June 5, 2024 • 23 mins
To follow her dreams, Kathleen Griffith first had to blow up her life. She’s an award-winning business strategist, entrepreneur, and the author of “Build Like a Woman: The Blueprint for Creating a Business and Life You Love.” From overcoming doubt to finding the courage to pursue your passion, Kathleen discusses the importance of taking the first step towards creating a meaningful life and gives actionable advice to that end. Plus, the Reese’s Book Club pick for June is “The Unwedding” by Ally Condie. We’ll have her on later this month, so send in your questions to hello@thebrightsidepodcast.com!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hello Sunshine, Hey, fam Today, on the bright Side, entrepreneur,
business strategist and author Kathleen Griffith is here to share
her blueprint for creating a business and a life that
you love. It's Wednesday, June fifth. I'm Simone Voice.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
I'm Danielle Robe and this is the bright Side from
Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Okay, Danielle, grab your bougie bookmark, grab your coffee or
drink of choice, and get comfy. Okay, because the June
Reese's Book Club pick has just been announced, so we
are going to share it with y'all. Right now, Okay,
this month's pick is The Unwedding by Ali Condy. Okay.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
If you like thrillers, if you like suspense and murder
mysteries like I do, please check.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Look check check check is right.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Please look no further, because I'm telling you this book
is for you. It follows Ellery Wainwright, a recently divorced
woman who finds herself alone at a luxurious resort at
Broken Point in Big Sur, California.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
I'm there, I'm already there in my mind.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
It's giving big little lies. I'm not gonna lie. So
she should have been celebrating her twentieth wedding anniversary.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
But that's not happening.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
And to add insult to injury, the resort is hosting
a wedding and Ellery gets the surprise of her life
when she discovers the groom's body floating in the resorts pool.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
I just love a wedding thriller, a wedding murder mystery.
There's something about the inherent chaos of a wedding, bridal parties,
warring factions, because we all know that under the surface
of a wedding is a whole lot of drama. So
it makes sense that somebody has to die.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
I don't know that yet, have not been married, but
we'll see TBD.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
This sounds so juicy. Ali's written a ton of books.
You may know her as the author of the number
one New York Times best selling Matched series. So good. Yeah,
so maybe that was ringing a bell. She also started
a nonprofit called the Write Out Foundation, and they run
writing camps for rural teens. How cool is that? That
is so cool and so important.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
I'm not trying to get like all intents here, but
I was just listening to a podcast about how important
it is for kids, in particular to learn how to
write because it allows them to express themselves and their
emotions later, especially in relationships and at work.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Yes, that's so true. I'm not a rural teen, but hey,
maybe there's a chance for me at one of these
writing camps. It sounds amazing.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Well, you know, I love a thriller. I cannot wait
to read this one. I'm also super interested in how
authors craft a mystery. So stay tuned because we get
Ali here with us. We're going to ask her all
the questions, all the questions about our process. I'm picturing
a Homeland style map that she has at home, with
strings connecting the different characters and plot points, m index cards,
(02:52):
a lot of post it notes.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
You love post it notes. It's part of the lifestyle.
It just it is what it is, all right, y'all.
So up next, Kathleen Griffith shares her biggest piece of
advice for people thinking about starting a business. This one's
really good. Plus she tells us what it means to
build like a woman. Build like a woman.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
It's right after the break.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
We are back talking about one of our favorite topics
here on the bright side, entrepreneurship and how to build
a business doing something that you truly love. But in
order to do that, you've got to take that first step. Danielle,
maybe you can relate to this, maybe you can't. But
I've often felt like, man, I have all these great ideas,
but I just get stuck, or we've been in a
(03:46):
job sometimes, or we're not excited about it, and then
we don't know how to go about creating something more meaningful.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Everything you said could not be more true. And our
guest today is an expert in building, in building a life,
and in building a business. Kathleen Griffith is an award
winning entrepreneur, business strategist, and the author of the newly
released book Build Like a Woman, The Blueprint for creating
a business and a life you love. Kathleen, Welcome to
(04:14):
the bright Side.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
I'm so glad to be here because you know, I
love building a bright life and i love building a
big life.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
So I've come to the right place. That's what we're
going to talk about today. Big and bright.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
Yes, let's get into your big and bright origin story
because I think a lot of women can relate to
what you were doing before you started your first company.
