Episode 8: Predictions for the Online Education Industry with Jeni Barcelos
QUOTE OF THE EPISODE
There's so many paths available. There's so many ways to make money. We live in this
really remarkable time where it’s not that
it’ll be necessarily easy, but it can be
easeful for you if it’s aligned with you
Welcome to episode eight of the podcast where I chat with Jeni Barcelos, one of the co-founders of Marvelous, about entrepreneurship and predictions for the online education industry. Our conversation is rich and encouraging.
Jeni is an attorney, a parent, and an artist. She is the co-founder of the Marvelous software platform, the And She Coaching Co., and the climate justice project, Three Degrees Warmer. Prior to her foray into entrepreneurship, Jennifer graduated Phi Beta Kappa from UC Berkeley, worked on multiple presidential campaigns, served as a Gates Public Service Law Scholar, and received a graduate degree in Environmental Science from Yale. Jeni makes her home in Arizona and on a remote island in the Pacific Northwest and travels often with her family in their 25-foot Airstream.
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Read the Transcript:
Welcome to episode 8 of the Gentle Business Sessions, a podcast powered by Marvelous and Willow Space and hosted by me, Ashley Beaudin. It is such a gift to have you listening in today.
On this week's episode, I am interviewing, Jeni Barcelos, who is one of the co-founders of Marvelous. She brings such a richness to this conversation as we look at and explore some of the aspects of entrepreneurship. And the online eucation model / industry as a whole.
It is a conversation that will leave you with lots of points of reflection. So I am excited for you to hear it. And here we go.
Ashley: Jeni, welcome to the podcast. It's such a honor to get to interview you and have Marvelous be a partner for the podcast. So it's going to be good.
Jeni: Yeah, I'm excited.
Ashley: For those who have never met you, would you like to share a little bit about who you are and how you came to this work?
Jeni: Sure, yes, so I came into this work because I was essentially on maternity leave. I had just had my daughter and I was building a non profit. I had been incubating it in a university, in a major research university in the U. S. And I was fundraising all the time and trying to kind of figure out what to do.
With a baby in my arms and whether I wanted to go back fully into that career, and I had this kind of wild, very naive idea that I could fund my own legal work because I'm an environmental and human rights lawyer by starting a tech company because somehow that seemed logical with a baby in my arms and rather than fundraise from other people, primarily in tech, which is where I was in Seattle for that time, um, I just thought, well, I'll just make my own money.
It can't be that hard. And, um, so that's why, that's why I became, uh, the founder of a SAS company. And in particular, I, I started the business in the yoga industry because, um, I had gone through yoga teacher training at the end of law school, just to deepen my own practice.
I had had a really profound relationship to yoga. My mom passed away while I was in law school from cancer. And, um, her, her doctor sort of had in the hospital, there were free yoga classes for family members. And I just had like this really phenomenal experience and felt very held and nurtured. And I just, I was struggling because the work I I do the other work.
I do the climate change and human rights work. The legal work is very, um, there's a lot of like secondary trauma with that work. And so the yoga for me was like, just like the answer to all of the hard things in life. So when I was thinking about building a company, I wanted to build it in an industry that was lighthearted and healing and felt made me feel good.
Ashley: Are you still balancing both of those?
Jeni: Well, that's an interesting question. So my last case I handed off, I think two and a half years ago, I was just part time litigating a case, um, against a major international oil company. So I, I was just, I have, I have taken on some, Work like some volunteer work and contributing to some amicus briefs for major kind of environmental litigation.
But yeah, I'm mostly just running my company at this point, but but it's still, um, a lot of my thinking and a lot of my like, kind of intellectual capacity is still in that space, like, because that's the whole reason I Wanted to build tech was to do that other work and I think that that's just my truth to be honest I will go back to that work eventually.
Ashley: Yeah, yeah. Sounds like it's, like, the work of your soul.
Jeni: Yeah. Yeah, it's yeah It's taking me like 10 years wrestling with it to like really acknowledge that but yes, I think that's true.
Ashley: I, uh, I actually have an, uh, undergrad degree in human rights.
Jeni: Okay Oh, wow. Yeah, so you get this you you probably can feel how heavy that work can be.
Ashley: Yes. I mean, the, the classes, even just the classes for that were so intense and sitting with some of that topic.
