the bossbabe podcast - 91. From Secretary to Billion Dollar Business Owner: What I’ve Learned About Finding Customers, Managing Teams & Economic Uncertainty with Janice Bryant Howroyd

Episode Date: April 26, 2020

We’re joined by Janice Bryant Howroyd, the first African-American woman billionaire and founder and CEO of The ActOne Group, a multi-billion dollar global enterprise providing workforce solutions. Janice is the definition of an unapologetically ambitious woman who lives by her mantra to “Never compromise who you are personally to become who wish to be professionally.”  What started as humble beginnings as a secretary for her brother-in-law’s company, turned into an opportunity that led Janice on a path of entrepreneurship. We’re diving deep into the obstacles that she has overcome, including economic uncertainty and global hardships that are relevant now more than ever before. Tune in as Janice shares her entrepreneurial journey and the lessons she’s learned along the way.   This episode is brought to you by ELLE, iconic lifestyle brand, and the world’s largest women’s fashion magazine. We partnered with ELLE for their 75th anniversary to celebrate women entrepreneurship. Learn more about this partnership at bossbabe.com/elle

Once that respect elevates to fear, step back, do the work, come at it again, or walk away. You'll always win that way. Your ability to solve problems is honed by your ability to pay attention to the lessons you've learned. Welcome to the Boss Babe podcast, a place where we share with you the real behind the scenes of building successful businesses, achieving peak performance and learning how to balance it all. I'm Natalie Ellis, CEO of Boss Babe and your host for this week's episode. So in case you missed it, I actually have a really special announcement. At Boss Babe, we have partnered with lifestyle and media brand Powerhouse Elle. Elle actually

means she in French and for its 75th anniversary, Elle is partnering with Boss Babe to celebrate female entrepreneurship. I have no words for this. Honestly, this is a total pinch me moment. I grew up reading Elle magazine and the fact that we get to partner with them on their 75th anniversary is blowing my mind. Can we just take a moment? We are partnering with them to celebrate their 75th anniversary. This is one of the proudest moments in my career and not only that but we get to work with them on an initiative that will actually have such a big impact on female entrepreneurs. We really believe women are the future of entrepreneurship and this year more

than ever we want to discover and reveal the faces that build tomorrow and if you stay to the end I actually have a really big announcement about what Boss Babe and Elle are going to be doing together that is going to directly impact your business and could be a game changer. So that's coming at the end. And our guest for today is actually our first role model for the L Partnership, Janice Bryant Howroyd. Janice does it all. She's an entrepreneur, author, educator, amongst many other things. She is the founder and CEO of a multi-billion dollar international talent technology enterprise. She's currently number 39 on the Forbes list of America's richest self-made women. And she was also the first African-American woman to build and own a billion dollar company.

She is an incredible woman and a massive inspiration and such a role model. And I am just honored to get the opportunity to interview her for you guys on the podcast. In this interview Janice touches on her early lesson in team building through her family and the importance of having a mentor. We'll also go through her entrepreneurial journey and how she dealt with the objections she faced as a minority woman. And what I love most about Janice is how transparent and honest she is throughout the whole episode. Her integrity really shines through in this interview. Her mantra, never compromise who you are personally to become who you wish to be professionally, is the basis of what drives her in her life. And despite being

wildly successful, she's remained really true to herself along the way. I think this episode's actually going to shift a lot of your perspectives on entrepreneurship because it did mine. We were meant to be doing it in person but obviously that's not happening right now and so it was actually great to pick her brain on the economic situation and what that means for businesses too. So as I said stay tuned after the episode because I'm going to be sharing about our partnership with Elle where female entrepreneurs can enter a nationwide contest in June to pitch their ideas to a panel of inspiring businesswomen. So without further ado, let's dive right into this episode. And as always, take a screenshot, share your biggest takeaways on Insta stories, tag me at I'm Natalie, tag at bossbabe.inc.

And then if you want to go the extra mile, you can tag at Elle Boutique. A boss babe is unapologetically ambitious and paves the way for herself and other women to rise, keep going and fighting on. She is on a mission to be her best self in all areas. It's just believing in yourself. Confidently stepping outside her comfort zone to create her own vision of success. Okay, so I want to dive in and go all the way back to your childhood because I'm very similar to you in a way. I'm one of eight siblings and I know you're one of 11. And I know that coming from a big family has so much to it. I think it's where I got a lot of my leadership skills from because I'm the eldest. So I would love to know what was it like for you growing up in a family

of 11? Well, Natalie, if you're asking me to share a lot of my childhood, you'd better have a lot of time. So why don't we condense it a little bit? You see, we'd have to go a long way back and there's a lot of it. I will tell you fundamentally that like you, yes, I did learn a lot of my leadership skills growing up in the home. And I was really blessed not only to have great mom and dad in the house, but to have siblings who we just kind of meshed. I mean, even to this day, when people meet us or people who've known us for years, it doesn't matter, will compliment our ability to get along. And they usually will make remarks in jest oftentimes about how families can be dysfunctional. Don't let me suggest to you one minute that we

don't have our disagreements, but I think it's that our parents raised us in a way that taught us how to disagree with an idea and not be disagreeable to each other. And I think that's really important in business as well. We certainly are seeing it politically wherever you look across the world, especially in governments that have elected officials, where we have competitions for offices and people tend to get disagreeable in order to disagree. So I just think that it's a personal life skill that evolves itself into wherever you find your desires or your opportunities. And in my case, in business, it's just really incredible that I'm able to take so much of what they taught me. You know, I'll tell you something else.

