Take the Leap and Grow Your Business with 95-98% Satisfaction: One Woman’s Story of Taking Control and Not Looking Back.
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When Dr. Barnsley Brown, an outspoken female professor, discovers the abuse of power of a potential tenure track professorship and a cheating partner on the same day, she courageously turns them both down and starts her own business with only $1,000 and ‘a lot of boobs, not a lot of balls’ to face the big moments of failure and discouragement that come with it.
“It was just really a moment where the thing that I had prepared for with 25 years of education… I found that it wasn’t going to be the fit I wanted, and I wanted to be 95% to 98% happy in what I did, and I wanted to use all my skills. I didn’t want to have to pigeonhole myself into one little scholarly rabbit hole. I was never good at that.” – Dr. Barnsley Brown
Dr. Barnsley Brown is a self-proclaimed steel magnolia who taught at Wake Forest University, Duke and UNC Chapel Hill before launching her coaching business, Spirited Solutions. She now helps big hearted business owners double, triple, quadruple, or more their income and impact.
On this episode of the Live. Love. Engage. podcast:
- Dr. Barnsley Brown’s experience of leaving a tenure-track professorship offer to start her own business.
- Reiki as a tool for physical healing and business growth.
- The power of setting a timeline and clearly defining goals to achieve success.
- The tragic lesson Barnsley learned that changed how she handles enrollment conversations.
- What questions to ask a coach to see if they’re a good fit for you and your business
Connect with Dr. Brown
Website: Spirited-Solutions.com
Quick Links:
- Join the Live. Love. Engage. Community
- Intuitive Business Coaching
- The Live. Love. Engage. Book
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TRANSCRIPT
Gloria Grace Rand
00:00:00
You’re listening to the Live Love Engage podcast on today’s show, why it pays to invest in your professional growth. Stay tuned. I am Gloria Grace Rand, founder of The Love Method and author of the number one Amazon bestseller, Live Love Engage – How to Stop Doubting Yourself and Start Being Your Yourself. In this podcast, we share practical advice from a spiritual perspective on how to live fully, love deeply, and engage authentically so you can create a life and business with more impact, influence, and income. Welcome to Live. Love. Engage.
00:00:47
Namaste. I am Gloria Grace Rand, and so happy to be with you again for another edition of Live Love Engage, and especially when I get to talk with interesting and amazing people on the show, and today is no exception. I am delighted to welcome Dr. Barnsley Brown to Live. Love. Engage.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:01:13
Thank you, Gloria. It’s so wonderful to be here with your folks and just to share a powerful message with some strategies that people can implement. So exciting.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:01:24
Absolutely. Well, let me let folks know the few out there who may not have heard of you before, so we’ll enlighten them today. So Dr. Brown is a self proclaimed steel magnolia in a long line of strong Southern women who taught at Wake Forest University, Duke and UNC Chapel Hill before launching Spirited Solutions Professional Speaking and Coaching over 22 years ago. And she now helps big-hearted business owners double, triple, quadruple or more, their income and impact in her Make It Happen Mastermind group coaching program. Get Results Now laser coaching and transformational Reiki trainings. I almost got to say treatments, but kind of be that way a little bit. And for those of you who are listening to the podcast and you don’t see, she also calls herself a kickass coach. So maybe I’ll ask you about that in a little bit. But I always do like to start off talking about our guest’s background a little bit, and I thought we’d start with especially what led you to make the transition from speaking at or well, teaching, teaching at universities to launching your own coaching company?