Jeni: Yeah, I used to have, like, the books on my nightstand by the bed used to be, like, books about genocide. And, like, my husband at some point was like, maybe you should read something else before bed. Maybe that'd be a good idea. And I was like, oh, right. And then over time, I've learned his wisdom is really powerful. Like maybe you shouldn't read genocide books before bed.
Ashley: Maybe the importance of that space and gentle care. I'm curious, cause you said that when the idea to do the tech startup came, you thought it would be that it would maybe bring, like, it would bring the funding, but that there would also be a little bit of, maybe it's a lightness to the work?
Jeni: Yeah, I did. I mean, it was naive, like, for sure, but you know, the work that I was doing, I felt like I was trying to resolve the apocalypse, and so any other work seemed easier compared to that, like saving humanity from the apocalypse, which is what I, how I thought of my other work was like Gargantuan task.
It was actual life or death. And I was doing fieldwork and in places where people, so I was, I was working with kind of some of the first populations in the world who were really feeling the effects of climate change on their ability to survive, or at least have their survive within the current context of how they lived their lives.
And so it was very much life. Life and death and like tremendous amounts of suffering and like legal complexity because if you're, you know, island nation sinks, then what happens? Where are you a citizen ofr? Where are you allowed to live in this world and what rights do you have in those places and like so to come and we?
Don't have questions answers to those questions as a society so to come to makes a technology company, like there's a playbook for that. Like there's a way to win at that. There's, you know, like, and even if you don't win, the stakes are still just, okay, so you failed at something. Nobody's dying at the end of the day.
So for me, it did, like, I think that's maybe the difference I bring as a tech founder compared to, I think a lot of other founders, they really think what they're doing is. Like the end of the world. Like if they fail, you know, there's a lot of emotional attachment and I definitely have that. I'm not gonna lie and it's grown over a decade since I've been doing this.
Like I'm very attached to my company and to the work we do. But I still have that other perspective that's like, all right, well, you know, if this were all to disappear, like it's not the end of the world. Like it would be really sad for me and a lot of other people, but it's not this.
Ashley: Yeah. There's a more like zoomed out perspective still within you. I think that's beautiful. What, uh, what do you think has been the most unexpected piece of starting this company?
Jeni: I mean, how, how hard it is. I would say I was not I think that we all would say that for anything that we take on, right, that's challenging. Like if I knew how hard it was going to be, I probably would have made a different choice. But then by the time you realize that you're so far in and you're committed, um, I would say that was shockingly hard.
And, and to clarify, when I was building this, I was just thinking it would be me and a couple of contractors working as developers. I did, like, I, I just needed enough to fund my work, which was my salary so that I could have the freedom, the intellectual freedom to go pursue. the legal cases I wanted to pursue.
So, it has grown into something much bigger than that. And I think that's the other surprise is like, I, you know, when you create something, I think as the founder or the creator, you have a lot of agency, but also sometimes things take on a life of their own. And so for me to give the promise of Namasteam, which is now Marvelous, what it, what it deserved, I had to think bigger than what I initially went into this.
To do, and I think that has caused a lot of tension for me personally, just to wrestle with for all these years. Um, but I'm also glad, you know, I'm glad that I've made the decision to kind of like follow it through versus, um, keeping it really small. I don't think it could have survived in the, like, I thought it would be, like I said, a small, a small kind of business that would just kind of operate in the background of my life.
And I, that's hard. Like that's. That's hard to have as a business for anyone probably. Yeah.
Ashley: Yeah. I'm sure people listening can even resonate with that from the perspective of starting any business and you're like, this is going to be a small thing. It's just going to be like, my life will come first. And then getting into it and realizing that aspects of it are harder than maybe you want to imagine, or.
I think a big thing that comes up for a lot of people is when we start a business, we don't realize how much personal stuff we're going to have to confront within ourselves. Around years or belief systems we have. And I feel like that is even for myself, that probably continues to be one of the most surprising elements.
Jeni: Yeah, I like to describe that as being an entrepreneur is the greatest path to self actualization that I've ever seen. I mean, I think that you are putting yourself intentionally in a situation where over and over you're going to be challenged and you're going to have to rise to the occasion to meet those challenges.