Growing up at a time in the Deep South when folk didn't have a lot of money and we often supplemented food by gardens and clothing by hand-me-downs and redesign. I think that was beneficial to me as well. You're one of eight. I don't know what your economic status was in your community, but I did go to university before it really hit me that we were poor based on national standards in the U.S. because I thought we were quite well off. We always had enough for everybody and a little bit left over. And so growing up as one of 11 in a house of 13 with the mom and dad and any other guests or pets who came around, you know, just

add it to the fun of it. I thought we were doing quite well in that, honestly, I thought that we were primed for success. And, you know, later in life, I learned that was real as well, but just in a different way than I had thought of it. I love that. So when you say you went to university, it was only then when you realized you had a different economic class. What was that like for you? Did you find it really difficult to fit in? Oh girl, let me tell you something. No, not fitting in because you see, I went to a historically black university, North Carolina A&T. And so that's our shout, got to give a shout out. We got Aggies all over the world. But here's the thing. I went to university with a lot of other people who were on either financial aid or scholarship like I was.

And so most of the kids who were going to university at that time in that place were coming from homes where they weren't economically there. However, the thing that hit me was I was sitting in a class and a professor mentioned what the average household income was. And basically he continued throughout that class to give statistics that taught me, wait, wow, we're poor. And I remember having that open eye mouth draw. And I was like, yeah, we kind of are. How did I live all of these years, go to school on scholarship, which indicated that I was kind of smart, and be too dumb to know that we were poor? I think it is in great part that number one,

we didn't measure wealth by money. Like I told you, we always had enough to eat and we had enough to share and everybody else was either at our standard or below. So my very little bitty world in Tauber and North Carolina back in the early fifties suggested that we were doing quite well off. It's only after I got exposed to the larger world that I realized, no, by national standards, we're poor. And I think a lot of businesses and business owners reach that point sometimes in their business growth when they realize, wait a minute, I really need to do some things differently to compete on the open market because it's a lot different than competition was when I was this size or when I was evolving this idea. And so I don't see it as anything other than a really great eye opener to the opportunity I had,

not so much a closed door because I was coming from a different circumstance. Where did that mindset come from? Because for you to hear that statistic and see a big opportunity is different to a lot of people who would hear that statistic and think, oh, well, that's just my life or that's just the cards that I've been dealt. So how did you have that mindset from such a young age? Well, first, let me give honor to the fact that it could be a door closer. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So that's real for a lot of people that I don't want to be dismissive about my circumstance. What I'm doing is not painting myself as a shero because there were so many people along my journey who were angels to my process. But definitely the mindset

for opportunity and growth came from my parents. You know, my family and I always have Sunday dinner together. And here in California, where I live most of the time right now, I have family who will come around for dinner, whether it's in California or Vegas. I actually live in Vegas more than California now. But with this COVID-19 pandemic, we're finding that we're having to stay at home. And so we've decided that we meet together and we just Zoom in with each other on Sunday around a preset time. Yesterday, we were laughing and playing music and all gathered and there were nine of us

on the Zoom as siblings. And we were having a really great time. And then my brother Carlton mentioned, you know what? We're doing exactly what the slaves did, who were really the history of how we got to here. And all of us have had this discussion in some way or another, but in this moment, it felt very poignant for us when Carlton brought it up because we were singing and laughing our way out of a circumstance that felt very, very cold and

could leave some of us alone. I have two siblings who live on their own. And so whether we're practicing safer at home or lockdown or whatever term you want to give to it, we're all contributing to rural health by following the advice of the CDC and others who are advising us, rural health organization. And so while we're on this call, we're each showing what we're eating and others who are advising us, World Health Organization. And so while we're on this call, we're each showing what we're eating and we're playing music. We select scripture. We say prayers together, just do the things that siblings do around my table normally. And I

thought about it afterwards. We were doing exactly what mom and dad brought us up to do. We didn't let circumstance become the primary factor in how we looked at life. And so when I say slaves sang their way to freedom, they weren't singing out of joy or simply because they loved the circumstance. That song oftentimes was their map and their path for their journey. Swing low, sweet chariot was an instruction. It wasn't just a feeling of that genuineness of love for your circumstance. So I think that many businesses get what I'm talking about. Many business owners get what I'm talking about. When you are responsible to lift a group of employees up or whether you're starting your own company and it's you plus one other or just you at a desktop. I tend to say play the music that

