Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Opinions expressed in this episode are personal. They do not necessarily reflect the views of this streaming platform.
[00:00:11] Speaker B: Good day, wonderful people, and welcome to another edition of let's Be Diverse. I am your host, Andrew Stout. This episode is dedicated to all my loved ones who supported me through this journey. Those who have left us will always be in our hearts and will never be forgotten. Today, our topic is.
Today, our topic is what leadership didn't prepare us for the lessons you learn in real time. Our guest today is a cool human. Her name is Stephanie Gross. Stephanie, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for joining us today.
[00:00:41] Speaker A: Thank you so much for having me. Andrew, I'm very excited to be here talking with you today.
[00:00:44] Speaker B: I'm excited to have you. How are things going with you? What's. What's. What's going on in your world? Give me the tea, give me the deets. Give me it all. What's going on?
[00:00:52] Speaker A: Well, things are going great. I've been an entrepreneur for 18 years, and there's been a lot of ups and downs over the years. Just since the beginning of the year, I really did a large pivot in what we're doing, and I just feel like I'm in this. People talk about the flow, you know, when you're in. In the right path and things are just. It's just like all these interconnecting pieces that I've been trying to build over the years are just locking into place. Yeah. It's been really fun, including meeting you today. So I'm excited to be here and talk about what I'm doing and what we're doing and see if we can have fun with our audience today.
[00:01:24] Speaker B: Absolutely. That is so awesome. And glad to hear that things are going well. And congratulations on the entrepreneurship journey for 18 years. That's. That's super awesome. And that means that things are going well and you're successful at what you're doing and. And so, yeah, not really stubborn.
[00:01:41] Speaker A: It could be just.
Yeah.
[00:01:44] Speaker B: Well, I'm anxious to hear the lessons that you've learned along the way here as well. So that's super cool. Before we begin and get to the nuts and bolts of this conversation here, I always have a fun thought, thought provoking question that I asked my guests to get things going. Are you ready for yours today?
[00:01:59] Speaker A: Well, yeah, I thought we were going to do that at the end, so.
[00:02:01] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:02:02] Speaker A: Throw it at me. Throw it at me, Andrew.
[00:02:05] Speaker B: So your question is, what do you value more comfort or growth and why?
[00:02:10] Speaker A: Ooh, that's a really tough question. Very thought provoking. Very true.
I think I'm overthinking this whole question, but one of it's. It's interesting because one of the keywords that I've really been focused on for my clients is comfort. And actually part of one of the slogan, if you will, that we just came up with for the business is using the intelligence of wool. I'll get into what we do to make life a little more comfortable so people can tackle what life asks of them. That's my mission, is to empower people to do their best, do their best work and just find their happiness and their joy and success by uplifting and making them more comfortable to go and chase those dreams. So comfort is a very big part of what I'm doing. And I also say a lot, you're either growing or you're dying. Dying. And if you're not expanding what you're doing, you know, in comfort, being uncomfortable pushes us past our limits to go. And, you know, being too comfortable is just as dangerous as being stagnant, you know, and so I just find those words really pair off of each other as both of them are great, and both of them are just like our greatest strength is our greatest weakness. I think that both of those words can mean really different things. And, yeah, I love them and I don't like them at the same time. Is that a very strange answer?
[00:03:26] Speaker B: No, it's a very good answer. I love that you. That you took a little bit of thought into that and you thought before you answered. So that's. That's great. And you're absolutely right. Comfort and growth are two interesting words. And I agree with you when you say comfort. Sometimes people get too comfortable in what they're doing.
[00:03:42] Speaker A: How about this comfortable growth? I want to push past, just past the comfort to be in that growth stage. So you're not. So, you know, I. I've been actively wanting to engage with more podcasts, and one of the podcasts that I was actually invited to do was, I think it was something about being. It was a millionaire thing, like how to be a Millionaire, millionaires club sort of thing. And that's not my goal. My goal isn't to go out and sell as much as I can and be a millionaire living on a yacht or, you know, this is about making the world a better place. And, you know, and like I said, empowering people and collaborating with people and having growth within that sector. And with that, I want to be. Go to sleep at night knowing that I've done something good and not just milking the planet for whatever I can get. So yeah, I think that it all goes to together, you know, and, and it's all about balance and symbiosis and you know, collaboration and helping one another.