And I think. That's a different choice than a lot of people make in life, which is to optimize for something that seems more stable or more predictable, even though I would argue being an employee and living a more conventional life is still not safe or stable. Um, that's my perspective, but, but I do think it's like, I would say I was, I wrote a, a tweet about this or an ex post about this the other day and was talking with.
My co founder Sandy and I just basically said, being a business owner in this way is like just expecting that you're going to get sucker punched a couple times a month. Like that's been my experience is like, you don't know what day it's coming. You don't know how intense it's going to be, but you got to like, you're sort of like walking out into the world and knowing that like someone's going to come up to you from the side and like punch you.
That's, that's my perspective. And I'm the first. Five times or ten times that happened. It was shocking to me and And now it's not and so I'm like gosh if I can deal Like with things that like are pretty hard on a regular basis and still be okay I feel like that's building up a resilience in myself.
That is really powerful and I'm proud of it And I'm sort of like, okay come at me like, all right What do you got?
Ashley: There is definitely that, that sense of like developing a capacity almost to move through some of those more difficult things and, and the, the sort of difficult aspects of people's negativity.
Jeni: One of the other observations I have had is that when things are going the best in the business, that's when I'm most prone to making foolish mistakes. And so I've also noticed that pattern is like when things are going really well, um, I don't tend to be as, as like vigilant about my decisions or think through the long term effects.
And so that's also been a learning for me, which I think applies to life too, is like when we take things for granted. Um, you know, it's, you, you can expect something hard might happen. So I think I'm just. I take it all as I'm showing up and I'm giving this work my full attention over the hours I decide to do that.
And I'm just going to be able to be as responsible as I can in handling kind of what comes at me. And working to have as much agency as I can in making decisions so that I don't have as many unexpected surprises. But like, entrepreneurship is not for the faint of heart.
Ashley: Yeah. It's definitely for the strong of heart.
So, I wanted us to chat a little bit about, and I have no idea where this is gonna go, so we'll see. But, uh, around the online education industry as a whole, both any, like, noticings of where it's been and where it is now, maybe where we feel like it could be going.
I, I specifically have been in the online business on education world since for the last 10 years. And I know that Marvelous started off more in the wellness. That'd be right? And when did that shift happen or that pivot happen?
Jeni: Well, I would say it's still mostly I t's still mostly present in the wellness industry, but I use wellness very broadly now. And so I think that maybe rather than pivoting, I like, we have just taken a more expansive view of what wellness is. So wellness is like financial wellness and creative wellness.
And, you know, it's not just physical wellness, it's like spiritual wellness. And I mean, that just sort of all kind of happened organically where all of a sudden they were like, Psychics on the platform, and then therapists on the platform, and then, um, you know, people selling like budgeting courses on the platform, and I just, to me, I also have that more expansive view of what wellness is.
Like, if you're helping people live better lives, Regardless of in what context, like to me, that's wellness. So I still really do consider us a wellness oriented company, um, serving wellness creators because I, I pretty much think everyone who is a creator and teaching something. And helping people on the internet kind of is helping them with one of these aspects of wellness, like someone who's teaching drumming, you know, or other music, they're bringing that beauty into someone's life.
Like it's still like, they're grounding that person in something. I, so I don't have, I guess, rather than thinking that we've pivoted out of wellness, I just think we've evolved along with the industry to be more expansive. And I think a lot of that has happened like since COVID too, is just like, we have more expansive ideas of what it means to be a healthy well person.
Ashley: Yeah, I love that. I think that's so true and resonant with, with what you've seen as the, in sort of the education, online education industry as a whole. What, what are some things that you've noticed?.
Jeni: A lot of things. Um, I have really seen a trajectory in the last couple of years towards kind of cohort experiences, people really wanting interactive experiences with their teacher or their coach, as well as with a small group of people like that has been a big trend, which I think is worth paying attention to.
I think that stand alone courses or memberships that are sort of hands off can work really well at lower price points, but once something reaches kind of, I feel like, a certain threshold in price, like people, the students, and the client side are really demanding more interaction, so more emphasis on community, too.
And I think I also, I think that I have like a perspective on like influencers versus creators that I think is fairly unique that other, like I've, I've debated people about this who don't agree with me and that's fine, but, um, you know, we, in my mind, Marvelous and Nomistream really started as a creator platform, people who have a skill or a set of expertise that they are then creating content and products around and teaching other people solving a problem through that, whether you're like a physical therapist and you're putting together, you know, a program for back pain or whatever, and that's still that will always exist.