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:02:42
I love the question, Gloria, and it’s, it’s a powerful question because actually, you know, I would say that at the university, I was about 75% satisfied. I mean, I really enjoyed it. I really enjoyed the young people. It was mostly young people at the schools where I taught, and I enjoyed the scholarship, the reading, the publishing, the presenting. But the thing I didn’t enjoy so much were well, the things I didn’t enjoy were the ways that women faculty were treated, for example, especially outspoken women faculty, of which I was one. I also didn’t appreciate the way that the canons were formed to, and I taught literature and women’s studies, so I did not appreciate the fact that the writers I considered central were considered marginal. And I just got to a point, really, I reached a point, Gloria, where I had been made what would have been the tenure track professorship offer of my dreams. And on the very day I found out that the job and the guy were cheating on me – just say. An abuse of power with the potential job and the guy as well. And I turned both down on the same day and started my own business. And that was August of the year 2000. I went and got my business registration, and I registered it because it’s important what the birthday of your business is, and this is interesting. It was September 11 of the year 2000, one year before the Twin Towers came down. So that’s how I started. And really at that moment in my life, I’ll be candid, I didn’t really feel like I had anything else to lose unless I had lost my mother and my brother and all my family members. It was just really a moment where the thing that I had prepared for with 25 years of education, I i just would, I found that it wasn’t going to be the fit I wanted, and I wanted to be 95% to 98% happy in what I did, and I wanted to use all my skills. I didn’t want to have to pigeonhole myself into one little scholarly rabbit hole. I was never good at that. Never good at that. That might surprise you, right? Never good at that. I always was interested in so many things. I still continue to be interested in so many things, and it just was not something that, that was going to work for me long term. So I made that decision, and I like to say, Gloria, I mean, I started out with $1,000, and here’s what I say. I say I started out with $1,000 and a lot of boobs, not a lot of balls, because the balls didn’t apply to me, and I had to make it happen. I had four mouths to feed. Granted, they were rescue animals, but I had four mouths to feed, and I was not married. I did not have a partner. I did not have a second income to fall back on. What I want to share with your listeners is really tried and true. It’s proven. It’s not airy fairy. It’s not theoretical. These are things that I did that I had to be and do to have the success that I’ve had and to bring my business into over six figure range. And you can do it too. Your listeners can do it, too. But I wish I had known at that time, in the early 2000s what I know now.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:06:36
Can you share what what specifically give an example of, like, what you would have done?
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:06:43
Oh, my goodness. I wish one of the biggest things I wish I had done relentlessly, even though it would have been a stretch, would be to get an amazing high powered coach early on in my business and to invest in that. Now I did a lot of seminars. I went to a lot of seminars that were offered through the Small Business Center. They were free. They were paid with tax money. I participated in a launching program called Good Work that was local. It was good, too, but nothing could replace a fantastic coach who made it to where I am now. Right. I needed me then, the me I am now.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:07:24
Yeah, exactly.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:07:26
And so I got there, but it took a lot longer. And there were some big moments of failure and discouragement, too, as part of business. Right? There’s no buffer zone. We’re not working for someone else, so we can’t say, oh, well, that Gloria, she’s so horrible. You can’t really say that about yourself.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:07:49
I know. Yeah. Although sometimes we do, though, unfortunately.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:07:54
I saw a funny Facebook post, Gloria, that cracked me up. It said, My boss is a real asshole, only I’m self employed. That kind of hits home sometimes.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:08:09
Yeah, exactly. Well, what was one of the biggest challenges that you faced in making that transition?
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:08:17
Boy, I’ll tell you, one of the biggest was the idea of a paycheck, right? So if you’ve been working for someone else and you have that paycheck that arrives every other week or once a month, just the psychology of a paycheck that’s coming in, that’s consistent, it was hard to release that, and yet I did. And I will tell you that one of the things I did, Gloria, to soften the blow, kind of, of moving from being full time teaching to doing my business is I taught part time. I taught English as a second language with adult learners, and I really enjoyed that. They were from all over the world. Japan. Korea. Mexico. Guatemala. Peru. They were from all over. Europe. Different countries in Europe, some countries in Africa. They were from all over. And so it was very interesting. But it also didn’t take me away from my work that much because I just taught a couple of evenings and a couple of mornings a week, and yet I had a paycheck that would come in. Now, granted, it wasn’t that much, but it was enough to cover my mortgage at the time. So what that did because, remember, I didn’t have another income.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:09:39
Right.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:09:39
Those of you who have another income, this isn’t an issue for you. Right. But I have to say, I’m happy I didn’t have another income. You know why? Because I was, as we say in the South, I was hungry. Hungry. And so were those four rescue animals. And it was up to me. It’s that leadership principle. If it is to be, it’s up to me. I was the one who got to make this happen or not. And so I know that that transition was difficult. However, I muted the blow a little bit by teaching part time. And I loved the teaching so much that I actually continued it for several years because I enjoyed it so much. And the other thing is, a lot of the students that I taught became my clients in Reiki training, or they became my clients for coaching, but more often for Reiki training. So it was interesting that there was a cross pollination.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:10:36
Yeah, absolutely. Well, let’s go there for a minute. What got you interested in Reiki?