takes you where you want to go because that's exactly what we did in my home. And mom and dad were really full of conversation to us all the time that basically, if I were to cap it off for you, Natalie said, you know, pay attention to where you are, but look to where you're going. I think athletes get this when they, you know, keep your eye on the ball kind of thing. I love that so much. And that's such an important lesson. It can be really easy sometimes to get so caught up in your circumstance and you can forget your bigger vision of where you're driving towards. And I really like it. And it's also a case of not just saying I'll be happy when, or I'll have a better mindset when I achieve something, but actually, how can you embody now where you want to go? We do that at my, we were having dinners around

my table. We actually had a family ritual where we would eat dessert first. And it was kind of our joke. It evolved from one of my children. My daughter, Kay, wanted to eat her dessert before dinner. And we were all saying, my mom said, oh, you shut up, kids. You're just being silly. Let the kid eat dessert first. Life is short. Let her eat it first. And we all just laughed at it. And we said, okay, from now on, we eat dessert first. Now, that certainly championed in my house, making healthier desserts and ensuring that everybody was nourished properly. But we certainly did. We ate dessert first until we were no longer able to sit around this table. And I'll tell you, Natalie, I hadn't thought about it before you brought the

conversation point to here, but I'm really looking forward to when my family is sat around my table again, and we're certainly going to continue to eat dessert first. I love that. I can just see so many people listening to this, like, yeah, I'm going to start doing that too. So, okay, you were at university and in 1976, you moved to LA and you were a temporary secretary for your brother-in-law. Was that your first career? What did your career look like up until that point? And what made you take that move? Because that was a pretty, I think, career defining moment for you, right? You must be reading my books because I do speak in both of my books to the point that many people have jobs along the way to a career. My first career truly was the one I'm in now, which was

entrepreneur, but I did have jobs along the way. And I had worked in office and office admin in each of those. When I took over for my brother, Tommy, his office, when he went on vacation with my sister, and actually it was a work, it was a conference and they extended into a vacation. And that's what gave me the time to be able to make the changes that I saw that needed to be made. When he came back, he thought I worked a miracle and encouraged me to hang my own shingle. But that was the first opportunity in work that I truly innovated around the total solution. I think in my life, I've always looked at how do I do this smarter? I'm hesitant to say better because I remember conjugation in school being good, better, best.

And I reconjugate in business and in life to good, better, best, better. I believe life is iterative and so business should be as such. And in his office, I got a great opportunity, even though I had not put definition to what I was doing at that time, to innovate him forward to what would be better efficient. And he got it. He saw it right away. And it's kind of in the DNA. I don't know that I ever made that decision. The decision for me is more following through on the idea of the decision. Don't you think for many people that's the case though? I don't think I'm any particular genius in that. Do you? Yeah, I think for a lot of people, it kind of is the case.

And so do you feel like you really stumbled upon something where you were like, I'm really good at this. This is the way I think. And other people were noticing that. Was that the moment you decided I could make a bigger career out of this? Well, by the way, you really sound Newcastle to my American Southern ears now. Shout out to Newcastle and Ben. Ben Little, you're going to get to graduate. You will get back to school. But yeah, you're laughing at me, Natalie. For me, I think that it was a case of not so much, yeah, other people noticing and I thought I could do it as it was my brother-in-law noticing and encouraging me to do it. He wanted me to extend my stay in LA, make no mistake about it. So as I look back on it, whether he actually thought I was that brilliant or not, I don't know,

but I know he didn't want me to go back to North Carolina because I come to California on vacation and my sister was loving having me out here. He saw the change in everything and he really enjoyed the girlness of who we were together. And so he was like, yeah, stay. You owe it to yourself to prove yourself, you know? And I got in with it because LA was a lot of fun. And I have to tell you, as I am talking with you right now from LA, I can't imagine the time that I didn't live here. I love this city and I'm just so ambitious and positive and hopeful

that this city, like so many I do business in, will come through this pandemic well. And it's going to be the innovation of business owners and business-minded people who are going to help that to be the case. So the work that you're doing, I want to shout out and applaud now because you're giving so many women and all, regardless of gender, an opportunity to network with each other via your show and to be able to lift each other up. So kudos to you, Natalie. Thank you. And I think that's a really important point you've made in that right now is a crazy time for all of us around the world. And for a lot of entrepreneurs, we think about solutions. And so we see what's happening and we're thinking ahead. And it is entrepreneurs that do change the world and they have these ideas. And already you're seeing so many entrepreneurs jumping online to help people who have brick and mortar businesses to bring their businesses online and show them softwares like Zoom and Slack that they might never have had to use before. And I feel the same way. I think entrepreneurship is going to be

really, really important in driving forward. I agree a hundred percent. One of the things that is so beautiful for me and my company, Act One Group, is that now we're a workforce solutions company, as you well know. So inside of that, there are different segments. Yes, there's staffing. Staffing is core to who we grew from and who we continue to be. There's also talent technology and process that we sell and we help companies to manage and plan and retain workforce, designing talent communities for them of all types of workers, not just people who are coming in and temporary or looking for full-time positions. And so it requires really smart people to be inside of that. And when you're talking about entrepreneurs coming together and sharing with each other's technologies and processes to help them grow, I have not seen in all of my career, and it's a pretty good one. I've not seen in all of my career the expertise and camaraderie as exhibited by my own teams in this moment ever before. And I've worked with many of these people for so many years, know their kids. We go away together and celebrate each other at company events and know each other's birthdays. And to see us in this light is so beautiful to me, how they're coming together with themselves and with clients and employees on how do we win through this, not make it through this, but win through this, Natalie. And that I believe