Because people will always have problems and need experts to help them solve those problems. So that's a pretty, to me, a safe business, like a pretty stable, safe business. And that's the same kind of thing you can do in the real world and not online. You know, you know, hang up a shingle in any town and do that.
What's been interesting is to see the transition of how influencers behave. And so for I feel like for the first six or seven years online, influencers were really kind of like people who were famous for whatever reason, reality TV stars or, you know, what, whatever people who just became famous because they were a blogger or they just were like a mom influencer or something.
And those people used to be selling other people's products. They used to just be affiliates or, you know, like getting commissions to sell other people's clothing or makeup or whatever. And what I've really seen now is like those influencers and thought leaders developing their own products. And, um, and that's been really interesting because I think they're different than other creators.
I think there's like the expert creators. And then I think there's like the influencer creators. And I think the path to success for each of those kinds of people is really different. And I don't think there's. one that's really better than the other depends on what kind of business you want to have.
But I do think like growth comes much faster. Like when I'm observing people on our platform, growth comes much faster for people who have a big audience. And so those are not usually people who are like the local natural path. Like that person can charge a high price and serve people and will build a book of business and have a great business online.
But if they're, if someone's expecting to sort of have skyrocketing amounts of success and revenue, it's almost always, I think, coming, they're coming in as like what I call influencers. So people who've built a body of thought, leadership or work or fame from some other place, and then they're translating that into a set of digital offerings.
And so I think it's important for people to know where they fall. Are you like the professional slash expert who's just taking your existing business that could be offline and turning it into an online business where you have like maybe some broader reach, some more opportunities to scale? Or is it the influencer game, which is really, which really means your business is content business. And then the things that you sell are kind of an afterthought.
Ashley: Yeah, that's really interesting to think about and I think, at least for the people who listen to this podcast and are in my audience, they're probably going to fall more to the, to the first one that you're
Jeni: Yeah. Yeah, I would, I would imagine most, most everyone who I encounter is in that first group.
Ashley: but what's interesting about that is I think that they're in that first group, but they feel the pressure to be the second group.
Jeni: Yeah. And I think that's because those two things have gotten merged in the creator economy, which, which I don't think is helpful for any of us. Um, cause there are two different business models. Like I, like I said, I've just, I study this, this is my job to understand this or have a perspective on this and to see like the kinds of things.
Of marketing practices and business practices that are bringing in money. Like I analyzed that across our platform and across our client base, and it's very clear to me that there's sort of these two different camps and um, and you know, like conversion rates are really different between them. Like the people who are the experts and who are, you know, who have a skill at copywriting or at, at like, um, physical therapy or whatever.
However, those people. They're going to have high, high conversion rates compared to the other people. Like, they're going to be able to charge more compared to the influencers. You know, there's benefits to being in that camp. You can have a much smaller audience, a much more deep niche. Like, it's, um, It's great, but, but then it's a different business than running an influencer business where your job is being famous and, um, so I, yeah, I would encourage folks to really think about that because if you look at those people who have huge audiences and are selling, for the most part, smaller priced products or offers that have usually less access to them, like that's a different That's like playing a different game.
There's again, there's no right game, but that's a different game with different rules and different things to optimize for. So you're optimizing for big, shallow relationships with a big audience, you know, deep relationships with a small audience, and those are. Very different things. You can't do both really.
I don't think people do both. I don't think anyone does both. Wow.
Ashley: Yeah, that's a good point. I think what's interesting too about that is that a lot of the business coaching and business education, a lot of them over the years have taught. Around what you're kind of speaking to you with the influencer model of like, you need explosive growth in audience, audience growth, and then, you know, that maybe leads to something like.
There was the age of the webinar, the age of the five day challenge, convert those at a specific rate, sell them to into a high end course. Um, but I think that what ended up happening is that people signed up for that model. And then learned that it wasn't actually what they wanted or learned that they didn't work with their capacity or whatever, or they didn't agree with it ethically.
And now they're like, now what?
So what would you say to that, that person who thought they had to be the influencer to have a successful business? And now they don't know how to move forward. Yeah.