[00:04:34] Speaker B: To get us started here. Who is Stephanie and what really drives you to do the work that you do?
[00:04:40] Speaker A: I've already guess I, I touched on that. So I started the business 18 years ago as I mentioned and we work with merino wool exclusively. I'm very passionate about reducing our global textile waste. It's. It's one of the largest contributors to pollution on our planet that not everybody talks about. And I'm very passionate about low waste sustainability. Like I said, making the world a better place and, but actually taking action, not just sitting at home hoping, you know, and, and feeling frustrated by it. So that's always been a mission of mine right from day one really. I've just grown up very thrifty. I'm a serial entrepreneur if you will. There's a special thing that people have and I guess I just have always had it. Even girl guy cookies like there used to. If you read so many books you get these little puffballs or whatever. In elementary school I'm like very driven for the prize. The puzzle games and all those sorts of things. Life game for me and the game of life. And I'm just being really cognizant of what success means for me this year especially and like you already said, pausing and thinking about what I'm doing instead of just being reactionary to things. So that's a big part of who I am at this point as I approach my 50s. You know, you grow and learn pushing paths of comfort. So right now, so the business that I, I have that I've been doing for 18 years, my first two hires are still with me which we'll touch on a little bit as well. So they've been with me for 16 years and I'm very proud of that. I'd also validates that I'm a decent human being that my staff stayed with me this long and we still like each other, which is fantastic. And so we make custom merino wool clothing for all ages, all genders, all sizes. We're very inclusive with our sizing and approach to textiles and put big pockets on anything and very customized and we support people all over the planet really. We're E commerce but most of our clients are in the United States and Canada and we make sweaters and hats and mitts and scarves and we're also focused on cloth diapers that's part of the wheelhouse of what we make. And sporting the sporty people. I just said sporting, like go team. I'm obviously not a very sporty person the way that I said that. But people that like to hike and backpack and camping and wool has so many magical properties. It's. It's like I said in my little intro there, that using the intelligence of wool and wool has the oldest textile. It was the original textile. It's the only textile in Minecraft, if you know about Minecraft. And so I'm really passionate about using, embracing the heritage and the old ways of doing things and bringing it into the modern world in an effective way. That's, I guess, me in a nutshell. I'm also very enthusiastic about everything I'm doing. So passionate, enthusiastic, loud. Those are some good keywords for me.
[00:07:16] Speaker B: Well, I love the passion that you have and I think that you have to have the passion for what you do because if you don't, then I think you're going to struggle with it. So I think that's key right there to have the passion. And I love when you talk about low waste. Sustainability is also key. And you saying you're a decent human because you've had staff members that. With you a long time.
So that's, that's key right there. I don't hear that too often that people are working for the same employer these days for 16 years. So that says a lot about you as a leader and the things that you're doing for your, for your team members. So that's super cool.
[00:07:49] Speaker A: So I.
[00:07:50] Speaker B: Cool. So I commend you about that.
[00:07:51] Speaker A: Thank you. And when I heard about what you're doing with this podcast, I really wanted to share the way that we ran the operation and because I think that it's not the norm and just to show that it is a way of running a business, being sustainable and successful in what we chose to do and it is possible to do things a different way. And just sharing that, that story because I think it's empowering really just to talk about. I'm excited to share again. I'm excited. I'm excited about everything all the time.
[00:08:20] Speaker B: When you're talking about yourself and your business, that you have two staff members, what I wanted to know was when you first stepped into a leadership role, what expectations do you think most people have? What did you have and how did reality differ?
[00:08:35] Speaker A: What a great question. And I, I think some people are given the title of leadership and some people just grow into that role or just, just Take it by the reins. I didn't even really recognize that I was in a leadership role until much later. I'm just a naturally just fall into that role. And I recognize as I'm approaching my 50s, one of the things that I like to talk about is, is knowing your strengths and knowing your weaknesses. And I think a good leader will know that about themselves and then be able to recognize that.