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:10:43
Yeah. Oh, that’s a great question, but let me make a point to your folks first on cross pollination, because I think this is important. So here’s a tip for you listening when you’re starting out or you’re in the first few years of your business, if you don’t have a backup of money, for example, give yourself a position that doesn’t take a lot from you but puts you in front of your targeted ideal clients. For example, get yourself a job at a business incubator. If you’re a burgeoning business coach or if you are someone who’s a massage therapist, get yourself some kind of position, administrative or whatever, at a Chiropractor’s office or an Acupuncturist office. Figure out who your ideal client is for your type of service or offering. And then cross pollinate by getting yourself a part time or full time job that doesn’t task you, right, that you can leave there when you leave. There’s a point for everybody. Just a nugget. So how can I get interested in Reiki? That’s such a good question, Gloria. Actually, in 1992, I was the sixth car in a seven car pile up on the highway. Somebody just decided to completely slow down, and everybody hit. And I was out of town going to a conference, a poetry conference, and I was in a place where there was no median, right? There was about this much extra space on each side, and I had double whiplash, and I was in a lot of pain. And because I did not want to miss the conference I’m serious, this is the only reason — I let the wife of one of my professors, who was a Reiki level Two practitioner, do Reiki on me. And I can tell you that before that, I was completely skeptical. I had been offered Reiki multiple times, and I got as far away as I could. It scared me, and I thought it was weird, and I jokingly say, but it is true. I even got in the end of a potluck line because somebody offered me Reiki. I was having, like, menstrual cramps, and they offered me Reiki, and I went to the end of the potluck line. And anybody who knows me knows I love a good potluck. I am a good Southern girl, and potlucks are the thing. So I went to the end because I wanted to get away from them. So, you know, the whole irony of it is, after that experience, she did Reiki on me for about 35 minutes and really just worked on my back and my neck, and then my pain was gone, and I did not take another of those narcotic painkillers again. I went home on the bus, Gloria. I went home on the bus. I had a friend with me. We both went home on the bus because my car had been totaled. I never saw it again. Never saw my car again, which was a virtually indestructible old Volvo, 242 DL, right? And we went back. 242 DL, I think was it the model. We went back to Chapel Hill, and I went to church, was talking to a nutrition professor friend of mine, and I said, Sarah Sally, I just had this interesting experience with this thing called “Rocky.” I totally mispronounced it. Totally mispronounced it. And she said, you mean Reiki? And she said, Actually, I’m studying Reiki this weekend, and I need someone to work on. And within three months, I began studying, and I studied with a retired IBMer Gloria, who had gotten off insulin. He was a former IBMer who had gotten off all his insulin using Reiki. And that’s before, I think they had all the oral medications you can take. Now. He had to give himself insulin shots, and he got off all of it using Reiki.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:14:41
That’s awesome.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:14:42
That’s pretty amazing.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:14:44
It is. I love it. I’ve done it for a very long time, and I absolutely believe in the power of it. I was able to help my dog one time, even with it as well, who is not doing well. So it’s a great thing. Let’s go back a little bit, because I would love to know, when you talked about things that you wish you had done, like you wish you had invested in coaching, what was the maybe, like, the tipping point of where things started to really start to gel in your business? Is there something maybe that you really attribute that to?