is what's so common in the spirit of so many of us. And historically, when we've had any type of interruption to economies, whether it was war or famine or any nature of crisis, we've helped each other country by country. But today, my company operates in over 32 countries, and these people are one community. One manager out of New York said it distinctly. I had the pleasure of working with some of my peers on a particular situation. And they called me J.B.H. I have to tell you, J.B.H., it occurred to me then that we're not regions, we're not states, we're not nations. We are one community of people helping each other. I think that's the gift of human spirit married to technology. And so there are a lot of wins that are going to come out of this. And I have to respect that a lot of people are in

this moment of pandemic around the world right now, where the immediate fear, the lack of knowledge, or even just knowing that somebody's ill in their family or network is so real that they're not ready to see the colors of that rainbow. I'm telling you, Natalie, we can be a much better world. Our businesses can be much more efficient. Young people can have much sooner born businesses. Should we but listen and learn from this in the best way? There's a lot of heartache and pain that's in here. There's a lot of sunshine and opportunity too. And I think we have to make sure that we're looking for that as we continue through these next, however, it may be months in cleaning this all up. Sorry to go on a rant for you, but it's on my heart today. So full. Yeah. I love everything

you said. And particularly, how do we win through this? A lot of businesses, you're right. People are in fear and they're just thinking about stopping everything to take a step back and deal with what's immediately in front of them or asking, how can I survive through this versus how can I actually thrive in this? How can I win through this? How can I show up with the most service so that what's happened now doesn't have to happen again? And I think as entrepreneurs, we really can be having that mindset. So I love how you were talking about the size of your company and it really is incredible. So you were just saying you left in 1976 and came to LA. And if I'm right, you had $1,500 in your pocket. And by 1978, you'd started your own

company, which is now in 19 countries across the world. We do business in 32 countries, but I had $900 and I borrowed 600 from my mom. But that's semantic. Your point really is well taken that I didn't fund my business with a lot of money. Here's the good thing. Today, your audience can start their business with a lot less than I started mine. As long as they upskill themselves and are prepared to really vet and research, they can get out there and be in business today. Let's take a quick pause to talk about my new favorite all-in-one platform, Kajabi. You know, I've been singing their praises lately because they have helped our business run so much smoother and with way less complexity, which I love. Not to mention our team couldn't be happier because now everything is in one place.

So it makes collecting data, creating pages, collecting payment, all the things so much simpler. One of our mottos at Boss Babe is simplify to amplify and Kajabi has really helped us do that this year. So of course I needed to share it here with you. It's the perfect time of year to do a bit of spring cleaning in your business, you know, get rid of the complexity and instead really focus on getting organized and making things as smooth as possible. I definitely recommend Kajabi to all of my clients and students. So if you're listening and haven't checked out Kajabi yet, now is the perfect time to do so because they are offering Boss Babe listeners a 30-day free trial. Go to kajabi.com

slash Boss Babe to claim your 30-day free trial. That's kajabi.com slash Boss Babe. Totally. And so that two-year period of moving to LA and then starting a business, what was that like for you? How did you decide? Did you have a lot of experience where you just completely like, I'm going to go out there and try this? What was that looking like for you? So see, if you want an academic or textbook prescription for people who want to start a business, I'm not your girl. Okay. I came to LA on vacation, had a lot of fun, found that I had something that was really valuable, used a lot of what we called common sense back then. We know common sense ain't that common anymore. And my best resources was the network of friends and professional people who I had met along the

way. I remember mama telling us always treat people well on your way up because you'll meet the same people going down. Well, I'm grateful that I haven't gone down yet, but a lot of the people I've met on the way have continued to help me to progress in my journey. So I can't suggest that I was in any prescriptive way, the ideal for an entrepreneur, unless we accept that the ideal for an entrepreneur is to find opportunity to find how you can differently or importantly support what you're interested in as a business and go for it and I think a lot of the most successful entrepreneurs aren't the textbook entrepreneurs are they they're just people that have decided that they're going to take a leap and no matter what experience they have or how much money they've got in their pocket they just

go do it don't you think that's a beautiful expression of faith to really believe in the idea number one that tomorrow is coming and number two you're going to be important and very supportive of it I mean I just think that's such a beautiful way that we can all agree no matter where we come from. And that's why I think entrepreneurs often can be the threat to business where we look at big enterprise and we look at small business. But when you think about it, entrepreneurs truly are the thread of economies. Yeah, I completely agree. And I think that mindset's really needed because, and we can get into it, but entrepreneurship isn't this decision to start a business and then the money comes flowing in and everything's fun and games after that. It's actually a really difficult journey. And if you

haven't got that mindset of this is going to work, then I think a lot of people will, you know, step out of the ring. I'll share with something with you, Natalie, real quick while I'm thinking of it. There's an organization operating out of the UK. It's called MSDUK, and that is the Minority Supplier Development for the UK. And a guy named Mayank Shah is head of that organization. Mayank and I have been friends for years back in his time when he would visit us at NMSDC, National Minority Supplier Development Councils here in the US. And he is doing incredible work with entrepreneurs and helping small businesses in so many different areas, just fulfilling. It's like a school for entrepreneurship.