Jeni: I think I like to use the exercise of like imagining yourself a year from now or two years from now or However long in the future and what is your ideal? day look like? I mean, that's what I try to do for myself constantly is like, because that determines what decisions I should make today. So again, what am I optimizing for?
So if you know that you don't have capacity to like have a high end coaching program with like employees under you and coaches under you and like, you know, high ticket sales calls. Cause I was in that, you know, one of our businesses was in that space. Um, Like, don't do that. Like, wind that down and, like, think about what you want to be doing.
So for me, I, I've spent a lot of time, because I'm 10 years in also, like, I was, last month was my 10 year anniversary since starting my company. And, um, like, what do I want to be doing with my time? Because I've, I've had, I think the biggest, our team was Is 24 people. Um, it's a bit smaller than that. Now. I don't want to.
I don't want to have a 50 person company. Like I am dead clear on that so that I cannot make decisions that are going to require that. And so that's a like you've got to think about. That like, I know that the next thing I go into in the, on the business side of my life, I want to be a creator myself.
Like I want to write. I miss writing. I was an early blogger. I started blogging in 2010 before I did any of this. And I am so jealous. Like when I see bloggers who write and get to spend hours writing every day and connecting with their audience through their blogs and in the comments, like that's where I feel kind of pangs of jealousy.
So I'm like, Got it. Listening, listening, intuition. Like that's what I want to be optimizing for, at least in some part of my life. So right. Thinking in that there is a way like, okay, decide you want to go back to blogging, Jeni. What does that look like? Like you can, I can reverse engineer what that business or that lifestyle looks like.
Right. So for me, I'm like, okay, I'm going to take the steps. I'm going to commit to writing and publishing, writing in public every single day. I'm going to, you know, figure out kind of what, what my, yeah. Like pillar thought pillars are like, what am I, what are my, what is the message I want to share? Where do I want to establish myself as a thought leader and a, and a contributor in the, in the online space?
Like, I think that's super helpful. The business, then the business model flows from there. Then you just look at who has that successful business and examples of that successful business. But I think it starts with like being honest with yourself and thinking about like, what do I really. You know, if money were a no object, what would my business look like?
And then look at who has that business and do a gut check. Does that look good? Would I like to have that business, yes or no? And I think that that's, that's just being honest with yourself and it's hard. It's hard to actually let yourself desire something. and want something like that, that you don't have.
Ashley: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I think too, it opening sort of the, the windows of our imagination to know that like, there are limitless ways to get to the same result.
Jeni: Yeah, that's right. That's right. Yeah, my, um, for a few years, we've, well, actually since my daughter was five, we've had like a family summer business where we distill essential oils from like plants and trees. And we make like natural candles and body products and stuff. And there's a part that's like, I know I could go grow that business to support my family if, you know, if I want.
I mean, as that business was growing and we did it for our daughter, she wanted to do it. And anyway, she's artistic and amazing. We wanted to teach her business, but like it ended up, I was getting like crates of like pallets of glass. For the candles like delivered to my house, like, like it kind of took over our, our, you know, weekends in the summer and I was having like all of this inventory and it was, it's always like there's always essential oil smell it was like so strong if you walked in the house.
And I was like, I don't know, like, I don't know that I want this to be bigger than a summer farmers market business like I don't what, like I certainly could. I could have the capacity to grow this into a national brand or, you know, an online brand. And I just don't, like, I have to look realistically at, like, what does that mean?
Like, we need to have a warehouse and I'm not going to pour all those candles. So we have to hire some employees, like, just all the things. I'm like, I don't want to do that.
At least not right now. So it's like just being real with yourself because you can, there's so many paths available. Like there's so many ways to make money.
That's like we live in this really remarkable time where not, not that they're necessarily easy, but they can be easeful for you if they're aligned with you.
Ashley: Yeah. I love that. Do you have any other brewing predictions about online education?
Jeni: I mean, I think probably just like everyone, I think we're going to see a lot change with AI this year. I think we haven't seen anything yet compared to what, what is coming. And so I guess the prediction that I have is that a lot of the tricks, you know, are going to be short lived because people who are making money quickly or figuring out like, um, like special advantages, like AI is going to come into those spaces.
