Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:02 Welcome to the balanced perspective podcast, where we're going to be challenging perspectives on what it actually takes to be successful in both business and in life. I'm your host, Terry Ann Richards. And with 16 years as a serial entrepreneur, I've experienced some of life's most epic successes and failures. Join me as we journey on a mission to blow the lid off of some of the best kept secrets to living a life of true success from the inside out.
Speaker 0 00:00:38 Welcome back to the balanced perspective. I am sitting here with my new friend, Sarah chin, chin ski. I had to ask her and I literally put it down in the phonetic way for me to know how to say her last name. We're really testing my language skills folks. So Sarah is down in, is it Wisconsin, Wisconsin, Wisconsin. I said that right to Sarah is a mama to a toddler. Well, those days are very far behind me. She is an army wife podcast or online entrepreneur who has more than a decade of leadership experience. Really excited to jump in and talk about that. And her passion is in guiding women to create a leadership style that aligns with their truths, core values and aid them to embrace stepping into that role in business, as well as all areas of their life. She is speaking my language, Sarah, welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 00:01:33 Thank you so much for having me, Terry. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 0 00:01:37 Talk a little bit about who it is that you serve and what it is you do for them beyond what I just said in your bio.
Speaker 2 00:01:45 Yeah, absolutely. So I am first and foremost, I'm a mom, but after that I am a creator of leaders and the people that I work with are really, they tend to be female entrepreneurs who are also primarily first and foremost mothers. That is the group of people that I connect with. Like fellow Instagram, moms. Hello. Hi, nice to meet you. I'm your new best friend.
Speaker 0 00:02:14 Okay. So moms who are stepping into their leadership brilliance and into the business world, what would they be looking for that you can bring to them? What's the struggle.
Speaker 2 00:02:26 Yeah. So what I've found over the past several years is really that women are, we have all these societal expectations placed on us, right? We have to be the perfect mother. We have to be the perfect wife. And if we choose to work outside the home, we have to be good at that too. And what a lot of people don't realize these women in particular is that it's not three different skill sets that you need in order to be a leader in your home, a leader in your community, a leader in your business, it's the same skillset across board. You just need to language different to a three-year-old versus a 33 year old. Who's a business with you. So what I really do is I, I help these women figure out, okay, first and foremost, what are your priorities? What do you actually want out of life? Not what does someone else tell you you should want, but what do you want? And then how do we build a life around that with a leadership style that's authentic to who you are so that you're not making the same mistakes that I did by just checking the box and getting the next position and going to the next right thing and ending up miserable and resentful,
Speaker 0 00:03:33 Um, that you talk about leadership over the last few years, spoke a lot around leadership and having women move into the leadership brilliance that they have within what I've learned though, is a lot of women don't consider themselves leaders. A lot of women will call themselves business owners. They'll call themselves coaches and entrepreneurs and consultants. And what have you. But if you ask them, if they're a leader, they'll say no. So how are you finding the individuals that you're working with? Are they relating to the word leader? Are they relating to the words, leadership or are, is that sort of an education process that you have to take them into stepping into that brilliance?
Speaker 2 00:04:11 Yeah, I would say not at first, but because there is this image that I think most people have of a leader and that is the entrepreneur magazine cover. John Maxwell, old white man, fortune 500 CEO in a suit. Yes. And you and me core sitting here with our business on the top and both of us were in yoga pants on the bottom, right? You don't necessarily fit that mold. And so I have to reframe that concept of leadership with a lot of these women, with a lot of people in general, because the way I look at it, if you have someone who is looking to you for guidance, you are a leader, you are leading them. And it doesn't matter if you wear a suit or if you wear athleisure or if you've washed your hair this week. Like if someone is looking to whether that person is your age older or a small little baby yearly,
Speaker 0 00:05:14 A hundred percent. So I love that you said the weather, you washed your hair this week. That's what dry shampoo was for folks.