You were working in marketing as a director for a
big agency. So can you take us into your life
before you broke off and founded your own marketing consultancy
called Grace and Company.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
The story doesn't feel particularly special in that I did
all the right things or that I thought that I
should do. I went and got the right job, I
got the right home, and I was doing everything that
I just felt like I was expected to do. You know,
you work eighty hour weeks, you work nights and weekends,
(05:06):
You walk into meetings where you know, you kind of
pass your work off to someone else who invariably takes
the credit for that work. And the more and more
I kind of marched into that life, the more burned
out I felt. You know, I knew I was underpaid
for what I was contributing. And I remember I went
to grab pizza with a friend one night in New
(05:27):
York City. It was one of those rainy nights, and
I was eating what's called the Shroomtown pizza, So it
was four different types of mushrooms, and I had treffle
sauce shmeared all of my face and they looked at
me deadpan and said, like, you look kind of like
a ghost. You just look so washed out. There's not
(05:48):
a whole lot of life in you. I was kind
of drowning myself in the pizza, which there's nothing wrong
with the pizza, but for all the wrong reasons. And
I decided, you know, instead of taking a cab to
walk home that night, and the lights were just reflecting
off the pavement and I walked I think it was
something like forty blocks home, and I had this quote
that just kept reverberating in my head, which was from
(06:09):
Tamra Keeves.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
She was a Harvard professor.
Speaker 3 (06:13):
I'd just been to one of her workshops, and it was,
if you are this successful doing what you don't love,
imagine how successful you'd be doing what you do love.
And that haunted me in the best possible way and
did not leave my mind until I left that job,
(06:34):
that relationship, those friends. I honestly left it all like
I burned my whole life to the ground to start again,
destruction as a means for creation. So it was painful.
But here we are, Simone.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
She did a bless We talk about blowing up your
life on this show. It's just it's what the doctor
orders every few months years. The actual time frame is
up to you.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
That's so right, and I think there are people who
actually that is their creative process. There are those who
it's not. But for those who it is, like, yep,
you're going to keep destroying and creating and on and on.
I call it breakdowns and breakthroughs. Like you break down,
you break through, you break ground, You break down, you
break through, you break downd Oh.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
I like that, you break down, you break through, you
break ground. So what gave you the confidence to know
that there was a space for your ideas after you
had that breakthrough?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
The revelation I really had was if I was feeling
this way and I happened to work in marketing, if
I was feeling this invisible and unseen and burned out
and like no one really spoke to me or saw me,
that there had to be other women who felt the
same way. And so initially my consultancy was focused on
(07:53):
doing just that. We were going to help brands talk
to women like they were actually people, not like a
target that needed to be served, and not like a
group that needed to be sold something. Because I just
did not want to engineer more kind of insecurity. I
wanted to be part of something that would ideally inspire
(08:17):
women to take the reins of their own lives.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
So you've helped fortune five hundred companies authentically market to women.
Some of those brands were Nike, Correct any other brands
that stick out to you.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
We've worked across a lot of categories of Verizon, NBC Sports, Bacardi, Gray, Goose, Maserati, Google, Yeah,
a lot of the big guys huge so gals.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Well, when you think about marketing to women authentically for
people listening who are starting a business or have started
a business, what do you say.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
I would say the most important thing is to find
an enemy. So, no matter how small you are as
a brand, there needs to be something that you want
to push up against in the world, something that you
want to take on. So that could be, for example,
you don't believe in toxic household products and you want
to rid the world of that, or you believe that
(09:14):
families should be able to connect more over conversation, whatever
it might be. Finding really finding an enemy and then
bravely calling that out in the world and pushing up
against that is I think what takes you from a
generic place to a wildly specific and intentional place.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
I'm always kind of amazed by your vulnerability when it
comes to talking about work because a lot of people
in general, but particularly women, I think, have a hard
time admitting a failure or they did something wrong because
it's so much harder for us to fail and continue
in society. You're big on failure. You say it loud,
(09:57):
you say it proud. So in the spirit of failing
big and proudly, is there something that you feel like
you failed at that made you better, something you're grateful
you experienced.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
Yeah, I still think of myself as a novice in business,
like who comes out of the womb and knows what
to do and how to do it?
Speaker 2 (10:17):
I was.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
I don't have family who've done this before. I don't
have a lot of friends or didn't at least when
I started, who'd done it before. So I almost think
of myself as like a baby who's driving a car,
and like you wouldn't expect a baby to know what
they're you know, I'm hitting fire hydrants, I'm like jumping
the curb. The car is all dinged up. But like
to expect perfectionism is which I did initially, is just
(10:40):
it's so impossible. You're setting yourself up for this like
impossible thing that's way too stressful on top of what
is already a stressful situation. The biggest failure that I
had was when I had to lay off my whole team.