And he gave my company, Act One, the honor of being able to sponsor one of the programs that he operates there for entrepreneurs. What you're talking about, I can tell you is spot on and I have to stop and applaud you for the work you're doing in your show. Because when I look at all of the data that I learned from MSD UK, it really rallies around everything you're doing and everything you're about that the entrepreneur today and the entrepreneur tomorrow needs to know. So please allow me to just thank you for that. Wow, would I have loved. You talk about me starting my business with 900 and a loan of six from my mom.

Let me tell you, much more valuable than that to me would have been a show like yours. Thank you so much for saying that. That means a lot. That's definitely our big mission. Well, you're fulfilling. Thank you. Thank you. So when you did get started, what did that journey look like? How did you even get your first customer? Was it your brother? What did it look like? Well, yeah, he was my first customer because he continued to use me after I started my business. He also was a lot of my referral and my network. And I'll tell you, I've written about this in one of my books, my first book, The Art of Work, How to Make Work Work for You. And I talk about WOMB, W-O-M-B, word of mouth business. I got, somebody

loved it and got carried away and said word of mouth baby when they were interviewing me, but it's actually word of mouth, word of mouth business. You know what, even in this day and age, word of mouth continues to be the way that we've grown our business. It's so important because it's nice for you to be able to, with authenticity, cite the values of your company. It's really great when someone else is doing that. And I just think that that cannot be overlooked in this world of social media and self-promotion, which I am a fan of for anyone, but the ability to have someone, I've had clients today, back when they were building a relationship with me, call me and I'm not even be aware they were going to call and tell me another client told them what

we did for them. That feels great. You never get tired of that type of business growth. So I think word of mouth continues to be one of the most valuable contributors to any business's success. And we're all very aware of how quickly a brand can be built or torn down in a moment. You can have 20 years of well-invested brand and servicing clients really well and have 20 minutes of a bad situation and it can destroy your brand. Again, the very thing that builds us up on our

technological platforms can also tear us down. So you have to be diligent to paying attention to doing business in the way you say you're going to do it and paying attention to what's happening in and around your business so that you can manage that you're actually able to project into the world and into your own business future, those things that are going manage that you're actually able to project into the world and into your own business future, those things that are going to help you to grow. Do you have any core principles or ways of doing that? So ways in making sure people are feeling comfortable referring you out and then also making sure that what you say you're going to do is delivered in the way you said you were going to deliver it? Well, you know, you can become a very good avenue for other people when you have a good brand as

well. And for businesses, entrepreneurs, I think that's really important for us to be able to refer each other. So in my own personal instance, I live by never compromise who you are personally to become who you wish to be professionally. That sounds light on the tongue, but it can weigh very heavy on the heart and your bank account if you don't get that and understand that very early in your entrepreneurship life. The other thing that's really important in our organization is our business culture. And we have a culture of every day is game day. So we bring the best of it every day. It's more of an athletic type kind of reference. The big game day,

everybody's out to play their best. And so we just say every day is game day in our organization. And wow, is it these days. But the other thing that we are working very strongly from is real love. My son is in our business and he runs our staffing organizations. One of the things that he teaches from the platform of everything he meets with VPs on is real love. And real love in our world, suggests that you don't say in the hallway what you didn't say at the table, that you have the freedom to express in the room what you're thinking so that you don't have to chatter it about after the meeting. And that may mean not feeling self-bullied or from a peer perspective when others are putting their numbers up, if you're not going to make it and you know you're not going to make it, it's not real love to

suggest that you will or delivering to a client or keeping the promise we make to people when we bring them into the organization. All of that is real love. And so you have to be able to do that. And I would suggest real love is extending itself today as well, because now in this era of pandemic, we are having so many companies who have to have the real love conversations with their clients, with their employees, with their families, with their community responsibilities about what they can and can't do and what is and is not. And it's really important to express real love in this environment more than ever,

but it's certainly been one of the things that's been core for us in our organization. And then I would say the last thing is my ABCs. Ask the right questions, then listen, listen, listen for the right answers. Be where you say you'll be when you say you'll be. Very importantly, how you say you'll be. And then C is circular, complete communication. Everybody who needs to know has to be informed. And sending an email, shooting a text, IG, that is not complete communication. That's all one-sided. It's