And if you can harness that, uplifting the strengths and supporting the challenges so that people feel comfortable to struggle so that they can ask for help to put them in a position of success rather than constant challenges over and over and doing that for yourself as well. And that's where I find my leadership role comes into.
And I've always had that. Even my first job was at Dairy Queen. And like I said, I made it a game. And the drive thru people were like the special people, if you will, because you had to be quick in the drive through through. And I loved being in that space and being able to ask for help. And I don't know, I just, it's just always been a really comfortable place for me to just have a leadership space and people following even though I would sometimes do it quietly. I was very, very shy when I was younger, but even in high school I had a group of friends and I was the one that usually hosted the sleepovers and led us to do things. And it was just a really comfortable space for me. So then when I fell into this role, I started the business. I didn't intend to hire anybody. My first hire actually asked me for the. And I said to her I, I, she was a friend that we were doing some babysitting, sharing. We weren't super close at that point, but we liked each other. And she, yeah, she just said, I can see that you're busy. I don't like my job. Can I come and work for you? And I said, are you nuts? I, I'm not even paying myself. How can I afford to hire you? But she came in and she took a hat off my head that I did not want to wear. And I recognized that I was more successful, I was happier. I work better in a team. And it really helped me recognize my weaknesses that I don't finish jobs well. I don't like mundane bo like to work in a team. I do not like working by myself. And so she came in and she started doing the cutting. So I was doing the sewing and she was doing the cutting. And I've never, I barely touched a pair of scissors since because I don't like doing it, and she's better at it than I am. And I didn't find that demoralizing. Some people that when somebody's better than them, they're a leader, and then somebody under them is better than them, they feel challenged or they don't like it. I love it. I want the people around me to be better than me at all these things. Like, that's great.
And I think that that's a key part of being a good leader, is not feeling threatened. That's a word I was threatened by that and empowering people to. To do that. And to the point that I'll even make fun of myself. It's like, oh, no, I'm getting the scissors out. Who's gonna come and take them away?
[00:11:22] Speaker B: So, yeah, I love when you say she took a hat off of you, which is key right there.
And I love when you're talking about that, hey, you know, I don't know if I could pay you. I might have been paying myself. And then she came in and started doing things that you didn't like. You mentioned the word growth before, and I think that that's part of the growth that you realize as you were becoming a leader that you were able to do other things for your business that you didn't realize that a maybe that were more important or you didn't have time to do them because you were cutting and sewing where now you can do stuff like be on a podcast today and promote what you're doing and promote yourself as a. A business owner and a leader rather than cutting. And not that it's bad to be doing that, but you have some people now that are able to do that. And I commend you for realizing that it was time to do that and learning and growing throughout the process.
[00:12:24] Speaker A: Well, it wasn't just that I realized that. It was more that she showed me that and I thanked her for it and I did make sure that I paid her. You know, I said, okay, I can give you one shift a week like that. That's it. Like, I didn't over commit. And I. One of the things that I. I' very cognizant of is my team's time and money. And they're here, they're. They're giving me their time and I'm giving them money. Like that is the transaction that's happening. And all the rest of it is this. The sprinkles of spice that go on top of it. The golden spice, you know, and the respect and all those sorts of things. And then doing a good job. And. But at the end of the day, it's money and time, and so I don't mess with that. And like, these people are my friends, and I make sure that I keep those. Those roles really separated and very clear. So when we're. When we're at work, we're at work, and then sometimes we'll have fun and everything, but at the same time, we know what our roles are. It's very well defined. And I made sure that they. They get paid before I do for sure. And so. And I have hired more people over the years, and some people, it's ebbed and flow depending on things, but the two first hires are still with me. And I think that that speaks volumes to. To what we did. And so I'm going to parlay into that.
