from all of your mistakes and to have that kind of growth mindset where you're not afraid of failing you're not afraid of making mistakes really can help you kind of push ahead to take risks and try new things and it's like on the other side of that where real like exhilaration in your career can exist always look at the money get to know your numbers don't be afraid of it i think whether that's in your personal life or in your professional life get to love excel you know look at your finances educate yourself on on money because it'll really empower you to go a lot further when i was younger um everything had to happen now there was the pressure i put on myself to achieve success i am um in a faster way at an earlier age and to just keep going and going and going but as i've gotten older and wiser one of the things that i would look back and say is you know things happen when they're meant to happen and life is in ebbs and flows and so if i could go back and do it again i'll give myself the grace of time and know that you know to be a bit kinder to myself and that you know good things do take time to build so i think is to relax a little bit and sort of give myself that time to grow and to evolve and to experience the world really [Music] it's all about your mindset everything is up to you your emotions your thoughts your perceptions and your reactions so you're the one who's in control so don't let other people control how you react to things or your mindset and that will really help you succeed one thing in particular i got from my mom was to really sit back think about what i want and then just asking it no matter how ridiculous because at the end of the day you will spend so much time thinking about the thing you want and not really identifying it or having clarity around what it is um and i've ended up in more insane situations because i've asked the ridiculous question someone said yes then in the times where i maybe kept it to myself and didn't go for what i wanted so make that a priority i've somehow known what i wanted to do since the age of seven and have found it in myself to stick with it and but more recently i definitely wouldn't be here without tin top and the use of that as i won a competition ran by the purposeful project this time last year and the opportunities that's opened up for me has been endless it's a steve jobs quote which was um you can't see the dots moving forward you can only connect them moving backwards and or looking backwards and so for me a lot of the things have led to where i am now you can easily see the process now i look back at how i got there but at the time it was almost like i was doing it blind but because i trust my gut instinct it's definitely led me to where i need to be one of the things i can accredit my current success today ability to be resilient you know as a black woman first working in the city of london in finance and now running i'm a tech organization i've had to draw on my reserves of resilience in moments where it was really really hard you know everyone has tough times but there's some peculiarity that comes with you know being a black woman in spaces that's a lot of laughing interesting upgrades i love black people operate sometimes the game is won by the last man standing right so um is that ability to keep going in spite of challenges and just to develop that resilient muscle that's in me through very very tricky times hold everything more lightly not being so focused on one direction and thinking that it's just steps like this that you're going you know you start a and you go to b when you hold everything more likely you're just more open to opportunity what's for you won't go by notice those times when those thoughts come to your head so those times when you feel like you're limiting yourself because out of fear so i'm afraid to speak up i'm afraid to send this email i'm afraid to go to this networking event notice that thought and then try to break it down have a minute of mindfulness about it okay i don't want to send his email why and then talking yourself through that process often kind of neutralizes it and makes it a lot easier to just push ahead and once you've done it like that breeds confidence to then do it the next time you have to become a priority in your own life and when you do that all of a sudden you're voicing your opinions and you're voicing your needs and you're not looking for someone's reaction interpretation opinion or judgment on it it's amazing how we've been sold the narrative that impostor syndrome is a woman thing it is not a woman thing it's a human thing and i think for women to be more vocal about their success they need to understand that vulnerability is okay it is it is fine for you to feel the fears and for you to doubt yourself that is a perfectly natural human reaction it's not a woman thing it's a human thing but you just keep going in spite of that i don't know why women should be scared to stand up in general like why you should think of yourself less of a person than anyone else and the fact woman is stronger than men in any way it's just a fact woman is so used to to way much more stress you know like period and so on you used to handle so many things so being a boss you made for that as a female you like you made for that you know i don't think women should be scared to speak about their ambitions or successes because at the end of the day you're just showing that it's possible for the women to do the same and empowering yourself while you're doing it but for the women that are afraid to i think look up to people in that space that are already doing it and use them as inspiration yourself that you too can do that i think firstly women have got to support each other so stop seeing other women as a threat see women as a ally or a collaborator someone that we can talk to to get help and support from but also celebrate each other's successes so that would be the number you