Ensure Your Team Can Meet Challenges Head On

How do you ensure your team is prepared to meet challenges head on or even before they happen?

Here are four lessons leaders can take to guide their teams when disaster strikes.

How to Create Value Consciously For All Your Different Stakeholders

Whole Foods founder John Mackey said Whole Foods should have died in its first year due to a once in a hundred-year flood at his first store, and he didn’t have the words for it back then, but now he does: the stakeholders saved him. His customers, his team members, his suppliers, his investors, the bank, the community that he was a part of didn’t let him die.

He goes on to say, "I realized that we were an interdependent network of relationships. And they cared about us. They didn’t want us to die. It changed Whole Foods forever, because from that point onward, we began to take seriously each one of these different relationships and to try to do right by them, to create value consciously for all these different stakeholders."

Read the full interview here.

Super Success: 21st Annual WPO Chicago Summit 2024!

21st Annual WPO Chicago Summit 2024

WPO Chicago chapter members had a wonderful time networking and learning about what it takes to scale a a business, "Hyper Growth:  The 5 Phases to Scale Your Revenue, Profits and Team," from keynote speaker and CEO Allison Maslan (pictured in front row/center).

Allison Maslan, CEO of Pinnacle Global Network (https://pinnacleglobalnetwork.com), was recently named “One of the 10 Women Entrepreneurs to watch in 2023”, by Forbes Magazine. She is the Wall Street Journal Best Selling Author of, Scale or Fail, which is endorsed by Daymond John and Barbara Corcoran of Shark Tank. Allison’s built 10 successful companies over the last 40 years.

Here's what we learned from Allison:

Scaling doesn't come from working harder. It comes from thinking and acting strategically. 

If you, the CEO, are still rescuing projects, deadlines and micro-managing team members while chasing after clients, you are not going to be able to scale. Instead, you are choking the growth of your company.

It is critical that you become 'un-required' in your business and build a team-managed company that can flourish without you there. It is also important that you expand to a more scalable model that can multiply your impact, profits, and the number of people you serve.

In addition, she showed us:

• What Scaling Phase your Company is in right now and what needs to happen to elevate to the next level
• How to Hire for Growth so that each team member more than pays for themself
• How to Build a Team-Managed Company that can flourish without you in the day-to-day
• 15 Scalable Models that the most successful companies utilize to multiply their growth

I'd like to thank Foley & Lardner for hosting us – especially the extra assistance from Partners Lauren Loew (and Ellen Wheeler) along with their assistants Lorri Kilavos (and Cynthia Bailey).

Our Steering Committee members get a big shout out for their help:

1. Kim Robinson, President, FrontlineCo (Chicago I)
2. Angel Li, Founder & CEO, RISE Education (Chicago I)
3. Margo Jacquot, Chief Care Officer & Owner, the Juniper Center (Chicago II)
4. Nasutsa Mabwa, President, ServiceMaster by Simons (Chicago II)
5. Lauren Loew, Partner, Foley & Lardner (Chicago II chapter member)
6. Laurel Delaney, President, Women Entrepreneurs Grow Global (Chapter Chair)

Huge thank you to Allison for sharing her experience with us.

Gratitude to all for achieving a super success at our 21st Annual WPO Chicago Summit 2024!  A few photos can be found here.

Becoming Acquainted With Angel Li, Founder of RISE Education and WPO Chicago I Chapter Member

Discover how Angel Li (pictured), founder of RISE Education and WPO Chicago I chapter member came up with the idea for her business, how she manages her team, what resources have helped her prosper, and more.

Read the entire interview at Canvas Rebel.

21st Annual WPO Chicago Summit 9/12/24

As Jim Collins Says, "Begin With Who, Not What"

©2024 Laurel J. Delaney.  All rights reserved.

According to thought leader Jim Collins (pictured), "good-to-great leaders understood three simple truths. First, if you begin with “who,” rather than “what,” you can more easily adapt to a changing world. If people join the bus primarily because of where it is going, what happens if you get ten miles down the road and you need to change direction? 

Jim is all about getting the right people on the bus (and the wrong people off the bus).  Read on to learn the other two simple truths.

How Women Presidents Are Using and Leveraging Artificial Intelligence (AI)

AI is emerging as a powerful tool to level the playing field for women entrepreneurs. From enabling informed decisions to streamlining business operations, AI is proving to be a game-changer for women entrepreneurs in terms of running and growing their businesses.

AI has the potential to disrupt barriers and open up new pathways to success. Women business owners can use AI-powered tools to save time and money, an invaluable commodity when juggling a business and family life.  

Read the entire article on how women business owners and women Presidents, like WPO members, are using artificial intelligence (AI).

A Short Guide For Selling Your Business

There are many factors that must be considered when deciding whether to sell a small business: market conditions, personal timing for the owners, and when the business might be at peak value.

Small-business acquisitions increased by 10% in the first quarter of 2024 compared with the previous year, with more than 2,300 businesses sold for a total value of $1.8 billion.

Here is a short guide – all you need to know – for how to sell a small business from start to finish, including the complexities and implications. 

Will AI Revolutionize Every Industry?

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said that he thinks AI will be more transformative than fire or electricity.

It’s very easy to get caught up in the excitement. But here’s the problem: Most of this buzz and hype is coming from multi-billion or trillion-dollar companies – like Alphabet or Microsoft - that have a vested interest in selling us on an AI-powered future.

Every day, it seems, we hear bolder and more grandiose claims about how AI is poised to change the world.