Like the people who have these kind of faceless YouTube channels. Like, I think that that's like, I think all these like get rich quick things are just going to disappear very quickly. And that the way to really have a stable, predictable business is by being a human being. And I think we have to lean into that.
But I think it's going to be super tempting for many of us like in different capacities to lean on. technology. So I think we just have to be careful of like when is it appropriate and when does it really serve us to lean on these new tools and when does it really make sense to like lean into the thing the tool still can't do or be, which is a person, a human.
Ashley: Yeah, that humanity centric work.
Jeni: Yeah. And that's, that's like, I mean, I, I am a lawyer, trained as a lawyer, and to me, the biggest skill that I have as an attorney, and that I learned, is actually being present and listening to another person. So more than any technical skill or writing or research or arguing in court or whatever, the best Most highest use of me as a lawyer is showing up and sitting across the table from someone and just letting them share something they need to share with someone who might be able to help them.
And I just, I think it's like that with everything. Like all of us, that's, that's our magical gift. And so even in this like very technical training, trained profession, it still comes back to your humanity. Like, how can I actually sit here and listen to this person? Because the robot, the robot's going to be able to write a better brief than me pretty soon, but it's not going to be able to really sit down and You know, provide that human audience to another person.
Ashley: Yeah. That, that true genuine connection. Something I've learned over the last couple of years is that one of the most profound and healing gifts is for an individual to feel genuinely heard. And you can only get that in the presence of a human, another human being. Um, And so, yeah, I mean, AI can't really take that over for me.
Jeni: Yeah, yeah, I can't for anyone. I think it can give the illusion for a little while. Like, I think, I think lonely people are gonna have, like, something to lean on a little bit, which maybe is great. Like, I, I think that AI will be better. than a mediocre person at a lot of things. I got better at writing, better at like, therapy and coaching.
Like there's lots of bad therapists and bad coaches. And I think like a well trained AI, you know, who's trained on a good coach or a good therapist is probably better than a live mediocre person. Who's like, just not really whose heart isn't in it or they aren't, they're not skilled. So I think that there's like, I think that your expertise and humanity is going to be at a premium.
Like. We all have capacity to be, um, remarkable at something like I'm a, I, I interned with Seth, Seth Godin when I first started my business and I just, he loves that word and uses that word all the time. And I really lean into that word, like show up and be remarkable. Don't be afraid of that word because you have the capacity inside you to be remarkable at many things.
And so do that. Don't, um, don't let fear stop you from kind of like fully be. embodying yourself.
Ashley: Yeah. Yeah. I love that. One of the things that I've been seeing a lot in the audience that I support is there's major information overwhelm. So one of my predictions I would say would be around. Versus throwing everything you possibly can into one educational offering and being like, look at all the value. There being more intentionally crafted educational offers.
Jeni: Yeah. I totally agree with you on that. I, I agree exactly with what you're saying. And I also think that our value as creators is being curators. It's almost like curator and creator should go together because we, you know, you and I have been in this a decade. So we like part of the Benefit of that is like looking, being able to look at skills or opportunities and being able to evaluate what is really helpful for our audience or our clients.
And um, and that's a, like everything is available for free on the internet, right? So what we can do is simplify and curate or provide order and direction so that someone doesn't have to figure it out themselves from scratch.
Ashley: Yeah. Yeah. Like the facilitating. Um, I have a, I wonder what you would say to this. Let's say that there's someone listening who actually is really skilled at their craft, but really struggles to see themselves as a teacher. What would you say to them?
Jeni: So I kind of think the answer to this. Um, and then the last piece is to show up as a teacher every day until you see yourself as one like I don't think that there is a sit back on a meditation cushion and like have a realization thing here. I think like the only way out is through and that's that's why I'm a big fan of like writing in public or working in public.
Like I said, um, some people are podcasters and some people are YouTubers or whatever. It doesn't matter. It's all the same to me, but like showing up and teach show up and teach every day. Like you, you know, you have a skill. and a set of expertise. So show up every single day and put a little piece of it out there.
And eventually I think like you see yourself as a teacher or as an expert by doing that. Like you can't convince yourself of it. And maybe for five minutes you can, but you, you know, give yourself the evidence that you are just become that. And that's available for basically free to all of us. Like write your blog every day or your, or your, you know, Instagram thread or whatever it is that you do.