One of the things that I been really. Because right now I'm. I'm pivoting out. I'm changing the whole business model, which is the third time that I've really done it with what this success mean. And as I look back, I realize what I did, and now I'm really just qualifying it all, so defining what success is. And so now my definition of success is different because my whole life has changed. Back then wanted to.
My son was born. My husband and I, we decided to have children. We had a son and then we had another child. And during that is when I started the business. It was bootstrap kitchen table, putting a little food on the table.
We weren't struggling to survive on my husband's income, but supplementing was definitely more than just a want.
We're young couple. And so I started the business just to make a little bit of extra income while also being there for the kids we chose. We talked before we had our kids, what our roles would be. And he was to be the primary breadwinner. And nothing to do with genders. It had to do with what we wanted with their lives. His education, he's an engineer. His career was definitely more defined than mine. And I wanted to have a business too. That sounded like a really fun game to me. Me. And I also wanted to be there for my kids and. And raise them and be available for them. So that was a decision that we made together. And I think that the whole women's rights movement was about just that, about giving the opportunity of choice to people, to relationships, to women, to couples to decide what they want for their lives to be. And there's nothing wrong with doing anything, like whatever you choose. Like, I support the choice and that's what we chose. The more traditional man going to work, women staying home, looking after the kids. And.
And then. So the first two hires were in the same situation. They're married and they had kids and they wanted to be there for their kids. And having a job that was able to work around that definition of success. I wanted to be there for the assemblies, I wanted to be there for the sick days. I wanted to be there for the goods and the bads and so did they. So the work opportunity that I had for them was without question involving that. So like Becky, she the first hire, she has had a 2 and a 4 year old. I had a 2 and a 4 year Old. She brought her kids to work. We didn't have to pay for childcare. Those four kids learned how to potty train in my house to learn how to talk. They had their first days of school through my house, they had their sick days at my house. And she knew that if she had trouble with whatever challenges that the kids came first. And so that really indelibly. I mean, they're dedicated to this business and what we're doing because of that relationship. And it was hourly, it wasn't salary. So if they didn't work, they didn't get paid. You know, there's a whole time and money both ways with that they were there and they're present and then when they weren't there, they weren't present and it was okay, you know. And I find a lot of people are stressed with that work life balance and then they feel like they should be at work or they should feel like they should be at home with their kids when they're sick and they're feeling guilty and nobody's effective anywhere. So it just created a really great ecosystem of effectiveness and time management that allowed everybody to just be present where they needed to be at the moment that they needed to be. And it was a beautiful thing without stress. So I just think that. And it's a different way of running a business and it's not viable for everything, but it was certainly, it worked great for us. And yeah, it was, it was, you know, we were like that until, let's see, it was 2010, until 2018, pretty much that we were running like that. And then we moved into commercial space. Kids were in middle school and high school and now they have pivoted into going off to university. And that's where the whole business model is. We're working full time now, now, and we're able. The definition of success is more the exit strategy of like, what's the next 10 years going to be? And how can we take this business that we worked so hard to develop so many great amazing structures and, and processes that we can bring in some youth to take over for us to sell the business to? I don't know what the next 10 years are going to look like, but it definitely does not look like the last 10 years.
[00:17:24] Speaker B: So, Stephanie, you talked earlier about knowing your strengths and knowing your weaknesses. How do you think or how should leaders manage self doubt or uncertainty specifically in high pressure situations?
[00:17:37] Speaker A: Another great question. The way the thing that I have found personally is to pause and think. I see people sometimes react to a situation and then they react the same way and it feels like the right thing to do. They follow their guts and they don't realize or understand why. They keep on having the same things happen to them over and over and over again when they're trying and working so hard. And I think if you can pause and think about why and just witness your feelings, allow them to just be present and then take action on the way that your, your mind is thinking about it without so much emotion behind it, it can make it a lot easier to, to handle. And it's okay to pause. Like even when you asked me the first question, I paused for, for a few seconds. I mean, this is, this is my third, third podcast that I've done and I am very much enjoying the whole process with you and as well as what I've been doing, this is being recorded and going to be out on the Internet forever.