I was going through actually something in my personal life
and I just couldn't hack it. I just had to
(11:02):
shutter my doors for a minute because it was so
consuming at the time. And that was a really low
moment to look in their eyes and tell them I
actually didn't have what it took to lead them in
that moment.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
What do you think was the learning from that?
Speaker 3 (11:20):
The learning was that I am an incredibly resilient human
and I during that time, Yeah, I discovered a lot
of interesting things about yourself.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Yeah, Yeah, mostly that you could keep going.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
Yeah, but I took a long pause that was longer
than a sixty second clauset.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
So there's a big piece of advice that you have
for people considering starting a business, and it's to start
with the heart test.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
I've never heard of this. I think you made it up.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
I sure did, and you certainly won't find it in
business school. It is not something that you know. That
is how we tend to create in our society, which
is all about the head, right, everything's very rational very
left brain, very cerebral. What's the white space and what's
the potential? ROI but I love this because it is
(12:15):
a way for you kind of put something in your heart.
You've got an idea for a business. Right So for
anyone who's listening right now, just imagine an idea, something
that's just been sitting on your heart, and I want
you to run it through your heart and it should
do one of two things. It should either break your
heart or it should light your heart on fire. Break
(12:36):
your heart meaning it makes you just feel angry, frustrated, disappointed,
your blood is kind of boiling over this particular idea.
Or light your heart on fire in that you're so
passionate about this idea, You're so excited, You've got heart palpitations,
your heart is fluttering, you can't wait to drive after it.
(13:00):
What is not a good idea and is not worth
something or at least is something that you should then
go back to the drawing board on is if you
feel neutral or kind of ambivalent because you're just ultimately
not going to be able to go the distance in
your business. This requires heart above head.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Does what did your heart test tell you when you
started Gracing company.
Speaker 3 (13:23):
I was broken at that point, having worked in corporate.
Now I'm this kind of broken shell of a person.
Humpty dumpty on her back. How do I put myself
together again? And so starting that business, my first business
was really again just a desire for me to feel better,
for more women to feel better. And I was really
(13:45):
angry also at the time. You know the number one
regret on people's desk beds.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Guess what it is.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
I lived a life that others wanted for me instead
of the one that I wanted for myself. And so
here you are.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
This.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
How did I construct all of this with so much
effort and energy? And it is absolutely not the suit
I want to be wearing, not the life I want
to lead.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Well, I love your hard tests. I think it's brilliant.
And when I hear you say heart, I also hear purpose,
I hear calling, and I think that that's something that
comes from your soul as opposed to a cerebral place.
So I couldn't agree more. All right, we've got to
take a quick break, but we'll be right back with
the entrepreneur and strategist Kathleen Griffith.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
And we're back with Kathleen Griffith. So, Kathleen, your book
is called Build Like a Woman. I'm going to ask
the most obvious question, what does that mean?
Speaker 1 (14:54):
What does it mean to build like a woman? So
to be a.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
Builder, in my view, is to be a woman who
has a vision, has a really distinct, clear vision for
what you want to create, and it is someone who
intentionally deliberately steps into realizing that vision as best they
can every day.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
You lay out what you call golden tools for entrepreneurs
in your book. You've got the bacon take tests, you've
got nailed it, risk and reward, hard hat hair, and
the outrageous ask. I mean, first of all, names are incredible,
love it so good? But can you break down one
or two that most entrepreneurs tend to overlook?
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Yeah, I mean we're grown women, we're having fun. Why
not have some fun with us too? So the book
is really broken into two pieces. It's half mindset and
half skill set. So how do you get your mind
right when you're going to construct a business? And then
what are those tangible skills that you need to be
really good at building a successful company? Sprinkled throughout or
what you're talking about are golden tools, which are my
(15:57):
favorite tried and true techniques kind of hacks to supercharge success.
And I discovered them as I was building. I was
kind of playing around and then you'd stumble upon something
and be like, wow, this thing.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Really really works.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
I should share this with more people, I'd start. Let's
start with risk and reward. We can do two kind
of fun light ones. So risk and reward is based
on the idea that we are hard wired to work
for reward, so our brains release the feel good neurotransmitter
dopamine when we get a reward. We are pleasure seeking
(16:36):
people and we want things that we can touch, taste, feel, smell,
besides something that's intangible like money, which just goes into
your bank account. And so what I like to do
here is you tether a goal. So everyone right now
can just think about a goal that they have something
that's really important to youkay, and then you put something
(16:58):
else on the line. This is you reward that you
really want, and I'm talking really want, really really really want,
like in your bones. It's going to motivate you. So
for me, you know, one of one of my first
goals just to share when I was starting my business
was I wanted to land a seven figure client that
(17:18):
was really important to me when I was just starting out,
and I finally did, and the reward I told myself
I would treat myself too at the time was this
love bracelet, which I really wanted but I would never
get for myself. I'd never splurge on it. And so
when I landed this business, I was out in California
doing some consulting. I flew my mom out spontaneously. I
(17:41):
was like, Mom, get on a plane. We're going to Napa.