ensuring that everybody circles back and everybody who should have a voice has a voice. That circle of communication and those ABCs are what will get you through your business to win on the other side of this pandemic. It'll also be what helps you to win as a family. I want to share with you that I learned a statistic, Natalie. It suggested that in one city that I'm familiar with, over this last weekend, when people are asking you to basically kind of lock yourself down and all take personal responsibility for it, we found that in one city, we didn't have that many call-ins for violence on the street. It was domestic violence that was going up. So I think that it's really important for us to, you know, when you step back to grow forward, think about what that means in our homes and

in our families. If people really are learning to live together again, not just as citizens out there or business people to business people, but actually in your own homes. I've been writing so many notes, as you're saying, Matt, because you have such a great way of saying one sentence so succinctly that really is so incredibly powerful. And I love what you said about complete communication and how just putting something on Instagram is one-sided. And I think that has been the case with a lot of businesses because of the way social

media has moved. So within your company, what's an example of having complete communication? Well, for us, we do have our protocols set up so that we have checklists. And because we've been working virtually for a long time in my organization, this is not a new experience. Many people who continue to work virtually at home still enjoy to go into the office for the camaraderie of it. And that's the strain on them. So testing that our protocols really work now that we're all having to stay home or choosing to stay home and work. We are an essential business in so many ways. So while we can go in the office, I'm encouraging people to exercise their own personal responsibility in this.

And we're testing our protocols as we work in this. And an example of that would be how we are looping in our weekly meetings, our communication with our employees and our candidates, as well as our clients. My son actually asked on one of his meetings this morning with a group of his VPs from the Northeast, had anybody had a complete virtual experience? And by that he meant, were you talking with a company who is virtual, who is doing their interviewing virtually, with an employee who can work virtually, who has references of their virtual achievements. And it was really exciting to hear the different answers and the enthusiasm, because while we're virtual, many of our clients aren't, and supporting them becomes important, or applicants who don't understand the processes. It's just

been a real experience for us to see where this is. So the examples continue to exhibit themselves as we get through this, but they aren't new for us. Most of the time, it's just tying one process to another in a virtual manner that we may have taken the luxury or invested the enjoyment from not being virtual. You said one thing that really stood out was, has that person got references as being a virtual worker? And I just wanted to bring that up because I think a lot of people listening, they are probably having to migrate their teams virtually, or they've already got virtual teams, but they're conducting their interviews and hiring virtually. And that step could probably be missed. So you can get a reference from someone, but have you got a reference of that person working virtually? Because I think that's

a different skill, isn't it? To be able to work virtually and be productive virtually without having a boss or people in the office. And a lot of us, whether we're in service or product lines of business, are finding that it's really important to ensure that you're working with the best data requirements in place. And I'm not talking about whether your technology supports the data you're managing, where layers of confidentiality are engaged, or whether you are able to handle, again, in this instance, it would be technology, what types of loads of data can you handle? All of that is coming into play. And cloud-based technology came around in front of this. Thank God it did, because where would we be had it not? Yeah, so incredibly true. You said another thing as well, your mantra, never compromise who you are personally to become who you wish to be professionally.

Can you expand a little bit more on what that's looked like for you in your business journey? Oh, you do listen. I love you, Natalie. Yes, I can. Because very early on, I had the opportunity to visit a company that was at or near my hometown. And I won't mention the name because while that specific name of the company has changed, it iterated itself into a new name. And I want to be respectful. I had gone out and my sister, Trish, is an industrial engineer. I was very blessed to have her join my organization. And when she came out, she told me I'd have to be prepared to look at things differently with her working with me. She said, you're going to go visit this company. We had an opportunity. Back then, it would be about 600

employees a day that we would have as temporary working at this site. And we would be managing it. It would have been one of our first services programs for my company. She said, you've got to go visit them. And I was like, oh, really? So we went, we visited. And today we can do that virtually. Back then, nobody did. And we walked around and we got to kick our feet in the corners, et cetera, and look at the environment where the employees would be. Now, Trish comes from a manufacturing environment as an engineer. And so she knew exactly what to look for. And it was very important to her that I was able to live true to what I say, because for me, that Sunday dinner that I was

speaking with you about earlier, oftentimes if that Sunday dinner is in North Carolina, I've got family members sitting around the table who are performing some of those light industrial jobs that this contract would have offered us. And I would always say, I'd never send an employee where I wouldn't send a family member. So she encouraged me to go look. And when we looked, it was not a place where we felt people would be safe. And she said, well, they want to do the business with you and your negotiations are going well. They're going to pay you what you want. Is this where you want to send any member of our family? And I cried my way back to California to have to not do that business. And we got a little bit into the process by then. So I'd invested not just my time, but the company's time, the potential client company's time as well.