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:15:23
Well, I started out really just doing one on one work with people. It was Reiki and it was spiritual counseling work. That’s how I started out. And very quickly, by all of these courses I was taking and attending and the networking I was doing, someone said to me, you know what? You are awesome at marketing. You are really creative and you’re awesome at marketing. Why don’t you develop a Creative Marketing seminar and come and give it for us and we’ll pay you? That’s how I started. I developed my first business seminar, which was Creative Marketing for Small Businesses. And I still have an iteration of that that I am paid to give all over. I have also about six others now, as well as I mean, I really have about 18 or 20 seminars now because I’ve been in business so long, and every year I create a new one. And so this is how I got started. And then it just went from there. And people hired me over and over because I was developing new seminars. And I was hired oftentimes through the Small Business Center network because I had attended many of their free seminars, paid for with tax money. And I was a golden child of the SBC. So I could stand there and say, look, here’s how I started. This is where I got much of my business education. This is where it all started. This is where you are, and you can make it happen too. And then I could give them lots of good edutaining information. So that’s how I got started with the speaking. And the whole time I continue teaching Reiki. I still teach Reiki. And interestingly enough, back when COVID hit, I asked I was in meditation, and I asked, what can I offer that will be super helpful to people right now? Because people are so afraid. So afraid, and worried about their businesses, worried if they’re going to survive the businesses, worried about their own survival period. What can I offer? And the answer I got was, it’s time for you to do that Mastermind coaching program you’ve been thinking about for ten years. And literally, Gloria, I have a piece of paper where I wrote this down over ten years ago. I mapped the thing out, but because I was so busy speaking and I was doing big keynotes too, with like, 1500 people, I was doing so much speaking and so much coaching and so much one on one work too. And I became a mom at age 40, and very soon, a few years later, needed to divorce, about five years later. So I became a single mom. So I was busy, busy, busy, busy. I am that kind of person who stays busy too, I will admit. But the point of it all is that I did not get around to the Mastermind until COVID hit and all the distractions were taken away. And literally on a Tuesday, I started doing Facebook Lives, and I ran a contest that somebody could win a spot, and I did Facebook Lives, and I had over 13 people enrolled by the following Tuesday, and we started.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:18:30
Yeah, that’s a great lesson right there. And there’s a couple of things I think is important, is that when the time was right that you did act and you got it going, because I had the same thing. I’ve been wanting to do a retreat for years, and finally, earlier this year, the inspiration struck to do it, and I had the retreat three months later. So even though supposedly experts will tell you, oh, you need six to nine months to be able to promote this thing and get people there, it’s like, no, I wanted to do it, and I got it done. And that’s what you did too. So I commend you for that.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:19:14
Yes, I want to say something about that. You had a clear intention. You knew you wanted to do the retreat. You set a timeline on it, and you went for it. And here’s the thing that people don’t get, and you’ll laugh today I had, interestingly enough, I had someone I taught Reiki all the way through Mastership. She even went through Mastership, which is a two year program. She went through it twice.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:19:39
Wow.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:19:39
She finished about eight years ago, and she called me and said, I really want to do I want to teach my first Reiki class. I’m ready. I’ve stopped working all these jobs I was working, and I really want to do it, and I really want to do it at the end of October. And I said, Well, I don’t want to rain on your parade. However, you will definitely want to come to a class of training before because you want to be absolutely ready. And here are some of the other things that you will need to do. And I’m just looking at this timeline, and even me being a go getter, this is a tight timeline. We actually figured out a way to have it happen. And I said, Look, I’m going to have you come. You can be a teacher assistant. You will send the people to me. I’ll do all the work, and you get to be there with your people. You get to come free. And really, what you had years ago is not the same as it is now. It’s so much deeper. It’s evolved. My way of teaching has evolved so much, and you’ll get to be there with your peeps, and then what you do is you have them rave about their experience, and you enroll them for your first you enroll their friends for your first Reiki level one.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:21:00
Right.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:21:03
You also need to come back before you teach Reiki Two so we can enroll them in Reiki two. You can come back, you can come free again. So we came up with a, with a arrangement that felt great to her and great to me, used all the wisdom that I’ve learned in so many years, 30 years of teaching in five different countries about how you can get these things together and how much time you need and even that little bit. Well, I’m still holding it with her. I said, look, they got to text me by Wednesday, and somehow I’ll get them in for the preliminary interview and we’ll enroll them. Just have it happen. Make it happen. She’s a ski instructor, and she’s leaving in November. She’ll be gone for six months. And I said, So, hey, this is your window of time. It’s good to give yourself that deadline, folks, because when you have something like you have a place you’re leaving for or another job you’re going to do that’s seasonal, guess what? You will, as we say here in the south, you’ll pee or get off the pot.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:22:10
That’s right. Yeah, exactly. Because if you want it badly enough, you’ll find a way to make it happen.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:22:18
You will. And how did you make yours happen? What was in your mind?