And we drove around. We had bathrobes on. We were
in this convertible just having the time of our lives
rippen around. We ran into there was a cardier there
got the bracelet. I told all the women in the
store this story, and they were then sharing their dreams
and what goals they were going to chase down. And
(18:02):
it was the most electrifying experience because there's something that
happens also when you're in the midst of celebrating your win.
You kind of breathe these magical crystals of possibility into
someone else's lungs, like you watch them light up through it.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
And you said, there was one more that you wanted
to do.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Yeah, this is my favorite you guys, this is so good.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Okay, I'm wondering where you're going. Is it hard hat hair? No,
it's hard to say fast. I know you really can't
write hard hat hair. Did a good job, but gun
tripped up on that a few times. So this is
called dundunta the outrageous ask.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
So the outrageous ask is a basic ask, something that
you want, ramped up to the tenth exponent. So you
basically imagine something some ask that you want to make
to someone and you Now, what makes it so interest
indifferent is that you take it to this very extreme place,
(19:04):
like you have to demonstrate to the person that you
are willing to humiliate yourself, embarrass yourself, go to extreme
efforts and time, you are willing to do whatever it
takes to make this thing you want come true. You
just need their participation. So it's an enrollment and it
should do one of two things. When someone gets one,
they should think to themselves, who does she think she is?
(19:27):
Or is she crazy? Like you need to seem certifiably
crazy when you send this thing out. So for me,
just to give one example, I was watching I was
on the plane coming home and I was watching Becoming
Warren Buffett. Have you seen that movie?
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (19:41):
It's a must watch everyone, And so I sent his office.
I just spontaneously send his office a message, and I
asked if I could take Warren on his daily drive through.
He gets an egg McMuffin every morning. I said, can
I fly to Omaha, Nebraska and go with Warren through
the drive through? And I got a respond and his
(20:03):
assistant said, I shared this with mister Buffett and he
got such a kick out of your hutzpah. And it's
not a no, but it's just a not now. So
I'm still following up on that one.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
That's a great one has need a moment to appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
How fun? Right, So what's the purpose of the outrageous ask? Like,
what do you think is the growth that comes from that?
Speaker 3 (20:30):
This is based on the idea that one ask can
change the trajectory of your business and life. Like getting
one person to come on board or one brand to
come on board and do whatever it is. It has
the possibility to change your entire life. And that's the
(20:51):
magic of it. Like when I started my interview series,
no one wanted to do it at first, and I
went out to Jessica Alba I asked her to do it,
and she did, and then once she did it, everyone
else wanted to do it. She kind of opened the door.
And again that came from me just being willing to
take outrageous action and make this request to the world's.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
I love the spirit of this. It's just about getting
outside of your comfort zone and being willing to take
big swings and big risks. Yeah, the hope.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
And intention for this book is something that I'm loving
right now, which is watching more women ask themselves like
what do I want? What do I want? Not what
does Aunt Sally want? Not does what does my dad want?
Or my husband or my kids? Like what do I want?
Speaker 1 (21:37):
What is true to me?
Speaker 3 (21:39):
And that then means this often kind of unconventional, unusual
life because it's unique to them. Like, I really believe
that we all have within ourselves the ability to create
something powerful while we're here. And I just I love
and I'm so excited by the fact that more and
(21:59):
more women have stopped building other people's dreams and have
started building their own.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
I mean, that's a very bright side. Kathleen and cheers
to nonlinear living Kathleen, thank you for sharing your time
with us and teaching us that it's all possible to
build and build like a woman.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
Thank you and thanks for being such inspiring builders. I'm
inspired by both of you and what you're building.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
Kathleen Griffith is an award winning entrepreneur, business strategists, founder
of the marketing consultancy Grayson Coe, and now the author
of Build Like a Woman, The Blueprint for creating a
business and a life you love. It's in bookstores now.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
We'll be back tomorrow with Olympic hurdler and sprinter Queen
Harrison Clay to talk all about this summer's Olympics, empowering
young girls through sports, and we'll find out how Airbnb
literally changed her life.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
Listen and follow the bright Side on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple podcast Us, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
I'm Simone Boye. You can find me at Simone Boice
on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
I'm Danielle Robe on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
That's r O b A. Y See you tomorrow, folks.