Speaker 2 00:05:21 So
Speaker 0 00:05:23 You have a section on your website that says it's time to break through the BS and start leading in alignment with who you are leading in alignment with who you are. And so you spoke about like leading in alignment with your values and your priorities and all of that. Give me some examples of how do you get someone to understand how to lead from their values, from their priorities. Take me through the Coles notes version of what would somebody be taught in the beginning of that process with you?
Speaker 2 00:05:52 Well, first I think to your formal question, you hit the nail right on the head. You first have to understand that you are a leader and you have to understand that leadership can look like whatever you want it to be. But there are some key pieces that you need to have in order to really come into that role. The first being know yourself, who in the heck are you? You can take all of the NBTI Enneagram, disc, whatever personality profiles you want. But if you're not going to do anything with them, what the hell was the point in taking them in the first place? So you have to get to know yourself, who am I? What are my priorities? What do I want out of life? And then from there you go to your vision, and this is the place where I think most people get hung up.
Speaker 2 00:06:41 A lot of the moms that I work with are in the entrepreneurial space and more specifically their network marketers and the vision that they have for their business is whatever their upline told them they should do. Just because you want to run a business well, here's how you do it. Step by step by step. And it's really great that network marketing can deliver that kind of pre-packaged concept to you. But just because it's a pre-packaged concept, doesn't mean you have to do it the same way every time. So here we get really into again, what is it you want and how are we going to go about doing that? So, you know, yourself, you know, your vision, and then the third piece of it is know your people. And how do you lead people? How do you talk to people? How do you lead different people at the same time, toward a similar end goal while still making sure they hit their intermediate goals in the middle?
Speaker 0 00:07:35 What do you feel is the biggest obstacle? Why are these women not already stepping into their greatness, understanding their value system, understanding what their one thing is that vision and knowing how to communicate with
Speaker 2 00:07:47 It gets a lot of times that we don't realize it. So this know yourself, know your vision, know your people is the framework that I teach to all my clients. And it didn't really come about until a few years back. I was, uh, my other job is that I'm in the army, right? So I'm a, I'm a major in the United States army. And I was very, very good at checking boxes and moving up and getting promoted and getting the next best opportunity that I could. And I remember I was, this is pre pandemic. I was leaving a really good position because I was hand selected for this job that I had been gunning for for almost a decade. And my mentor on the way out, said, Hey, you know, captain seas stop in my office. I want to, I want to talk to you before you leave.
Speaker 2 00:08:35 And here I am thinking like, I'm going to get the, go get them girl speech. This is going to be amazing. He's going to wish me. Well, I'm going to be on my way. And I'm going to go from this position where I have eight people to 119 people working for me. And he calls me in his office. He shuts the door. And a, the crux of the conversation was not the attagirls speech. It was Sarah. I don't know how you're going to do in this next position because I don't think you know how to lead. Ooh, uh, what the freak. Right. So I did what any self-respecting woman does? I thanked him for his advice. I calmly walked to my car and then I cried my eyes out because how could anybody have said that about me? I was in leadership positions. I was getting this next leadership position.
Speaker 2 00:09:29 When I really started to think about it. I had no idea what I wanted out of life. I was literally just checking boxes. I was a cereal box checker. And if you don't realize that you're a box checker, you don't know how to step out of that. So I guess recognizing that there's a problem is, is step number one, right? That's what all, all of the programs tell you first, you have to recognize that there was a problem, but then you have to recognize that you have to do something about it. If you want something to change
Speaker 0 00:10:02 Taking that personal responsibility. So huge. That's interesting. So would you going into that meeting have thought that you were the sort of the cat's ass and leadership, like yeah. I'm a great leader. I'm a good leader. And I'm going to get this promotion. Did you walk into that with that similar mentality?
Speaker 2 00:10:23 Huge ass chip on my shoulder. Absolutely
Speaker 0 00:10:26 Love.