Like. Make your video, whatever it is, just do it every day. And I think it's, I mean, I have found this over the years and I think I researched this at some point that it's like kind of 40 days where you develop a habit and you develop like, so I started writing, I'm like, I'm in like somewhere in the forties.
Again, just as myself, not as a brand and not as one of my businesses, but like just me publishing something every day. I'm like, I never want to stop. Like it was so hard. It took me months and months to work up to do the first one, like years, actually, because just being honest and now I don't want to stop.
It's like something I look forward to doing because it's, my heart is in it and I was stopping myself for so long and I think that's, I think that I'm not alone. in that. I think that's all of us. So if you have something that you know is powerful and can help other people, which is everyone in your audience, um, give it to them, let them have it.
You know, it's, it's honestly not about, it's not, it's, it is about us, but it's not about us because when we have something to share, it's really about the reason why we share it publicly is because we want to impact someone else's life. So like, if you start to frame what you're doing as a teacher, As I'm showing up because I know I can help people, then it's not, it stops being about you.
Ashley: Yeah, yeah, something I think that could be cool for people to pay attention to. I don't know. This just came to my mind, but, um, is notice how you are or bring to any bring up any experience where you have taught something to a child. What is your. Because I feel like when that's happening, specifically in a relaxed environment, so like, yeah, I think a relaxed environment, um, I think it kind of reveals your natural ability to teach and also what your style is, like what that kind of looks like for you.
Like, are you like, do it with me? Are you like, let me make this funny? Whatever.
I don't know, for me at least, I feel like my truest self comes out when I am with kids.
Jeni: Yeah. I think that makes a lot of sense. I think especially if you're a nurturing person, that connecting to that role I think can be really helpful. Yeah. I think in business, like I kind of look at us as having different archetypes or personas and. Mm hmm. Um, when I first was getting started, I, because I came from incubating this program at a university, I, I like really approached my business and all of the outreach I did and the blogging I was doing for the business as like being a researcher.
It's like, I can identify with that, like that's safe for me because I've been in school for so long or in a school environment for so long that that's not threatening. So I leaned into, okay, I'm going to go learn something and then I'm going to talk about it. And that's very comfortable for me. And I can reach out to experts or people that I would normally be really scared of to ask their advice or input or invite them to be a guest on my show or whatever, because I could be like, I'm researching this topic and I love to know what you think.
And that was an easy relationship for me other people like you like you said is like there's people who are comedians and who like they they can just like naturally point the eye point out the irony or the funny parts of things so I think like not everyone's going to identify as a researcher like I did but for me and I don't necessarily identify as that anymore but I did for probably the first six years in business and that like That was my kind of internal persona.
I never really talked about it, but that was how I showed up every day is I'm, I'm learning and researching and sharing what I learn. And that was easy. So I would just encourage people to like, really just kind of like figure out what is your personality type and how are you most comfortable? Like when you're with your friends.
Who, what role are you in that group of friends? Or, you know, who are you to your best friend? And sometimes you might need to ask them, like, maybe it's hard to identify it in yourself. So it's also like a powerful exercise, like pick three or four people, like a boss, former boss, or like some of your closest friends or your sister.
Ask those people, like, you know, when you think of me, what are the words that come to mind? Like, what do you think my biggest skills are? My best skills? Like, really a llow yourself to hear it from the people. Yeah.
Ashley: Yeah, it's so good. That's a really good takeaway for people to implement and I really resonate with it because when I started my business I knew that I I was confident that I had a strong skill set in community gathering and optimism from my previous generations And so I knew how to mobilize people but I didn't understand and I did not feel confident in teaching anything or like coaching anything like that my first Digital product in 2000 and 2013, I think was, I felt I was confident in that community gathering. And so I partnered with a coach and we delivered like a seven month program where my role is to facilitate the community aspect. And it's actually the thing that like launched my business because we made. Over 5, 000 that helped me, uh, and then I was like, how do I do the skin?
And then really struggled, but that it gave me that initial boost of confidence of like, it's possible.
This work is possible. And what I think my encouragement with that is, is I just fully owned that role until I could grow into other ones,
But by fully owning it, it gave me the momentum and movement to start to grow into other skill sets.