But I had to make that call. And I called my mom, as I so often do on many things, two of my best kitchen cabinet, really kitchen cabinet, happened to be my sister, Linda, we call her Zest, and my mom. And I called my mom and I was talking with her and asking her to pray with me over the decision I had to make. And my sister Zest was there and she said, girl, just live by your own rule. Never compromise who you are personally to become who you wish to be professionally. And she bit me with my own teeth because I had to walk away from that business. And that was huge for me. Now, there were some good things that happened consequent to that, Natalie, because that business

would have doubled my business. But hindsight, it would have been half of my business and it would have been risky business because that company did not do well with respect to their risk management. And it would have fallen on me had I had that contract. But going in, everything about it looked great, but it just wasn't the place to send your family. And so I had to decline the business. And I don't think that it was the best decision I've ever made in my life, but it certainly happens to be one of them. I love that you shared that. And I think what a great lesson for people listening, especially when you're building a business, it can be really easy

to say yes to all opportunities and all clients that come in. Right now, it can be very easy to cut corners too, or to take shortcuts, because so many protocols and requirements are being lessened in order to get us through that I would just say now is the time to pay particular attention to what you're doing and how you're doing it so that your rush to get through this won't put you in a place that you're going to end up looking back on and feeling bad about a decision or someone else suffering from that decision. Have you got an example of that specifically, what you think businesses might be facing? That's going to be depending on anybody's business where they are. I mean, if you're a product developer, don't cut corners on products.

Don't make it a little shoddier or a little faster. If you are selling services or whatever, please don't profiteer, but don't gouge people, but don't cut corners so heavily in competition that you aren't able to sustain beyond it. There are so many ways that it can explode itself that I would just say, stand in front of a mirror. And I mean this literally, Natalie. Try it this evening. Stand in front of a mirror. And I mean this literally, Natalie, try it this evening, stand in front of a mirror, put that thing in front of you that you're having to ask yourself, should I do this?

Because you see, and then get the answer from that. Because you see, most of us operate from a conscience and intuition. Intuition is our gift that tells us, hey, let's step back. Let's look at it. And typically when intuition steps in, it's usually a signal that something's not wrong or that something's wrong or that thing shouldn't be given. And then when we don't listen to our intuition, we're so well-designed that our conscience steps in. Our conscience says, go back and make that right. Re-examine that. Give that another shot or that person another shot or walk away. Our conscience is the back end of our intuition and they both work together well for us when we listen to them. Yeah, you're totally right. And it's really about making decisions now that you're going to be happy with in the long term, because a short term decision can have a lot of long term

effects. And in times like this, you said earlier, people are still in fear. And it's not always the best place to make decisions from. I don't think good decisions ever come from being in a place of fear. That's right. I love respect. Respect the circumstance you're facing and you can make decisions from that. Once that respect elevates to fear, step back, do the work, come at it again, or walk away. You'll always win that way. So true. And I love how this interview has probably been different to a lot of your interviews because we're in a time where we couldn't even do this interview in person because of what's going on in the world and we're having to pivot and I love the fact that you've came on here and shared so much of what

you know about the time we're facing or what you're predicting with people because I think it's so fundamentally important one thing I would love to ask you is you know we touched on it in the beginning of where you started with your business to where you've grown it now. And to say that you're wildly successful really is an understatement. And I want to know what you attribute to that because I've picked up on a lot of things in this conversation. You really don't compromise and you live by such great principles with your personal and your business life. So with that being said, what is it that makes you wildly successful and has succeeded doing something that a lot of other people haven't? Well, you know, that depends on how you define success. I can't really say that I've become successful. The truth is I was born

successful. I was born into a circumstance and a time when everything was right about what my mom and dad were teaching me that allowed me to succeed. And so if I were to attribute my success to anything, I've often said my company is the one that my mother built. All of my mom's mommy-isms, I write about them in my second book, are the things that I have best applied in my business. And I learned more in my home growing up than I ever did in school or quite candidly, life has just taught me that those things were true. And I've been able to prove them through life. I'm not suggesting that I haven't learned anything since I left home at all. What I am saying is that what I learned at home has fundamentally supported me to build

a business. And so that would be the best thing that I could say my success has come from is that I was truly blessed to have a mom and a dad who cooperated in how they raised us, taught us things that I believe were right for us in our lives. I mean, you think about it. I've had over the period of my career, eight siblings work in my company. And to this day, several of them still do. And most employees in the organization will tell you that my siblings have never been a ball to their own growth. And most often they've been supporters

of it. So that says a lot when you can bring that many of your own brothers and sisters into a company and have a company the size of mine still believe that they add value to the organization and to others respectively. I love that. And what about times where things aren't going so smoothly? As your business has really, really grown, I would love to know, has your ability to deal with problems gotten better? My assumption is yes, because when you have more employees, more clients, your problems are always going to be on a bigger scale versus when you're just starting out. And I would love to know what you've learned from dealing with challenges in business.