Speaker 2 00:10:27 Absolutely. All of a sudden, I mean, I hated him for several years for having that conversation, but oh yeah. Truth hurts recently learned to thank him for knocking me down at peg. Yeah. I have learned so much on this journey and now I'm in a place where yes, I'm still learning, but I get to share this and I get to build up other leaders so that they don't make the same mistakes that I did thinking that they're the cat's pajamas. And then realizing, oh, maybe not so much.
Speaker 0 00:10:59 It's almost like you're blinded by your own light. And so when you're doing good and I think that's why they say every coach needs a coach. And you know, don't surround yourself with a bunch of cheerleaders, surround yourself with a few people that are going to tell you, what's what, because you need to be when you, especially when you're doing well, you're in leadership roles, you're the CEO of your business. There's nobody really above you. And you feel for all intents and purposes that you're doing. So we're pretty rad things. It's really hard to learn and grow from that perspective, because everyone's just telling you how awesome you are. It's not until someone says, actually, let me just take off those ankles of yours and put you down a notch because you're actually not as awesome. You could be, but here's where the work's not necessary. So it's almost like you're uncovering. Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:11:45 Absolutely got to uncover the blind spots. And then you've got to figure out assuming one, that you actually want to do something about and you want to be a better leader. What can you do? I think one of the other issues, especially in network marketing too, is that we're taught to check the boxes. We're taught to move up. You did the network marketing thing, you know, the book coach sell, recruit book, coach, sell, recruit, book, coach sell, recruit, right? So you're recruit and recruit and recruit and recruit. And then you have this huge team. What the hell do you do with them? Yeah. Nobody teaches you that part.
Speaker 0 00:12:16 The leadership side. Yeah. You're right. Cause the leadership
Speaker 2 00:12:18 Side, nobody teaches you that part. So you have this huge group of people and you just do whatever your upline did and maybe that works for their personality style, but maybe it doesn't work for yours,
Speaker 0 00:12:31 Which is why I think your second piece of your formula that you bring people through is getting really clear on your vision. Like your why, right? Like what, why are you actually doing this organization, this business, this, whatever, what is your, why, what is your reasoning for doing it? And then allowing that to be the guiding light in how you run your business. So let me ask you this. What made you get in to coaching?
Speaker 2 00:12:57 I took myself through this process and then I started taking all of my junior leaders in the military through this same process. We do a couple of personality, leadership, strengths assessments, and I say, okay, well here's where you are. Here's where you say you want to be, how can we use these strengths to get you there? Okay. And we go through this and I just, I started talking about it on social media and more and more, I had women coming to me in my DM, Hey, can you help me with this? I've I've got this question. I'm going for this next position, my business, how would you handle this? Or how would you work this problem? Or I'm having this issue with my upline, where she wants me to do this, but it feels really cringy. How would you handle that kind of a situation? And I, as a leader, really light up when I'm doing it, I get excited about it. So it, it feels good. Just like with my, my career in the army, I always say I'm going to stay in the army. As long as me and the army have something to offer one another. I'm going to stay in the coaching space. So long as me in the coaching space have something to offer one another.
Speaker 0 00:13:59 I like that mindset. It's sort of a, no one to hold them. Know when to fold them. You don't have to hold onto something so tight and make sure it never goes away. It's sort of, if it serves you and you serve it, it's probably a good relationship. And if it's not, then it's okay to let it go. That's not quitting. That's letting go and giving room for new things. Let me ask you this. I always am intrigued because I feel like a lot of us have these individuals in our past who have piqued our curiosity. They've influenced us. There are a part of our story, our journey, who in your past, when you look at who you are today has been the most influential to you. Be it somebody that's living or past.