Gloria Grace Rand
00:22:22
Well, it was a combination of things. I’ve got a lovely friend who’s also putting together a retreat. And we talked about the importance of visualizing and which is really good and having that, because you do need to have the right mindset and you have to get into action, so you have to market it. So I told her, I sent out emails, I posted on Facebook, I did speaking opportunities, I put a picture up, I called people, I texted people, I emailed people, and I kept doing it even right up until the end.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:22:58
You were relentless.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:22:59
Yeah. And I probably could have even done more. And for me, though, it was good because the beauty of it is I got wonderful testimonials out of it. So now I’ve got proof of concept. I know what works, I know what didn’t work. And the next time around, it will be so much easier to enroll people. I’m confident of that fact.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:23:21
Yes. You ran the beta.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:23:23
Yeah, exactly.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:23:24
That’s the biggest step right there, is getting the beta just starting. Here’s the thing I always say to people, if you are analytical, right, if you’re an analytical person, you want to think through every single step and you want to make sure it’s all perfect before you get started. Well, that doesn’t work. And so you need somebody like me. I’m a promoter and I’ll say, no, that’s BS. Stop. I want you to call the people you know who you love and I want you to say you need to be there, and I’m giving you a special rate because I love you. And then enroll them and that’s it. Because they already love you, you need to be there. I’m going to give you this special $100 off and do you want to pay with a credit or a debit? Notice I didn’t say do you want to pay with a credit or a debit, I said do you want to pay with a credit or a debit? My intonation went down because why? I’m certain that they need to be there.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:24:18
Yeah, absolutely.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:24:19
It’s not a service.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:24:21
That’s true. And that’s such an important point that I know I’ve had some folks on who talk about sales before, and it’s still a good point to hammer home because it’s one that I had to learn the hard way as well, is that so many people, they don’t like the idea of sales or they’re afraid of it, afraid of rejection or whatnot. But if you do treat it like it is a service, you’re doing someone a service. If they really, truly need what you have to offer, you owe it to them to make the offer.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:24:56
And their life depends on it. And I’m very serious about that. I have a story that I tell sometimes. I’ll share it here a quick version of it, and that is that years ago, and I was not relentless like I am now, I am relentless, which is why I call myself the kick ass coach. I kick my own butt to be relentless, and I kick yours and make sure that you have your vision, that you say you want actually happen, that you have it happen, and you don’t go get to the end of your life and say, well, I wish I had done that business I thought about for 35 years. I don’t want you getting to the end of your life like that. That’s why I do what I do. That’s why I called my coaching program the Make It Happen Mastermind Coaching Program. Because we make it happen anyway. There was a woman who was a prominent head of a department at a very well ranked research institution, let me just put it that way. I won’t name it, obviously. And she called me about Reiki. She had been referred to me by someone else who had taken Reiki with me. She was extremely stressed out. Of course, being the head of a department at a research institution of that stature is extremely stressful. You can easily spend 70 hours a week or