Keep looking on the bright side.
Hello Sunshine, Hey, fam Today, on the bright Side, entrepreneur,
business strategist and author Kathleen Griffith is here to share
her blueprint for creating a business and a life that
you love. It's Wednesday, June fifth. I'm Simone Voice.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
I'm Danielle Robe and this is the bright Side from
Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Okay, Danielle, grab your bougie bookmark, grab your coffee or
drink of choice, and get comfy. Okay, because the June
Reese's Book Club pick has just been announced, so we
are going to share it with y'all. Right now, Okay,
this month's pick is The Unwedding by Ali Condy. Okay.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
If you like thrillers, if you like suspense and murder
mysteries like I do, please check.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Look check check check is right.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Please look no further, because I'm telling you this book
is for you. It follows Ellery Wainwright, a recently divorced
woman who finds herself alone at a luxurious resort at
Broken Point in Big Sur, California.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
I'm there, I'm already there in my mind.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
It's giving big little lies. I'm not gonna lie. So
she should have been celebrating her twentieth wedding anniversary.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
But that's not happening.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
And to add insult to injury, the resort is hosting
a wedding and Ellery gets the surprise of her life
when she discovers the groom's body floating in the resorts pool.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
I just love a wedding thriller, a wedding murder mystery.
There's something about the inherent chaos of a wedding, bridal parties,
warring factions, because we all know that under the surface
of a wedding is a whole lot of drama. So
it makes sense that somebody has to die.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
I don't know that yet, have not been married, but
we'll see TBD.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
This sounds so juicy. Ali's written a ton of books.
You may know her as the author of the number
one New York Times best selling Matched series. So good. Yeah,
so maybe that was ringing a bell. She also started
a nonprofit called the Write Out Foundation, and they run
writing camps for rural teens. How cool is that? That
is so cool and so important.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
I'm not trying to get like all intents here, but
I was just listening to a podcast about how important
it is for kids, in particular to learn how to
write because it allows them to express themselves and their
emotions later, especially in relationships and at work.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Yes, that's so true. I'm not a rural teen, but hey,
maybe there's a chance for me at one of these
writing camps. It sounds amazing.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Well, you know, I love a thriller. I cannot wait
to read this one. I'm also super interested in how
authors craft a mystery. So stay tuned because we get
Ali here with us. We're going to ask her all
the questions, all the questions about our process. I'm picturing
a Homeland style map that she has at home, with
strings connecting the different characters and plot points, m index cards,
(02:52):
a lot of post it notes.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
You love post it notes. It's part of the lifestyle.
It just it is what it is, all right, y'all.
So up next, Kathleen Griffith shares her biggest piece of
advice for people thinking about starting a business. This one's
really good. Plus she tells us what it means to
build like a woman. Build like a woman.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
It's right after the break.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
We are back talking about one of our favorite topics
here on the bright side, entrepreneurship and how to build
a business doing something that you truly love. But in
order to do that, you've got to take that first step. Danielle,
maybe you can relate to this, maybe you can't. But
I've often felt like, man, I have all these great ideas,
but I just get stuck, or we've been in a
(03:46):
job sometimes, or we're not excited about it, and then
we don't know how to go about creating something more meaningful.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Everything you said could not be more true. And our
guest today is an expert in building, in building a life,
and in building a business. Kathleen Griffith is an award
winning entrepreneur, business strategist, and the author of the newly
released book Build Like a Woman, The Blueprint for creating
a business and a life you love. Kathleen, Welcome to
(04:14):
the bright Side.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
I'm so glad to be here because you know, I
love building a bright life and i love building a
big life.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
So I've come to the right place. That's what we're
going to talk about today. Big and bright.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
Yes, let's get into your big and bright origin story
because I think a lot of women can relate to
what you were doing before you started your first company.
You were working in marketing as a director for a
big agency. So can you take us into your life
before you broke off and founded your own marketing consultancy
called Grace and Company.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
The story doesn't feel particularly special in that I did
all the right things or that I thought that I
should do. I went and got the right job, I
got the right home, and I was doing everything that
I just felt like I was expected to do. You know,
you work eighty hour weeks, you work nights and weekends,
(05:06):
You walk into meetings where you know, you kind of
pass your work off to someone else who invariably takes
the credit for that work. And the more and more
I kind of marched into that life, the more burned
out I felt. You know, I knew I was underpaid
for what I was contributing. And I remember I went
to grab pizza with a friend one night in New
(05:27):
York City. It was one of those rainy nights, and
I was eating what's called the Shroomtown pizza, So it
was four different types of mushrooms, and I had treffle
sauce shmeared all of my face and they looked at
me deadpan and said, like, you look kind of like
a ghost. You just look so washed out. There's not
(05:48):
a whole lot of life in you. I was kind
of drowning myself in the pizza, which there's nothing wrong
with the pizza, but for all the wrong reasons. And
I decided, you know, instead of taking a cab to
walk home that night, and the lights were just reflecting
off the pavement and I walked I think it was
something like forty blocks home, and I had this quote
that just kept reverberating in my head, which was from
(06:09):
Tamra Keeves.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
She was a Harvard professor.
Speaker 3 (06:13):
I'd just been to one of her workshops, and it was,
if you are this successful doing what you don't love,
imagine how successful you'd be doing what you do love.
And that haunted me in the best possible way and
did not leave my mind until I left that job,
(06:34):
that relationship, those friends. I honestly left it all like
I burned my whole life to the ground to start again,
destruction as a means for creation. So it was painful.
But here we are, Simone.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
She did a bless We talk about blowing up your
life on this show. It's just it's what the doctor
orders every few months years. The actual time frame is
up to you.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
That's so right, and I think there are people who
actually that is their creative process. There are those who
it's not. But for those who it is, like, yep,
you're going to keep destroying and creating and on and on.
I call it breakdowns and breakthroughs. Like you break down,
you break through, you break ground, You break down, you
break through, you break downd Oh.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
I like that, you break down, you break through, you
break ground. So what gave you the confidence to know
that there was a space for your ideas after you
had that breakthrough?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
The revelation I really had was if I was feeling
this way and I happened to work in marketing, if
I was feeling this invisible and unseen and burned out
and like no one really spoke to me or saw me,
that there had to be other women who felt the
same way. And so initially my consultancy was focused on
(07:53):
doing just that. We were going to help brands talk
to women like they were actually people, not like a
target that needed to be served, and not like a
group that needed to be sold something. Because I just
did not want to engineer more kind of insecurity. I
wanted to be part of something that would ideally inspire
(08:17):
women to take the reins of their own lives.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
So you've helped fortune five hundred companies authentically market to women.
Some of those brands were Nike, Correct any other brands
that stick out to you.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
We've worked across a lot of categories of Verizon, NBC Sports, Bacardi, Gray, Goose, Maserati, Google, Yeah,
a lot of the big guys huge so gals.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Well, when you think about marketing to women authentically for
people listening who are starting a business or have started
a business, what do you say.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
I would say the most important thing is to find
an enemy. So, no matter how small you are as
a brand, there needs to be something that you want
to push up against in the world, something that you
want to take on. So that could be, for example,
you don't believe in toxic household products and you want
to rid the world of that, or you believe that
(09:14):
families should be able to connect more over conversation, whatever
it might be. Finding really finding an enemy and then
bravely calling that out in the world and pushing up
against that is I think what takes you from a
generic place to a wildly specific and intentional place.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
I'm always kind of amazed by your vulnerability when it
comes to talking about work because a lot of people
in general, but particularly women, I think, have a hard
time admitting a failure or they did something wrong because
it's so much harder for us to fail and continue
in society. You're big on failure. You say it loud,
(09:57):
you say it proud. So in the spirit of failing
big and proudly, is there something that you feel like
you failed at that made you better, something you're grateful
you experienced.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
Yeah, I still think of myself as a novice in business,
like who comes out of the womb and knows what
to do and how to do it?
Speaker 2 (10:17):
I was.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
I don't have family who've done this before. I don't
have a lot of friends or didn't at least when
I started, who'd done it before. So I almost think
of myself as like a baby who's driving a car,
and like you wouldn't expect a baby to know what
they're you know, I'm hitting fire hydrants, I'm like jumping
the curb. The car is all dinged up. But like
to expect perfectionism is which I did initially, is just
(10:40):
it's so impossible. You're setting yourself up for this like
impossible thing that's way too stressful on top of what
is already a stressful situation. The biggest failure that I
had was when I had to lay off my whole team.
I was going through actually something in my personal life
and I just couldn't hack it. I just had to
(11:02):
shutter my doors for a minute because it was so
consuming at the time. And that was a really low
moment to look in their eyes and tell them I
actually didn't have what it took to lead them in
that moment.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
What do you think was the learning from that?
Speaker 3 (11:20):
The learning was that I am an incredibly resilient human
and I during that time, Yeah, I discovered a lot
of interesting things about yourself.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Yeah, Yeah, mostly that you could keep going.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
Yeah, but I took a long pause that was longer
than a sixty second clauset.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
So there's a big piece of advice that you have
for people considering starting a business, and it's to start
with the heart test.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
I've never heard of this. I think you made it up.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
I sure did, and you certainly won't find it in
business school. It is not something that you know. That
is how we tend to create in our society, which
is all about the head, right, everything's very rational very
left brain, very cerebral. What's the white space and what's
the potential? ROI but I love this because it is
(12:15):
a way for you kind of put something in your heart.
You've got an idea for a business. Right So for
anyone who's listening right now, just imagine an idea, something
that's just been sitting on your heart, and I want
you to run it through your heart and it should
do one of two things. It should either break your
heart or it should light your heart on fire. Break
(12:36):
your heart meaning it makes you just feel angry, frustrated, disappointed,
your blood is kind of boiling over this particular idea.
Or light your heart on fire in that you're so
passionate about this idea, You're so excited, You've got heart palpitations,
your heart is fluttering, you can't wait to drive after it.
(13:00):
What is not a good idea and is not worth
something or at least is something that you should then
go back to the drawing board on is if you
feel neutral or kind of ambivalent because you're just ultimately
not going to be able to go the distance in
your business. This requires heart above head.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Does what did your heart test tell you when you
started Gracing company.
Speaker 3 (13:23):
I was broken at that point, having worked in corporate.
Now I'm this kind of broken shell of a person.
Humpty dumpty on her back. How do I put myself
together again? And so starting that business, my first business
was really again just a desire for me to feel better,
for more women to feel better. And I was really
(13:45):
angry also at the time. You know the number one
regret on people's desk beds.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Guess what it is.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
I lived a life that others wanted for me instead
of the one that I wanted for myself. And so
here you are.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
This.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
How did I construct all of this with so much
effort and energy? And it is absolutely not the suit
I want to be wearing, not the life I want
to lead.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Well, I love your hard tests. I think it's brilliant.
And when I hear you say heart, I also hear purpose,
I hear calling, and I think that that's something that
comes from your soul as opposed to a cerebral place.
So I couldn't agree more. All right, we've got to
take a quick break, but we'll be right back with
the entrepreneur and strategist Kathleen Griffith.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
And we're back with Kathleen Griffith. So, Kathleen, your book
is called Build Like a Woman. I'm going to ask
the most obvious question, what does that mean?
Speaker 1 (14:54):
What does it mean to build like a woman? So
to be a.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
Builder, in my view, is to be a woman who
has a vision, has a really distinct, clear vision for
what you want to create, and it is someone who
intentionally deliberately steps into realizing that vision as best they
can every day.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
You lay out what you call golden tools for entrepreneurs
in your book. You've got the bacon take tests, you've
got nailed it, risk and reward, hard hat hair, and
the outrageous ask. I mean, first of all, names are incredible,
love it so good? But can you break down one
or two that most entrepreneurs tend to overlook?
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Yeah, I mean we're grown women, we're having fun. Why
not have some fun with us too? So the book
is really broken into two pieces. It's half mindset and
half skill set. So how do you get your mind
right when you're going to construct a business? And then
what are those tangible skills that you need to be
really good at building a successful company? Sprinkled throughout or
what you're talking about are golden tools, which are my
(15:57):
favorite tried and true techniques kind of hacks to supercharge success.
And I discovered them as I was building. I was
kind of playing around and then you'd stumble upon something
and be like, wow, this thing.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Really really works.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
I should share this with more people, I'd start. Let's
start with risk and reward. We can do two kind
of fun light ones. So risk and reward is based
on the idea that we are hard wired to work
for reward, so our brains release the feel good neurotransmitter
dopamine when we get a reward. We are pleasure seeking
(16:36):
people and we want things that we can touch, taste, feel, smell,
besides something that's intangible like money, which just goes into
your bank account. And so what I like to do
here is you tether a goal. So everyone right now
can just think about a goal that they have something
that's really important to youkay, and then you put something
(16:58):
else on the line. This is you reward that you
really want, and I'm talking really want, really really really want,
like in your bones. It's going to motivate you. So
for me, you know, one of one of my first
goals just to share when I was starting my business
was I wanted to land a seven figure client that
(17:18):
was really important to me when I was just starting out,
and I finally did, and the reward I told myself
I would treat myself too at the time was this
love bracelet, which I really wanted but I would never
get for myself. I'd never splurge on it. And so
when I landed this business, I was out in California
doing some consulting. I flew my mom out spontaneously. I
(17:41):
was like, Mom, get on a plane. We're going to Napa.
And we drove around. We had bathrobes on. We were
in this convertible just having the time of our lives
rippen around. We ran into there was a cardier there
got the bracelet. I told all the women in the
store this story, and they were then sharing their dreams
and what goals they were going to chase down. And
(18:02):
it was the most electrifying experience because there's something that
happens also when you're in the midst of celebrating your win.
You kind of breathe these magical crystals of possibility into
someone else's lungs, like you watch them light up through it.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
And you said, there was one more that you wanted
to do.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Yeah, this is my favorite you guys, this is so good.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Okay, I'm wondering where you're going. Is it hard hat hair? No,
it's hard to say fast. I know you really can't
write hard hat hair. Did a good job, but gun
tripped up on that a few times. So this is
called dundunta the outrageous ask.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
So the outrageous ask is a basic ask, something that
you want, ramped up to the tenth exponent. So you
basically imagine something some ask that you want to make
to someone and you Now, what makes it so interest
indifferent is that you take it to this very extreme place,
(19:04):
like you have to demonstrate to the person that you
are willing to humiliate yourself, embarrass yourself, go to extreme
efforts and time, you are willing to do whatever it
takes to make this thing you want come true. You
just need their participation. So it's an enrollment and it
should do one of two things. When someone gets one,
they should think to themselves, who does she think she is?
(19:27):
Or is she crazy? Like you need to seem certifiably
crazy when you send this thing out. So for me,
just to give one example, I was watching I was
on the plane coming home and I was watching Becoming
Warren Buffett. Have you seen that movie?
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (19:41):
It's a must watch everyone, And so I sent his office.
I just spontaneously send his office a message, and I
asked if I could take Warren on his daily drive through.
He gets an egg McMuffin every morning. I said, can
I fly to Omaha, Nebraska and go with Warren through
the drive through? And I got a respond and his
(20:03):
assistant said, I shared this with mister Buffett and he
got such a kick out of your hutzpah. And it's
not a no, but it's just a not now. So
I'm still following up on that one.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
That's a great one has need a moment to appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
How fun? Right, So what's the purpose of the outrageous ask? Like,
what do you think is the growth that comes from that?
Speaker 3 (20:30):
This is based on the idea that one ask can
change the trajectory of your business and life. Like getting
one person to come on board or one brand to
come on board and do whatever it is. It has
the possibility to change your entire life. And that's the
(20:51):
magic of it. Like when I started my interview series,
no one wanted to do it at first, and I
went out to Jessica Alba I asked her to do it,
and she did, and then once she did it, everyone
else wanted to do it. She kind of opened the door.
And again that came from me just being willing to
take outrageous action and make this request to the world's.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
I love the spirit of this. It's just about getting
outside of your comfort zone and being willing to take
big swings and big risks. Yeah, the hope.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
And intention for this book is something that I'm loving
right now, which is watching more women ask themselves like
what do I want? What do I want? Not what
does Aunt Sally want? Not does what does my dad want?
Or my husband or my kids? Like what do I want?
Speaker 1 (21:37):
What is true to me?
Speaker 3 (21:39):
And that then means this often kind of unconventional, unusual
life because it's unique to them. Like, I really believe
that we all have within ourselves the ability to create
something powerful while we're here. And I just I love
and I'm so excited by the fact that more and
(21:59):
more women have stopped building other people's dreams and have
started building their own.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
I mean, that's a very bright side. Kathleen and cheers
to nonlinear living Kathleen, thank you for sharing your time
with us and teaching us that it's all possible to
build and build like a woman.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
Thank you and thanks for being such inspiring builders. I'm
inspired by both of you and what you're building.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
Kathleen Griffith is an award winning entrepreneur, business strategists, founder
of the marketing consultancy Grayson Coe, and now the author
of Build Like a Woman, The Blueprint for creating a
business and a life you love. It's in bookstores now.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
We'll be back tomorrow with Olympic hurdler and sprinter Queen
Harrison Clay to talk all about this summer's Olympics, empowering
young girls through sports, and we'll find out how Airbnb
literally changed her life.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
Listen and follow the bright Side on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple podcast Us, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
I'm Simone Boye. You can find me at Simone Boice
on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
I'm Danielle Robe on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
That's r O b A. Y See you tomorrow, folks.
Keep looking on the bright side.
Hosts And Creators
Simone Boyce
Danielle Robay
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