And I don't know what the future is going to bring. And maybe five people will listen, 100 people listen, or maybe we go off into the stratosphere or something and this becomes some sort of a thing, I don't know. So I'm just very cognizant of whatever is being said and the message being portrayed is there forever. So I'm pausing strategically and thinking about what is the message that I want to portray. And it's not in like a manipulative sort of way. It's just in a owning the words, the power that you have with your words and the message that you're speaking. So and I try to do that. I practice that in every. And I think that having a business or just it all ties in together, especially as you get older. It's not just a job, especially when it's a business that you're running. It's. It's your whole life and trying to, or practicing. I'm Taking those diminutive words out of my language, practicing, pausing, thinking, witnessing your reaction, your emotions, and then, and then responding with purpose. And I know those sound like lofty words and everything and you hear people talking about those things, but if you really practice it and calm down, it's, it's amazing because I am not a calm person and I can be very reactionary and explosive, not angrily, but more enthusiastically. I can be impulsive and the self doubt isn't too much in there. Actually one of my problems is that I'll just jump into things and then, and I'm like, whatever happens, ice, clothes, head first, can't lose, like I'll just figure it out.
And then it's gotten me into trouble. So I do the other thing of like a high pressure situation I'm pretty good in. It's, it's when I make a mistake with that high pressure situation because I went too far, so I need to reel myself back sometimes.
[00:19:59] Speaker B: When you said the message that you portray and the power of your words, I lit up because when we're a leader of a team, the things that we say, the messages that we portray and the power of our word are so important to those people underneath us because they're going to be reactionary to those words. So if you see something that is positive and you are pausing before you think and you're, you're, you're witnessing not your feelings, but their feelings as well, that's going to be powerful for not just you, but for them as well.
[00:20:35] Speaker A: I think especially in this day and age, people always want to feel heard and seen and valued. And I feel like our civilization in general now is feeling quite isolated. You and I are both in a room by ourselves and across the country in different provinces and having a conversation, which is great. A lot of people are just keyboard warriors or they're on their computers talking and on their phones. You go out to dinner and you see people not even talking, they're just on their phones and we're isolated. So words have even more meaning now than they, they did before, I think. And yeah, I think it's very, very important. And which leads me to the, the why that I've been listening to Simon Zenick and I take all these pieces of information with a grain of salt. I do like a lot of the messaging there and I think if you're very clear with your why, your purpose in your household, your, your life, your, Your business, it makes it so much easier, less decision fatigue for your team and for yourself, if you know why you're doing things and what you're doing, then the answers are so much easier.
The celery test. If you don't know that, you can look it up. Are you familiar with that little anecdote? So if you know that you're running a health food store, then the celery is probably better. Ch chocolate as an example. Right. So my team knows that we, we make very high quality clothing and if somebody on the team makes a mistake, we all find pride in catching the mistake before it goes out the door.
So if one person like Becky always does her quality control, so if she finds an error with something, she will just go to the person who could fix the problem even if they didn't make the problem to repair it, replace it or whatnot. And it's like, thank you for catching that before it went out the door.
There's no, why did that even happen? Or why did the first person make the mistake? And if it's repeating, it's okay. Our process needs to be updated because that maybe shouldn't have happened. So you're not feeling supported in your role. We're too busy. There's a problem systematically because I trust the team and they need to feel trusted. So the problems aren't laying necessarily on the people. It takes the pressure off. So people aren't hiding problems from you as a leader. I think that that's really important, especially praising. Good for you for finding an error. I'd rather we know about it before it gets to the customer so we can repair it.
[00:22:44] Speaker B: Absolutely. Stephanie, in your leadership journey, what's one thing about workplace culture and organizational life that surprised you?