To what extent are these hyperbolic predictions realistic, and how much is simply marketing hype?  Find out here.

Habits and Routines of 5 Successful People

As a woman president, you understand the importance of creating good habits; your habits can either help or hurt your success in life. Habits form good, regular routines that put you on track to accomplish your significant life and business goals. 

Here are the habits and nighttime routines of successful people that you can incorporate into your own routine. End your night well-rested and, by extension, set yourself up for a successful start to your day. 

Borrow the success playbooks of these well-known leaders.  They may not all be presidents but they know a thing or two about motivating others and making each day count.

How Businesses Fail to Scale

The key to avoiding failure as a company grows is ensuring that business leaders agree from the very start on what its products, ideal customers, and internal processes are. Solidifying these is critical before scaling up, as they clearly define a company’s business model. 

Failing to do this step is one of the primary reasons some startups fail in the scaling process, as they didn’t have a clear vision of where their company should’ve gone before the unprecedented growth took place.

Here’s a closer look at what scaling means and its potential impact on your growing business.

Buying a Business With Zero Money Down

There are a lot of people who would like to be business owners, but there is one small problem that is keeping them from pursuing their dream: lack of available capital. The assumption is that without a large bank account, it is impossible to purchase an existing business.

Although it is not as easy, is possible to buy a business with little to no capital.

How can you buy a business with zero money down? The answer in short, is creativity.

You will likely need to find a seller who is willing to finance at least a portion of your purchase, and you will need to find other alternative forms of financing.

Read more here to learn the ropes. 

Are You Stuck In Your Own Head?

Ten years ago, happiness researcher Gretchen Rubin set out to find the framework for a happier life. Testing the wisdom of the ages with scientific research, she learned how to strengthen her relationships, increase energy and more.

But a few years ago, she started to notice that she felt stuck in her head — disconnected from other people and from herself. 

Suddenly, I [Gretchen] realized that I’d been treating my body like a car that my brain was driving around town. But it was actually my body — through my five senses — that was my essential con­nection to the world. I didn’t want to come to the end of my life and think, “So many things happened to me. I wish I’d been paying attention.”

Discover from Gretchen some surprising ways that our senses can help us to focus more deeply, live longer and spark happiness.

WPO Chicago I Member Denise Press Featured in Fox Business

A recent study done by Morning Consult for Visa that surveyed small business decision-makers found that just 52% of U.S. small businesses have adopted AI in their operations, while about half of non-adopters are planning to follow suit within the next two years. Of those that have implemented AI, 85% say their use of AI has increased compared to a year ago.

"There is a recognition that AI and the advancement of technology is important in small business," Denise Press (pictured), Visa's head of small business for North America, told FOX Business in an interview. "There was an equal weight of, 'I don't know how to get started' and not knowing how to get started and not being experts in AI and/or new technology."

Read full story here.

Quit Micromanaging Your Talent Instead of Trusting Them

If you learn one thing from Anne Mahlum’s eight-figure success with Solidcore, make it this: Your relationship with money could be holding back your business. If you have a scarcity mindset rather than trusting yourself to go out and make more funds when you need them, it’s going to be hard for you to scale up as an entrepreneur. Also, if you’re micromanaging your talent instead of trusting them, you’re wasting your time.

“Think about how you were spending your time six months ago,” Mahlum says. “If you’re trying to scale and you’re spending your time the exact same way, something’s wrong. You’re never going to get there.” 

Honoring WPO Chicago Member Ellen Wheeler, Partner at Foley & Lardner

WPO Chicago member Ellen Wheeler (pictured) has been nationally ranked in the 2024 edition of Chambers USA for her work as a derivatives enforcement attorney.  Ellen is a Partner at Foley & Lardner. 

Ellen says, "I’m especially thankful and grateful for the wonderful clients I’m honored to serve and support. Additionally, congratulations to my colleagues who also earned recognition from Chambers this year."

On behalf of the entire Women Presidents Organization, we congratulate Ellen for this prestigious honor.  We are so proud of her!  

WPO Chicago Member AJ Goehle's TEDx Talk – Leaving Imprints: The Transformative Power of In-Person Experiences

Favorite Moments at the Women Presidents Organization Entrepreneurial Excellence Forum (EEF) in Colorado Springs 2024

Photos/videos:  ©2024 Laurel J. Delaney.  All rights reserved.  Learn more about WPO.

Thought Leader Jim Collins Presents at the Women Presidents Organization Entrepreneurial Excellence Forum (EEF) in Colorado Springs

©2024 Laurel J. Delaney.  All rights reserved.

What a privilege to attend the Women Presidents Organization Entrepreneurial Excellence Forum (EEF) in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

I spent quality time with my Chicago members, listened to several amazing presentations, including one by thought leader Jim Collins (pictured), and connected with more than 700 women business owners who all aspire tremendous growth for their companies.

Our WPO CEO, Camille Burns, sums everything up nicely:

"As I head home from Colorado Springs, I’m reflecting on all the inspiring and extraordinary women who attended the #2024EEF. The collective energy, brilliance, and strength of these women from around the globe is truly unparalleled. Here's to the continued success and global impact of women business owners!"

Hear, hear!

See You In Colorado Springs, CO at the WPO Entrepreneurial Excellence Forum (EEF)!

See you at the Women Presidents Organization (WPO) Entrepreneurial Excellence Forum (EEF), the premier gathering of women entrepreneurs who lead multi-million-dollar businesses, May 15-17, 2024, at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs!