Expand Your Fempire Podcast #1 Transcript

Refresh and Reboot Your Business, Mid-Year Review Live Session

Welcome to Expand your Fempire with Caterina Rando, the podcast for women in business on a mission. Sharing ideas to support you to grow and thrive. Now here’s your host, Caterina Rando.Welcome to Expand your Empire with Caterina Rando, the podcast for women in business on a mission. Sharing ideas to support you to grow and thrive. Now here’s your host, Caterina Rando. Caterina Rando: [00:00:00] Hi, this is Caterina Rando. And today is my first podcast that I am so excited to share with you because this podcast is for women on a mission. And if that’s you, then I am so excited for us to get to know each other, to connect, and for me to share with you guiding principles, super tips, stories, amazing experts that will inspire you to follow your path to bring even more value…to keep going when you want to stop… and many other ideas that I have to support you to be even more phenomenal in your mission and your purpose. Tonight, what I’m going to do, or today, whenever you’re listening to this, I’m going to share with you a little bit about me and three of my guiding principles that I embrace that I want to invite you to embrace, to support you to continue to do what you do even more effectively because I want you to be yourself, do your thing, serve your people. And I also want you to massively monetize your mastery. Because when you do that, you can serve more, you can sell more, and you can have greater impact. And that’s what I want for you. Let’s take a deep breath right now together. (Exhales) I live and work in San Francisco, California. I am a native San Franciscan. I am an Italian American. My grandparents came through Ellis Island, and they were entrepreneurs. My grandfather had a shoe shop. My other grandfather had a grocery store. Their wives both were involved in the business. My father owns a laundromat. He also is a retired engineer for the city. My mother is a retired schoolteacher who absolutely has had the entrepreneurial bug since day one. She sold Italian novelty shirts that say: “Italians and wine improve with age,” and “The luckiest people marry Italians.” She had that business. She created a business called chocolate chips Italiano with the touch of Galliano. She was an author. She wrote books. She’s done all kinds of amazing things. And I grew up in a household where I was encouraged to follow any idea that suited me, and I’m going to say that that has served me and I want to invite you to follow that, too. My Dad would call it as “theme of the week.” Whatever my Mom’s idea was, she would pursue it and have fun doing it. © Caterina Rando 2020 | Expand Your Fempire Podcast | www.caterinarando.com And that’s the first guiding principle that I want to talk to you about tonight. As we get to know each other and connect. Done is better than perfect. One of the challenges I see, having served so many women entrepreneurs, over the last many years, is that some of you are getting ready to get ready to begin to think about getting going. You’re not in action. And the idea that we get ready and we research and we figure it all out before we do something? My friends, it’s a myth in most instances. Because it is in the doing of something that we figure out a lot of things. Your first speech. Your first workshop. A client just said to me today, I just did my first 45-minute speech, and I learned so much. It is in the learning that we figure things out, and I want to encourage you to be in action. Here’s what you absolutely need to get started with your first workshop, your first retreat, your first seminar, your first charity event: You need a topic of course, you need a date, and you need a price. And once you start with that, and you take the first person’s money who signed up, you will figure out everything else before it’s time to have that event happen. I share this with you because I see many women entrepreneurs wasting way too much time trying to figure things out and not realizing that it’s in the doing that you figure it out. If you want to do your first workshop, do what I did. Start with 3 gals and a flip chart. You don’t even need the flip chart, around your dining room table. Three gals and a flip chart. Or, use someone’s conference room, or a community room. You don’t have to start with a hotel ballroom. I want you to ask yourself right now: Where in your life and in your business, have you been getting ready to get ready to begin to think about getting going — dragging your feet, procrastinating, stopping at any little obstacle; rather than figuring it out and keeping your party mobile? Where is there room for you to make an upgrade? Because you know what? My friend, Eddie, who is an amazing coach, I went to his seminar, he wrote a book called No Excuses and you’ll meet him on a future podcast. I went to his workshop and I learned about something I didn’t know about before, which I thought was pretty awesome and amazing that I’m going to share with you right now. It’s called the Law of Diminishing Returns. And what the Law of Diminishing Returns implies, it says, is that when you decide to do something, the further it gets away from that moment of decision; meaning the time when you decided to do it, the less likely it is to happen. The less likely it is to happen. And that’s why I’m saying to you right now, make a decision for where you’re going to move forward in your life or your business, where you’re realizing you’ve been dragging your feet, you’ve been trying to do it perfect, and take care of it right now. Do something right now soon as you get off this call, or put the time on your calendar right now to take care of it, because that is what would make it happen. Following the momentum. I want you to embrace this idea of done is better than perfect and pursue it in your business and your life until the next time we get together for a podcast tap, and let’s see what happens to you as a result of you putting an end to all that. Bing, Bing! Does that sound good? I like to say bing, bing, by the way, or bing, bing, bing! © Caterina Rando 2020 | Expand Your Fempire Podcast | www.caterinarando.com Let’s take a deep breath. Bing, bing, bing! I want to share two more important guiding principles with you as we continue. The first one is that as a thriving woman in business, as a woman on a mission, it’s really important that you pay attention to always wearing your cape, and your cape is an acronym for certainty, authenticity, positivity, and enthusiasm. C.A.P.E. Because in business, we are taught often to do it a certain way. And what I want you to know is the certain way, is your way. And I want you to have confidence in yourself, in your ability. I believe that I have massive value to bring. I have a lifetime supply of value to bring. I could bring my value all night and tomorrow, and into next week. Do you believe that about yourself? And if the answer’s no, time to have a little chat with yourself and figure out why not. Because when you know you have massive value to bring, when you have certainty about yourself and your ability to make a difference, and your ability to be of service, you know what happens? You bring it with more ease, you ask more people or work with you, you ask for what you want more, and you see more amazing results of that certainty. Authenticity, of course, is essential. Be yourself. Don’t be how you think you’re supposed to be, how you think it’s if you’re taught to be how society tells you to be or look like or do. Be yourself, be your authentic self. You know I have super curly hair, it’s pulled back right now so you can’t really see if you’re watching this on video. I got super curly hair, and image consultants and publish public relations people, and friends have said to me, “Caterina, you’ve got to straighten your hair to look more professional.” And I tried that. And even once I did a video and a speech with my hair straightened. And, oh my gosh, I didn’t like it, it didn’t feel good, I didn’t think it looked good. It felt not like me. It doesn’t matter what the experts say. What matters is what feels right to you. Authenticity. Authenticity. Certainty. Authenticity. The key is for positivity. Do you know that a positive attitude is essential to thriving and growing and learning and getting up when you fall down in life, because in life, and of course in your business, because you know what, managing our disappointment is an essential part of being a successful businesswoman. Because we have disappointments du jour! Every day! Somebody didn’t show up for their sales conversation, or somebody’s late, somebody doesn’t show up at all! There are a lifetime supply of disappointments that can happen in any day, in business and in life. If somebody told you they’re going call you at 10:30 and they don’t call, that doesn’t mean they can’t stand you or they’re never going talk to you again. It simply means they didn’t call you at 10:30. That’s it. Look at this. Look at how you can manage your disappointment more effectively. And as a result, you will find that you’re bouncing back from setbacks with a lot more ease, and having a positive attitude and a positive disposition will absolutely take you far. And in fact, one of my favorite books is 100 Simple Secrets of Happy People by Dr. David Niven. © Caterina Rando 2020 | Expand Your Fempire Podcast | www.caterinarando.com And in this book he says, and he shares research on what makes people happy, and what he says is that you know what, when you simply set the intention, “Hey, I’m going to be more positive,” you can take 70%, all the way down to 40%, negative and worrying thoughts, every day. The average guy on the street, 70% negative and worrying thoughts every day. You, simply by sharing to yourself, “hey I want to be more positive,” you can take that all the way down to 40. Isn’t that amazing? Set that intention. Put attention on being positive. And you know what, stop talking about traffic and the weather, and even politics in many settings because it doesn’t serve, and it detracts from the power of your message. And it detracts from people embracing what you’re up to. Eliminating distractions in our communication is a good part of moving us forward and being on message and on brand in our business. Certainty, authenticity, positivity, and of course the ease for enthusiasm, and enthusiasm is the energy behind your joy and behind your certainty and behind your positivity. And enthusiasm is contagious. It has people want to connect with you, has people want to talk to you. Has people be open to you. A smile, which is part of enthusiasm. A nice, beautiful smile will have people want to come and talk with you. My friends, wear your C.A.P.E. in every conversation about your business. Wear your C.A.P.E. when you’re out and about. Wear your C.A.P.E. when you’re networking. Wear your C.A.P.E. all the time. Certainty, authenticity, positivity, and enthusiasm. And you will find when you wear your cape that you will attract more like-minded, like-hearted people that you want to connect with and that will bring you further. You know, I’m going pause here and I’m going share with you. Why am I doing my thing? Let me tell you. You know, I told you about my mom and dad, they’re very entrepreneurial. I also grew up in a house where being generous and helping people was standard operating procedure. And when I was a kid I raised money for the missions. My parents had met at a fundraiser that my mom was throwing for Boys Town of Italy. Whenever a child would come to the door selling candy bars or anything, my mom would graciously and happily and with a big smile on her face, open her wallet and buy whatever was being offered. My mom would graciously open her wallet and come to the door with a big smile on her face and buy whatever the child was offering. Not only that though, she would lean down, she would give them a big smile to tell them how amazing they were, what a great job they were doing. This is how I was raised. And I want to tell you, generosity is an essential part of my life’s work, my life path, and in my business. Generosity feels great. Stingy doesn’t serve. And I want to encourage you, if you didn’t grow up in a generous household, if you didn’t grow up and help everybody, and help others’ household, you can choose now to do that. My first business was I owned a café and catering business, it was my family’s business, really my sister’s business. And my sister, I worked for my sister and then my sister left and I ran the café. And I loved having a business. And I loved all the people from the neighborhood that came in, and I’m getting to know them. What I did was I didn’t love though, was I didn’t © Caterina Rando 2020 | Expand Your Fempire Podcast | www.caterinarando.com love wearing tomato sauce every day. And, you know, making sandwiches for a living. I didn’t feel like that was my life path. And one day this lady came in my café and she was beaming with her big smile. And she looked so happy. And she came over to me and she said, “You know what Caterina? Thank you so much for the advice you gave me the last time I was here. I took your advice. My business is doing so much better.” And my friends the truth is, that I barely remember the first conversation. This conversation though, I will never forget because her gratitude literally touched my heart. I felt a pang of bliss in my chest and I thought, “You know what? This is what I’m going to do with my life. I am going to help women entrepreneurs, be successful in business.” That was way back when. And I’m still doing it today. I love every minute of it. I speak a lot. I have a center in San Francisco called The Thriving Women in Business Center, where ladies can do their workshops. There are so many ways that you can connect with us. You can come to my workshops live and in person, or guess what? You can even zoom in to the workshops, because I want to do everything I can to support you and other women around the planet to thrive in business. Because when a woman thrives in business, she uplifts herself, her family and the community that she serves. And that’s what I want for all of you. I want you to be yourself, do your thing, serve your people, and massively monetize your mastery. [20:08] And that’s the last guiding principle I want to share with you in our first podcast and time together. And that is that it’s not only about doing what needs to be done to be successful. It’s about mastering what needs to be done to be successful. I have been serving women for many, many years and I have some women in my community that I’ve been serving for 10 years and 12 years and five years and six years, and I teach them how to sell, I teach them how to speak, how to do workshops, how to do retreats, how to provide outstanding client care, how to make all of your clients feel VIP. And they learn it. Learning is only the beginning though. And then they do it. And that’s still just the beginning. Because we learn it, we do it, then we do it more, and we do it better. And then we do it really good. So the goal, though, is to do it masterfully. To master sales, to master speaking, to master writing, to master the systems in your business, to master outstanding client care, to master the finances and the cash flow, and managing it all in your business. And we’ll talk more about this in our next podcast. As a businesswoman, there are only five things I want you to do…Well I guess that’s all the “P’s” I’ll tell you about those five things in our next podcast. This is Caterina Rando, reminding you that you have massive value to bring and there is a lifetime supply of people to serve. Go be louder and prouder and bring your massive value so you can sell more, you can serve more, and you can have a greater impact. Sending you some love [kiss], and I can’t wait to be with you next time.We hope you enjoyed this episode of Expand Your Fempire with Caterina Rando.