[00:22:54] Speaker A: What surprised me? I think, my gosh, I know you gave me this question just before we sat down and I didn't get to the point of reading at all with my impulsiveness. So what is one of the things that surprised me? I think at the end of the day, business is a business and a cog is a cog. And at the end of the day, it doesn't matter how big the company is or how small it is. At the end of the day, it all can be be filtered down to all being very similar things. It doesn't matter if you're a service industry that you're fixing vehicles or you're manufacturing things, or you're dealing with people on a day to day basis. At the end of the day, it all can be trickled and filtered down to very similar actions that need to happen. And the culture, I think, is one of the most important things that an organization has, and it drives us. And just one. One issue that can happen, like one bag egg or one bad or negative thought can just decimate everything. And the smaller the business, it is like a larger percentage, but even just in a big company, like, that whole culture can just decimate a whole business. And, like, if people are scared to speak up, if people are scared to say something, it's like 100 people could know that there's a problem. But if they're scared to say something because of the workplace structure and the culture, then it can destroy the business just as much as it being one person having a nasty comment in the break room. So I think that that transcends all businesses and the culture through leadership. The head of the beast is the most important thing to have that culture really clear. And I think it's something that's very easy for companies to miss because we're so busy with their head down working that it can get ignored and not recognizing how important it is.
[00:24:35] Speaker B: I'll go back to earlier when you were talking about the first woman who started working with you who said, hey, I can help you with this or whatever. Can you hire me? And you were so open to looking at that or considering it. And now I don't know if you would have been able to answer those things or have that thought process if you were just doing things on your own. I think having her there and having other team members there open your eyes to all these things and what is important. So maybe culture was important to you when you were. When you were running everything on your own. But I can probably say that it's probably even more important to you now that you have people that you were leading on a daily basis.
[00:25:19] Speaker A: Absolutely. And I think I just. It was. It's just part of who I am, and I felt very fortunate. So when I was listening to this, it's like some of these. These podcasts and Simon Seneca, et cetera, et cetera. I remember I have been working on my mental and physical health, so I listen to podcasts while I'm working out, and I was sitting at the gym, and I was literally crying in the corner because I thought, man, I. What he's talking about doing or what some of them are talking, like, I did that, and I did that naturally. And I just felt so much pride in how I built the business and what I've done and the success that we had together. And, like, Christy's been on the team for quite a lot of years. She's like, whatever you say, boss. Boss. I'll follow you, boss. But she just says it with so much confidence. Like, the team feels so confident in my ability to lead them and where we're going and the ethics behind it all. And I've always said to them, like, we've been running very, like, lean and like, the goal wasn't to be this massive megalith of a business. It was to be present for our families and be available and put some food on the table. And then also within the whole ecosystem of low waste and doing something good with our customers, like, that was the success. And now we're pivoting into, like, let's grow and, like, scale what we're doing. And we been through, like, Covid was rough. Like, it was rough on us. And then most of our clients are in the United States and the tariff situation, the instability of the marketplace, you know, it's. It's been really challenging. There's been a lot of ups and downs over the years, and we've gone through a lot of changes. But the team trusted me, that I had their best interest at heart and that I will take care of them and that I will make sure that, you know, I have not missed a single payroll and that if we are. No when we are successful, because I know, I feel it in my bones that things are going to, you know, pick up. They will be taken care of, you know, and so if I'm being successful, they're being successful, and it is a team. And I think that that's just really, really important for what we're doing. And then it makes it easier to. To go for it, too. I don't know if that makes sense.
[00:27:13] Speaker B: It does. And I love your mindset because everyone's going to follow that mindset. You have that positivity. Things are going to be, well, things are going to go awesome. We're going to create an important, an amazing culture. We're going to work hard and we're going to build. Build something that's going to be memorable and that's going to be sustainable. That's what you're building. And I think that people under you, it sounds like they're ready, willing and able to follow suit of whatever you have built and what you're trying to build. So that's amazing that you've done that.