more. The obligations that you have to teach, to serve on committees, to mentor people, to go and do presentations, to develop your scholarship and publish. There is so much you have to do to work with curriculum development. Oh my God, it never ends. She was very stressed out. And what ended up happening when we had that conversation is she said, well, I just can’t do it right now. I don’t have the time. I’m just so stressed out. And I did not, Gloria, I did not take a stand for her. I just kind of agreed, oh, okay, I understand, because I did. I understand and I let it go. And I maybe called her and left a voicemail one other time, and that was it. I did not doggedly hold her to having that relief of stress. Well, then I found out some months ago, some months after that rather, that she had hung herself oh, no. And her eleven year old son had found her. Now, I share this story because I was not willing to take a stand for her. I was afraid, well, she might think I’m too pushy or she may be irritated by me or blah, blah, blah. I was just afraid for my own self right. how I looked. And I didn’t give a damn enough to take a stand for her. And I let her slip through the cracks. And so I would say to everyone listening, I hope you remember that story, because if you are not walking into that enrollment conversation. I don’t like the word sales. The enrollment conversation certain, absolutely dead certain, that that person is going to enroll and that you will help them, that you will get them from point A to point B, what they want, right? Then you’re basically letting them slip through the crack and their very life and the lives of their families, the lives of everyone they influence depends on their success. Honestly, it doesn’t have to be as horrifying as that situation. But think of it this way, kids watch mom slug it away in three jobs that she hates. She comes home, she’s irritated, she’s angry, she’s no fun. And that’s what they learn, oh, I need to slog it out in two or three jobs I hate to make it a living. On the other hand, mom preneur, momprenur, starts her own business, works her butt off, gets a fantastic coach. I have eight, by the way. I am humble. You may think I’m arrogant. I’m not. I have eight coaches because I will fail if I don’t have them watching out for my blind spots. I’ve got all those coaches and every dollar I’ve invested is totally worth it with them because they have stopped me from running over my own dog. i.e. my business many a time, right. So you get yourself the support and mentorship you need in place. So you’re not going it alone like I tried to do in those first few years. You’re not watching the bills pile up. You’re not frustrated. You’re not worrying, oh, is this going to work or not? Am I going to have to go back to that job I hate? You’re not waking up at night thinking, oh, I’m failing. I’m going to be a failure. This isn’t going to work. We’ve all had those conversations. Well, the antidote to that is you get a mentor who is a coach, right, a coach who is where you want to be.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:29:59
Yeah.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:30:00
And you hire them and you doggedly follow exactly what they’re doing. You listen to your instructions, you’re coachable and you take action, as you pointed out. So you don’t just sit there and visualize, hoping and waiting and visualizing are not strategies for success on their own.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:30:17
That’s right. Exactly. Let me ask you a quick question, and I don’t know it’s going to have a quick answer or not, but because I know we’re…
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:30:27
I haven’t given you any quick answers today.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:30:28
Yeah, but I want to follow up on this because I think I’ve seen a lot of people talking on social media about kind of dissing coaches out there. How do you find a coach who is at the level that you want to be at and is not just maybe, as they say, blowing smoke?