Speaker 2 00:14:42 When I think about my leadership journey specifically, there is this one man who I've known through my military career. I call him my over the cliff leader. My phone Terry could ring right now and it could be this guy and he could say, I'm deploying, we're going to war. We leave on Friday. Can I count you in? And I would say, yeah, let me figure out childcare. And I would pack up and I would leave my family for a year because I believe so strongly in him and his values and how he takes care of his people. That is the kind of leader I want to be. That is the person that I want to emulate when I'm going about my business and working in the military and my career path. So I would say when we're talking about my leadership journey, absolutely Colonel Rio repertoire,
Speaker 0 00:15:33 The impact that a mix, that's always the most intriguing question to me for no other reason that the people that have been the most influential are also people that we typically aspire to be more like. So what are those specific characteristic traits values that he possesses that you are either currently emulating or working towards emulating? What is it about him that would have you literally that that's typically a saying, but you would follow him into battle.
Speaker 2 00:16:02 I would literally follow him into battle. I think primarily it's the way he cares about his people. And I look back to one specific anecdote and I was pregnant with my son and you know, got to report it right away, report the pregnancy, the medical condition, right? So I tell him I'm pregnant. I said, well, I'm doing September. We had this huge exercise, huge training exercise planned for July. I started, I really want to go, I'm in this leadership position. I want to do this. I want to go. I want to do the thing. And in my mind I was thinking, I wasn't thinking that I wanted to go because I wanted to be with my people or I wanted to, to do the job I wanted to go because I knew it was going to affect my evaluation, right. Box checker. And I'd been telling them for months and months and months that I wanted to go.
Speaker 2 00:16:52 I wanted to go. I wanted to go. June, came around and I had some complications with the pregnancy and I had lost other pregnancies in the past. And he called me in his office and the subsidiary are not going, what the hell? Again? I cried. Cause I was upset and cause hormones. And the only thing I could think was like, how is this going to impact my career? No, I wanted to go because I wanted to prove myself. I was in a unit where I was the first female officer. I was thinking like, I, I can do this. I don't want my pregnancy to be an excuse. I don't want people to think that I like got pregnant to sham out of this three weeks in the field. But he held his ground. He didn't let me go. Thank God, because I started having contractions when they were gone. But it was that conversation he had with me where he said, you're not going. And it's not because I don't believe in you. It's because I do believe in you. And I don't want this to be a negative experience that forces you to leave this path or causes you any resentment toward the military. Why I want you to stay home because I care about you and I care about your career. And I know you're going to do great things.
Speaker 0 00:17:59 Wow. If only every leader in the globe just led that way. It's so important to allow your people to see that strength in vulnerability and saying, you know what? I care about you. I see you. And here's the decision as your leader. I'm going to make for you for the betterment of you and for the organization. Because of that, obviously I'm thinking you had a healthy pregnancy birth, little, little one. You still love the army. You're still in it. He did. He made the right decision. That's awesome
Speaker 2 00:18:37 Field. Medics can turn a great tourniquet, but I don't know how they would've done with a premature baby. So I'm glad now in retrospect that I stayed behind, but it was a hard pill to swallow. And it felt in that moment, like I was being jilted. Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:18:53 Of course, of course. And I think there's a lot of lessons that have something like that, where sometimes when we think we're being jilted or it's the wrong move or it's something that's going to affect our career in the long run. It's the thing that actually helps to catapult it, teach us a lot of life lessons and allows us space. And I call that sort of the pause for growth, where you had that space to be a human first, a mom, and then continue in your leadership role. Did it affect
Speaker 2 00:19:20 My evaluations? Nope. My evaluation was top-notch.
Speaker 0 00:19:24 Yeah. Kudos to you. If you had, I don't know, let's call it like a fairy godmother wand in your hand right now. What is the one thing that you would do full-time for the rest of your life to make the most?
Speaker 2 00:19:39 I would talk to women who are looking at, going into leadership positions, kind of like what I'm doing and I would teach them not how to get there, but what to do once they're there.
Speaker 0 00:19:51 So often people are put in leadership roles because they're good at something. And then they get there and they're like, oh no. What, how do I do this leadership thing? I'm really good at X, Y, and Z. But now you have people under me that are looking at me and I'm not entirely sure I know what I'm doing. So basically you would do what you do.