[00:27:42] Speaker A: Thank you. And, and just to. To really do a little summary on that, is that we're a small business, so it's easier to ebb and flow with some of these things. And, and I do recognize that I do find some of the SMEs like the small medium businesses out there, there's a, there are some, some that may be leery of hiring women that are young in the child rearing ages that they might get pregnant and they might need time off to look after their kids. There's also a lot especially and I love it with the younger generation coming through more that the parental leave and the men are a lot more involved than they ever were in history of mankind. And I think that that's fantastic. So being scared to hire somebody that might be in that situation. If you treat your team like a team and allow them to be there for their family, do you think that somebody is going to be able to lure them away for that dollar an hour to go across the street if they have that work life balance and they're treated like a human? Like you can get that attrition and people quitting are leaving or not caring. Like having a devalued staff member that hates their job because they aren't able to go to their kids assembly for school to congratulate them on something, it demoralizes them. So they don't want to work as hard and they don't want to necessarily stay. So having a workplace that supports that and genuine supports it, like I'll even message my staff like one of them lives out of town a little bit, the roads are icy. So please don't rush into work and if you don't feel safe, go home again. I mean it. And they know I mean it because I don't want, you know, I want them to feel safe and protected and they work hard and they know their job.
You can have a dedicated team and there are. And I think that, you know, during COVID a lot of people were, you know, we were working from home and there are some people that took that opportunity and no, they didn't have to commute. They had more available time to be with their families and to work. So they were more effective in both their life and their job. There's other people that just took it as an opportunity to do nothing, to be lazy, to, you know, watch TV and have naps and not do their job because nobody was babysitting them, you know, and it, it filtered pretty quickly. And I think a lot of employers recognize that very quickly. And I think the majority actually really shined because they were able to be there for their families. And I think it's just, it's a new way of looking at working and that work life balance and, and I think that more employers should really be looking at that because it makes for happier staff, it makes for a better team, and it makes for happier families and less stress and more dedication on all parts. It takes commitment, right?
[00:30:10] Speaker B: For sure it does. Before we wrap up today, Stephanie, what is one key takeaway that you'd like our listeners to take away from this episode?
[00:30:18] Speaker A: Well, I think that's what I just wanted to make sure I said what I just said. So I guess what I just said that it's possible to do that. And if you're in a leadership role empowering your people, I always think that, that it's. It's good to. To shine the good of your. Your team of like, wow, like, that was amazing what you just did. And not being scared of like a good leader knows that educating the team out, the leader out of the job is a good thing to do. Some people want to retain their knowledge and not share because you might be a leader without being the employer. You know, you could have a leadership role within the business. So if you're training yourself out of a job means that you're training yourself into another job or another position, and it's not something to be scared of, supporting your team, to uplift, like, go be the A team in the. In the company. I think it's a. It's a really a good thing to do. And that culture within a sub team is also important. So I think. I don't know, I just like making the world like I said, and I genuinely do it like, you know, having a nice smile at the door, like holding a door open for somebody and like after you, or when somebody holds the door, thank you. Or crossing the street and saying thank you and just being pleasant to be around and doing that at work and life and. And spreading some joy. And I know it sounds really frilly, but I think it's as beautiful. So that's how I want to live my life and I'm doing it. Own your space at the table. I think that's walking with confidence. Yeah.
[00:31:33] Speaker B: That is amazing. I love that. Anybody that's listening, my call to action today would be to, like, share and follow this episode. Stephanie, I wanted to take the time to. To thank you for. For coming on today. Your strength and passion is amazing. Very inspiring. You just have. Have such a creative and nurturing way of running your business and running your team. So I admire that. And I just also love your vulnerability because I think that it's important to have a little bit of vulnerability as a leader. So I admire that. So thank you for coming on today. I just admire all the great things that you're doing. So keep up the good work.
[00:32:12] Speaker A: I really appreciate that. And thank you for the space today.
As you can tell, I'm just talking about our story and I barely even touched on my business. But if anybody is looking at some amazing wool products, I would love to talk with you as well and book a call or consultation. It's free. And if you want to nerd out about wool with me, I'd love to chat with you.
[00:32:30] Speaker B: Well, on behalf of myself and my guest, Stephanie, I'd like to take the time to thank you for listening today. And until next time, be safe. And remember, everyone, if we all work together, we can accomplish anything.
[00:32:47] Speaker A: Sam, You have been listening to let's Be Diverse with Andrew Stout. To stay up to date with future content, hit Subscribe.