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:30:51
Yes, there are questions do you want to ask. And just a few are this, okay, you obviously want to meet with them. They should have a complimentary session that they offer you, a get to know you session or something like that. Mine is actually called the Get Results Now session. And by the way, Gloria, your people who are listening can reach out to me at my website, which is right there, spirited S-P-I-R-I-T-E-D DASH Solutions S-O-L-U-T-I-O-N-S dot com. And I will send them pre-work to do so. That’s the other thing. A good coach, in my opinion. My bold and strong opinion based on many years, over 20 years of coaching, is that they should give you preparatory work so that you walk in with a clear intent and purpose of that session. And so the session is not about, well, you’re going to give me your money, Gloria. It’s not about that. It’s a session that you will walk away from and hopefully you will enroll so we can continue working together. But you’re going to walk away with at least one or two tools you will absolutely implement to get your business on its way and to grow your business if you already have one. So that’s the first thing I would say. They need to offer you a complimentary short session. And I would look for someone who’s really going to have you fill something out ahead of time because, you know, then they’ve got a good coaching game going on. The second thing I would say, I’ll just give you a few. The second thing is I would find out exactly how long they’ve been doing it. I would ask, what’s your income? Guess what? I have a financial advisor. I asked her, I said, look, you know me and I’m going to be direct. What do they call it, your net worth? What’s your net worth? I want to know because I want to know. Yeah, told me she was upfront, and I said, Good, okay, that will work for me. Because a lot of people who are doing stuff like that don’t have a lot of net worth. So you want to ask, what are they making? You want to ask for references of people who have been in their programs. You certainly want to see what kind of references they have on their website and what kind of Google reviews do they have as well. So I have to admit, I’ve been kind of lazy about getting all those Google reviews. I have so many testimonials on my website and I know I need to do that, but I’ve got to hire a VA who’s going to take care of that. So you want to ask that. And I would say you also want to find out in their program what are the outcomes that they are guaranteeing you, what are the outcomes they’re promising and what percentage of people get those outcomes? Did everybody hear me? Ask them what percentage get those outcomes? One of the reasons that I have a boutique, small, customized program with just maximum eleven women and me is because I want all of my women to get the results. And so far, 98%, 98%, 9-8, you all, get the results. But when you look at these big programs that have 200, 300, 900, or more people in them, do you know what the percentage is? It’s 3%. You all, oh my gosh, 3% on average that get the results. And they’ve paid mega bucks for these things with, I don’t need to name the people. I don’t need to name the people. But this customer or client has paid mega bucks and only 3% on average in those big groups are going to get it. Well, in all integrity, I can’t do the work I do and sleep at night and feel good about what I’ve created and how I’ve served the world. If I’m taking a whole bunch of money from people and they’re not getting the outcomes. So you need to ask what outcomes do they provide? And in my Make It Happen coaching program, what I always say is I help big hearted entrepreneurs, ten X or more their income and their impact fast, and usually within three months, usually they at least double and many, more than triple their income just in the first three months of the twelve months together. So they should be really upfront and they should have references and they should have tons of testimonials.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:35:18
Very good. I appreciate you sharing that advice because it’s so important to work with a coach. It’s so important to have someone that you trust and that is going to have your back. And you do have to vet them and sometimes it isn’t going to work out. But if you can do take the time and do that research ahead of time, I think you’re definitely going to save yourself probably a lot of time and money and be much more successful.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:35:46
Let me tell you something wild. As far as I know, I’m the only crazy coach who does this. And let me tell you what it is. I give my people access to me by text 10:00 a.m. to 07:00 p.m.. Seven days a week.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:36:03
Oh my goodness.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:36:04
Seven days a week. And I thoroughly love it. So today I’ve had like probably there’s at least twelve messages on there. Hey, I got a new client. Everybody’s like, yay. Oh, would you sign up for this that I’m giving this presentation? Oh, my revenue generating activities, I always have them for accountability. They have to send those in every single day. They have to post them there. I’m the only one I know who does this and gives people access directly to me, not to a coach that I’ve hired. I’m going to go do this and I’ll send you over here. Sort of the Queen Elizabeth, bless her heart that way, to the coach I’ve hired. You want to know how much access you have to the creator of the program. You know what I’m talking about, Gloria. The creator of the program, the author of the book.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:36:53
Exactly.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:36:53
Your book behind you. You want to know, do you have access to that person or is that person hiring other people and they’re just staying kind of like The Wizard of Oz behind a screen and I don’t know, eating Cheetos while they watch Grey’s Anatomy 500 times? Or are they there in the trenches with you? And I totally love this on text. It keeps people going and it keeps them accountable and it creates momentum. And I’m the only one I know who does this.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:37:25
Well, very good. And I think on that note, I think we’re going to call it a day.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:37:31
Can I give your people a freebie?