Speaker 2 00:20:11 I would do what I'm doing. I, I love it. And it absolutely lights me up. Especially working with junior leaders. I do work with some more experienced leaders as well, but working with junior leaders who just still have that fire in their eyes, that hasn't been extinguished and they aren't jaded and salty the ones that are fresh that you can get to while they're still fresh so that they don't have the experiences that make them jaded.
Speaker 0 00:20:41 Yeah. They're still moldable viable. You can still kind of help bring them to that space when they get there. And yeah, you're right. When they get, I love salty when they get salty. So they say how low you've gone is typically how high you will rise so long as you can find the lessons in those low points. Can you share with me a pivotal moment in your life that you feel created? The woman you are today?
Speaker 2 00:21:12 I'm going to go with the cliche answer and say having my son. Yeah. Yeah. I knew that. I didn't just want to raise a little boy. I am raising somebody's future husband and I am raising a future leader and I am raising a man. And I know that I need to be the best I can possibly be so that he can be the best that he can possibly be. And I tell him every night that he is going to change the world because I so firmly believe that. And even if he doesn't change the whole world, he's already changed mine. So having my son is far and away, the most pivotal moment of my life, I worked, I say, I worked so hard to get him. I went through a lot of trials and tribulations to get my kid and always knew I wanted to be a mom, but I didn't know how it would change the way I view myself and the way I view the world and the way I view parenting and leadership.
Speaker 0 00:22:17 All right. So I'm going to ask you my signature question. What does perspective shifting mean
Speaker 2 00:22:23 To you? Taking a look at things from a different angle, a different light, and that often means stepping outside of what you perceive as normal. So for me, that was taking a step back and not like blinders on looking at the next position I was going to, but you know, kind of having that out of body experience and looking at myself with my biggest chip on my shoulder, like this mentor saw me, it took that shift in my perspective, to be able to shift everything that I was doing and come out on the other side, I won't say balanced because I think that balance is kind of, kind of bullshit, but like I feel harmony now. I feel like there is a good give and take. I can be on as a mom when I need to be on as a mom, I can be on as a business owner. I can be on as a military leader, never all at the same time, but I have that. I have the give and take now. And it took that stepping outside of it to, to have
Speaker 0 00:23:27 Awesome. It's so funny that you said that I think balance is bullshit too. And I think it's the reason it's it's bowl is because you just cannot obtain it. Right. It's just, it's impossible. Who the heck can he can't handle it? Like they're all super important buckets, running your business, going into the military and leading a team, your child all really, really important. There's no possible way to have them all as a number one at all times, but you can be present with one at a time and make that one. Number one. It's more like a triage.
Speaker 2 00:23:59 Yeah. Cause when I think balance, I think like, you know, the, the scales of justice and everything, like you get equal attention to everything at all times. That's called burnout.
Speaker 0 00:24:10 Oh, I don't want that. Yeah. And let's be clear. You're not giving equal attention. Well, you might be, but you're not giving equal energy by any means. Right?
Speaker 2 00:24:17 Like checking your phone, checking your social media while you're playing with dinosaurs is not giving equal attention. It's shamming out on your kid and half asking work. Yup.
Speaker 0 00:24:29 Yeah. Say it like it is. So knowing what you know now in business entrepreneurship, leadership, what advice would you give your younger self?
Speaker 2 00:24:41 I would say don't do it just because somebody else tells you to go. There's a time and a place for following orders, but there's a time and a place for figuring out what the hell you want in life.
Speaker 0 00:24:57 I have some lightning speed questions for you. So I'm just going to like throw them at you. You answer them. First thing that comes to your mind. They're easy. So your favorite book and why?
Speaker 2 00:25:09 Um, I always go back to the year of yes, by Shonda Rhimes. If you've never read it, highly recommend. I read it every year around the beginning of the year. And it's her journey, this amazing black woman who has done all of these things that a black woman has never done before. And she's getting all these accolades, but she was stuck in this shell. And she was like, no, I don't want, I don't want to go do Oprah. I don't want to go do this. I don't want to go do that. And how saying yes to every opportunity for a year catapulted her. It wasn't from one
Speaker 0 00:25:45 That is intimidating.