Jeni: Yeah. Because how would you ever have those skill sets if you've never done those things? You know, I think that that's where the grace needs to come into entrepreneurship. Like our team grew, especially after 2020, it grew fast. Um, because everyone online and I had no experience managing people really like other than my developers like so I feel really I've been doing that for a long time I've been like sort of managing the product and figuring out how to be kind of a technical product manager.
Super comfortable. Was very uncomfortable the first couple years, but like grew into that role over time. And then I had all of a sudden 20 plus people in the company, 24 people. And I had no idea how to manage 24 people. And I was really hard on myself for like a year and a half. And I was like, something is wrong.
I don't, I should know how to do this. This should be easier for me. And then I've just, I've had some coaching in the last six months, really six months or a year where it's like, why on earth? Yeah. Would you have known how to do that? You know, like, how, if you've never Managed all these people with these hierarchies and rules.
And, you know, somebody like you have enough people, like, especially during COVID, like somebody is always sick or somebody's family members, always sick, or somebody's always need needing something like things that are not what I'm used to doing and, and. Like, how would anyone know that? And I just think like everything and like, there's so many things in, in like the financial side of running a business and the taxes and like, how on earth would any, would any of, you know, this until you have to learn it.
So I think that, uh, yeah, what you're saying makes so much sense. Lean into the thing that you know how to do, and then like over time you're going to have to take on more and more roles, wear more hats, and then just expect to be kind of bad at most of those things until you learn how to do them. And then you, and then you can get, develop competence.
And some things you'll be naturally good at and it will surprise you, but you don't know. And like, you should have no expectation that you're just like, by being A successful entrepreneur, you're going to be great at all of the aspects of being an entrepreneur. Yeah.
Ashley: I love that, that, that grace aspect and also the, like, how can you sort of get comfortable with being uncomfortable when you're learning these new roles and pieces and I've even had that with this podcast. I was like, I, yeah, I'd edit.
Jeni: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I just, that's also, we're so lucky that we're in a position to be learning all the time. Like I, I just think about someone who's in a job for 30 years. I mean, how limited of like kind of a, you know, maybe you get really, really good at something and you have, you know, great relationships and stability and all those 401k, well, Canadians, but not Canadian, not for Canadians, but Americans have all these like retirement accounts, all these things, but you just, you're never going to, you know, you're never going to be like thrown into the deep end hundred things in a year and, And so, like, that's part of the gift of entrepreneurship too, right, is, is, like, I think that keeps our brains younger, I think it keeps us more nimble, like, we're more adaptable, you know, when the apocalypse happens, we're going to be, like, leading the charge and figuring out the answers.
Like, I just think we've got, like, it's a really great gift to give yourself. Like the opportunity to fail all the time.
Ashley: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it really, it really promotes a solution focused mindset.
Jeni: Yeah, which is life. Like we, like until really recently, that's what we all had to do as humans. You know, I, I think like there's just been really since, I don't know, maybe since world war two, if I had to, I'm not a historian, but if like my understanding is like before that things were pretty hard for everybody pretty much on the planet.
All like, there was a lot of hardship for a lot of reasons. And you know, we have Just in like a couple of generations. Developed for people who are privileged enough to live in wealthy countries, like a level of stability that I think humans never really had before. And so we're wired for challenge. Like I believe that this is, that's why people, you know, do dangerous things.
That's why people go bungee jumping or what take big risks. Like because we. There's something that we need from that. And to me, entrepreneurship gives you that. Like you get, I get the thrill, the thrill of being alive constantly because I'm challenged and, and a little bit scared. And it's kind of a safe, it's kind of a safe way to have all those experiences.
Ashley: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I'm gonna be reflecting on that. That's really interesting to, to notice within myself. Well, thank, Jenny, thank you so much for this whole convo. Uh, it's been such a delight. And is there anything left unsaid within you?
Jeni: No, Ashley, I just, I appreciate the conversation and I don't usually have conversations like this on podcasts. So thank you for creating the space for this. I think we need spaces to have these conversations. And just if anyone, my, my just message to everyone listening is just, if you feel called to make something in the world that doesn't exist, please listen to that because It will be really painful for you if you don't.
That's been my observation. And so even though it's hard or uncomfortable, like that's your truth. There's a reason you feel called to make something in the world and just, you know, give yourself that gift.
Mmm, beautiful.