Gloria Grace Rand
00:37:33
Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yes.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:37:40
Free is my favorite four letter word. I have a complimentary Ebook for all of Gloria’s people. Just go to my website. It is how to overcome overwhelm in seven easy steps. How to Overcome overwhelm in seven Easy Steps. It’s perfect for those of you who are starting out in your businesses and you’re like, oh my God, there’s so much to juggle. And it’s also perfect for those of you who are in business for a while and you’re looking for ways to delegate out some things and free up your time for your revenue generating activities. So it’s available at spirited-solutions.com, which I’m sure, Gloria, you’ll put somewhere.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:38:17
We’ll have that in the show notes. Yeah.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:38:19
So you just go there. All you have to do is put in your first name and your email. And no, we do not send you messages every, every week or even every day or whatever these people do. You’ll be lucky if you get two messages a month from me. And it’s probably one thing that’s really cool that you want to come to, that you want to attend or read or whatever. It’s not going to be a sales pitch. Some people just never let up, do they?
Gloria Grace Rand
00:38:50
That’s true. Yeah, it’s true. There’s different schools of thought and they figure the more you do, the better chance you have. And it may work for them. But I like your approach. And I do like the idea of working with a small group because I do think. I saw just and I had a very small group at my retreat, but it was okay. The perfect people were there. Yeah, exactly.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:39:24
Yeah.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:39:24
To be able to forge connections with everyone. And it’s so important because I know, I’m sure they are all supporting each other in The Mastermind, as well as having you support them, too.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:39:35
Exactly. They become friends for life, even when people eventually leave. And most people will re up for at least a couple of years, but when they eventually leave, what I love seeing is that on Facebook, everybody’s still cheering them on and they’re still connecting and they’re still doing business with each other, too. So when you forge that kind of group where there’s just a deep bond and connection and support and cheerleading and promotion of each other, that just continues way beyond when you finish taking care of your tuition.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:40:07
Yeah, absolutely. In fact, I’m still good friends with a couple of people from the Mastermind I was in six years ago now. And we’ve even still seen each other socially as well, which is which is nice, considering they don’t live close by. So it works out nice
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:40:24
Well, you’re obviously a relationship person. And see, here’s the thing, is that relationships are what build businesses, not transactions.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:40:34
That’s right, absolutely. For sure. Thank you so much. You have been such a wonderful, kickass guest and I appreciate you so much. And I know our listeners and viewers have gotten a lot of value from you today. And as I said, I’ll have all the links and everything in the show notes, so you can take advantage of Barnsley’s wonderful offers to help you out. I appreciate you so much for being here today.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:41:03
Thank you for having me, Gloria. And y’all don’t forget you can get the complimentary session. Right? Right. Call up Gloria too, and get one from her. You have one.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:41:13
Absolutely. Oh, yes, absolutely.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:41:15
And what we do is different, by the way. We are two different. We might be peas in a pod in some ways, but we are very different in our approach. And that’s why I have eight different coaches, because each one of them has their own particular expertise. Mine happens to be creative marketing. I think yours is mindset. Right. Mindset hacks. So you need that team that has expertise in the areas that you need.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:41:41
Oh, absolutely, yeah, because I’ve had speaking coaches as an example as well to help me with my speaking business.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:41:50
And I’ve written books and articles, but I still have a writing coach because I need it.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:41:58
We’re always learning and that’s the wonderful thing, because we also want to be able to stay ahead of our clients, too, so that they will be able to learn and benefit from us, because we’re doing that work ahead of time.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:42:12
Gloria I’m glad you said that. That’s another thing they need to ask when they’re interviewing a coach. They need to ask, what kind of professional development do you do? How many coaches do you have, how much do you invest in professional development every year? I invest over 25K in professional development. And why? Because otherwise I’m not going to be cutting edge invaluable to my client.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:42:35
Right, exactly.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:42:36
Ask them those questions as well. That’s a great point. Love that.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:42:42
All right, well, I think we can, we’re going to just go on and on.
Dr. Barnsley Brown
00:42:47
Let’s do it. We can do another one in some months. Exactly.
Gloria Grace Rand
00:42:51
Yes, I think we’ll definitely have to do that. Well, thank you again for being here. I appreciate all of those of you out there listening and watching. And until next time, as always, I encourage you to go out and live fully, love deeply and engage authentically.
00:43:08
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