So one thing I have learned about business is the same thing I've learned about life, and that is that both are iterative. So your ability to solve problems is honed by your ability to pay attention to the lessons you've learned. Now, I will tell you that one thing my husband, who's a Yorkshireman, told me years ago, he said, you know, he told me two things that have really helped me in solving poor solutions in my business. One thing he said was, if worrying paid, I could be the richest man on earth because I figure out how to do it all day. I've just never seen anybody earn a farthing from worry. And now part of that is that he grew up in England as a little boy during World War II. And so he got to experience, I think,

in a strong and emotional way, the strength and the character of a British during that war. And in particular in his home, because he was one of those kids who his mom chose not to evacuate him. And so he got to see how everyday adults were managing under some very different circumstances that were uncertain and

changing every day. And he took from that, I think, a strength of character that suggested he didn't have to hoard or have a lot. He never owned more than three or four suits at any time during his active business life. He always had a confidence in tomorrow so he didn't freak out in today. And I learned those kinds of things from him that helped me to decision-making my business. When you marry that to the fact that I grew up under lesser economic circumstance, but I also learned from my mom and dad how 13 people could live in a home and be cooperative as long as they valued good process and they respected each other. Those things helped me to make business decisions today too. So I would

really encourage anybody that while business schools offer a lot of value and certainly my company benefits from my son having great business school education and a master's in business from USC, fight on. It really is more about your ability to learn and let each experience teach you toward the next one. We say that experience, well-married to knowledge, is what gives you confidence. And so I think that as you get through certain circumstances, you learn to sail through others. At the end of the day, it becomes a matter of, is it the right thing to do? And that's very different than asking what's wrong with the situation. Those are two very different things. Oh, there was so much value in everything you just shared there. Thank you for being so transparent with that. So to wrap this interview up, I would love to ask you one last

question. And it's for those entrepreneurs who are not entrepreneurs yet. They're kind of on the fence. They've got a business idea or they might have started dabbling. I would love to ask, what would your advice to them be ahead of them going all in on their business idea? I think that the biggest thing would be to ask yourself if you would do it with or without pay. And the reason I say that is because you've got an academic platform for everything else you're going to evaluate when you're looking to start a business, would you do it without pay? Because there may come the day that you actually have to, and that day may come more than once in your career. I think now is the perfect time for anybody to start a business if they really can answer that question in the affirmative. I wrote a poem that I'm going to post, and I'm not a poet,

but in my poem, I say, last night as I lay not sleeping, I canvassed my faith amidst weeping and I called out God's name, my heart filled with pain. Do you know me? Am I in your keeping? God, are you there? Do you hear my prayer? Am I left in a world with no tomorrow? Will the sun rise again? Will I ever be the same? Will I see better or drown in this sorrow? Well, my tears cooled my brow. My prayer warmed my heart. The quiet brought ease to my pain. The answer was found beneath my thorn crown. I'm here. I already know your name. So I would encourage all of your entrepreneurs, Natalie, and people in general who listen to you for the fun and advice of what you do so well, that wherever they are,

that like me, they can be better through this if they're prepared to listen quietly, to wake up with the spirit of not just togetherness, but of winning. And they're going to do very well. And the last thing I tell them, if they are young entrepreneurs, starting families, your children more attention pay to what you do than what you say. When you kiss their little cheeks, when you put them to bed and you tell them everything's okay and it's not unusual that they're no longer going to school or playing in the park or running up to kids the way they used to. They're paying more attention to how you treat that than what you tell them about that. So let's all live what we tell the children.

Let's live in positive thought and let's practice good health and let's be kind to one another. And let's make sure we give ourselves individual times of quiet so that we can regenerate, we can be purposeful. And if we need to, we do that with grace and honor and love for one another. Thank you so much for sharing that. That was incredible. And I think was everything that people listening needed to hear right now. So thank you. And I just want to say thank you so

much for your time for this interview as well. It's really been incredible and so timely as well. So thank you. Thank you. And thank you for letting me shout out Ben. Ben Little at Newcastle. You will graduate. Newcastle University will be open for business again. Yeah, I love that. Newcastle. You will graduate. Newcastle University will be open for business again. Yeah, I love that. Newcastle University is the best. I really hope you enjoyed this episode with Janice. As I mentioned in the beginning of the episode, Boss Vape has teamed up with Elle to kick off a high impact partnership with Meaning. So together we want to continue to pave the way for women to achieve their own versions of success. As an entrepreneur myself I know how hard it was to have the resources and the guidance to start my first business and our goal with this partnership is to leverage our

resources to be able to help inspire women all over the world to really follow their dreams and go for it. So we are launching a nationwide contest called Pitch Your Biz which will run from June 1st to June 30th. Contestants will be able to pitch their ideas during this time and then if selected we'll move forward to take part in a virtual event on October 23rd. There they will present their ideas, this could be you, directly to the role models who will serve as judges so we have an amazing panel of ambassadors including janice from this episode rebecca minkoff baba canalis beatrice dixon and yours truly and we'll also be rolling out podcast episodes with

everyone that i've just mentioned who will be coming on to really really tell their story and let you into their entrepreneurial journey and give you some tips along the way so to stay tuned for the latest updates on this partnership make sure to check out bottled.com forward slash l as we announce updates giveaways and an opportunity to work with us so i hope i got all that right because i'm really not used to having such structured podcasts but i want to make sure i get you all the info so like i said june 1st june 30th you can pitch your business if you're selected you'll come to a virtual event you'll pitch in front of some incredible role models who have built very very successful businesses and in the meantime we're going to be bringing them onto the podcast so you can hear their journey so go to bosslives.com forward slash

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