Speaker 2 00:25:47 Right? And I can't fathom saying yes to everything for a year, you know?
Speaker 0 00:25:52 No, no. I'm having a hard time right now. About eight days ago started doing Instagram reels every day. And I was that person when Instagram reels and Tik TOK became a thing. I'm like, there is no freaking way. You're getting me on video at the air for words to pop up on a video. And now I'm the girl pointing African words on a video. Oh my God. I don't know if I'm liking it yet. I'm having fun. Cause I have a silly personality. But the reality is I am so uncomfortable doing it. And it's not because I'm shy or any of that. It's just, that just feels so weird. Right? Like the B point. Yeah. Thank God I can catch a beat. So yeah, saying yes to that was hard enough. I couldn't imagine saying yes to everything else. All right. Next question. Best self care routine.
Speaker 2 00:26:37 This is something that I'm actually notoriously bad at. Um, but I am working on it. So I will say therapy Because my therapist tells me that I need to be better at self-care. And I say, well, that's what I have you for
Speaker 0 00:26:55 Your, the beginning of it.
Speaker 2 00:26:57 You are the beginning of self care.
Speaker 0 00:26:59 I love that. Such an honest answer. The one app you can't live without in your business.
Speaker 2 00:27:06 That's pretty good. Give me some Instagram. Do you own your mom? I mean, come on,
Speaker 0 00:27:12 Ask that
Speaker 2 00:27:13 You can ask that I just turned 35 last week.
Speaker 0 00:27:16 Nice. I'm on the cusp of what they call a millennial. And I don't know if I want to be a millennial. I don't know. Millennials have such a bad rep. So weird do I
Speaker 2 00:27:24 Do, but I don't. I
Speaker 0 00:27:26 Embrace it. I feel like every millennial I've ever met is like awesome. But when people talk about millennials, they make it sound like they're so bad. So I'm like, well, I don't want to be a millennial. And I'm on the cusp where I could be one or not be one. So I'm like maybe I'm maybe I'm not.
Speaker 2 00:27:41 I also think it's really funny that when, um, the older generations, like we're talking like baby boomers and the older gen X-ers when they say millennial, they mean anybody who's like below 40 We'll we'll say like, oh, we need to figure out how to recruit millennials into the army. And I'm like, ah, hi, we're here. We're field grade officers. Now how about like gen Z?
Speaker 0 00:28:03 So funny. Yeah. Like my daughter is 21. What piece of advice have you been given in life or business? That was awesome.
Speaker 2 00:28:15 Asking yourself every day where you lit up, where did I light up today? And then doing more of that?
Speaker 0 00:28:21 Oh, I like that. It's like a different play on like what you're grateful for. It's more like what lit me and shook me up today though
Speaker 2 00:28:28 With my soul on fire today. Where was I happiest? Where was I most energized and how can I get more of that into my life? The answer can not be coffee every day. You can't just drink more coffee.
Speaker 0 00:28:41 He lights me up every morning. Makes me functional every single morning. All right, Sarah, how can people connect with you?
Speaker 2 00:28:50 I think I've said a couple of times already. I hang out on Instagram, your play zone.
Speaker 0 00:28:55 Okay. All right.
Speaker 2 00:28:56 Let's have a conversation. I am always down for having a conversation.
Speaker 0 00:29:01 Listen, sir. It has been really fun. Getting to know you. I like your style, like your vibe. I wish you the best of success for this year and do not be a stranger.
Speaker 2 00:29:11 Absolutely. Thank you so much,
Speaker 0 00:29:12 Terry. Thank you so much for tuning in to the balanced perspective podcast. Listen, if you liked what you heard, can you give me a review? Maybe even a five star. All right. Have an awesome day.
