Today I am filled with all consuming thankfulness. In the spirit of Thanksgiving I’m tapping into what I’m thankful for, specifically what I’m thankful I’ve learned since starting The Yes Girls seven years ago. There is nothing like starting a company from the ground up to teach you the importance of perseverance, patience, support and even rest. I quickly learned that college helped guide my passion for a career but it wasn’t until I was in the thick of it, creating and building The Yes Girls that I learned some valuable real life lessons. These didn’t necessarily come easy but they stuck. I write this today in hopes of encouraging the next generation of female entrepreneurs. As Steve Jobs said, “Those who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”
9 Things I’m Thankful I’ve Learned Starting The Yes Girls
1. My People
Who are the people in your life that cheer you on and rejoice in your success? Find them and stick to them like glue. They will save you in moments of doubt and celebrate with you on the joyous days (I’ll get to more on celebration later). I didn’t go to college for business or know the first thing about starting a company. Thankfully I had people who did. Create your own advisory board even if you’re a one woman shop. When my emotions ran high, because inevitably they will when you have your finances and heart invested, I ran significant issues or ideas by my support system/advisory board. As I received their feedback I learned to pause before acting, and doing so with a sound mind. I soaked up their wisdom and it became easier to respond with a clear head which always worked out better than the “but that isn’t fair” attitude. I can put clients first while keeping a healthy perspective. I’m a passionate person so trust me there are still times I want to give someone a piece of my mind for being unkind or unfair to us, our clients, our vendors, etc. but I’m thankful for “my people” and Jesus.
2. Fine Tuning The Niche
When I started out I wanted to help everyone with their proposals. I took on every client that came my way. I needed to do this to build a portfolio but I couldn’t keep functioning that way. Ideally I would still love to help everyone but it took some crazy stressful months in 2012 to realize I needed to target my market. I found the amazing untapped niche of proposal planning but narrowing down our clientele was what took TYG to the next level. In order to ensure our sanity and more importantly the quality of our clients engagements I had to fine tune our packages, pricing, etc. Sadly, this meant I couldn’t help everyone. This was probably the hardest “lesson” to embrace but it was a healthy one.
3. Do Your Research but Disregard Nay Sayers
My first light bulb went off during college. I thought about the idea of custom proposal planning while I was interning for a country club’s catering and wedding department. After hearing many engagement stories, I started to sense that guys were stuck on how to make their proposals romantic and personal so they just went with the go-to “over a romantic dinner” idea. When I graduated I decided to do some research. I found over 100,000 searches were being typed into Google for marriage proposal ideas and how to propose. Amongst my searching, there were no quality resources and no one was out there to help these guys trying to come up with memorable engagements. Proposals quickly became my new passion however it wasn’t that easy. When I told acquaintances and even some friends that I was starting a proposal planning company to help with personalized engagements, some thought I was crazy and others said “Oh yeah, that’s a cute idea” with the undertone being “ha, good luck with that!”
Bottom line, I’m thankful I did my research to back up my crazy plan but that crazy plan turned into over 1500 and counting memorable proposals for our amazing clients. I will be forever grateful I didn’t let the nay sayers stop me.
4. Well Hello There Competition
There will always be competition and those that copy you. Yes, we see them setting up the same proposal packages, copying proposal ideas, our website format, and many other weird things you wouldn’t expect someone to take. After all we are in the industry of being creative so we expect them to be creative. People say its a compliment and perhaps it is, but it can definitely be frustrating. However the best thing I can do is not get hung up on the competitors and continue to pave our own path. From my experience if you focus on your path, you’ll always be a few steps ahead.
5. Celebrate!
My innate nature is to be a planner, dreaming of the next thing and focusing on what’s ahead. In the same way I would get stuck on what wasn’t going right verses what was. I’ve had to retrain my thinking. My husband is the epitome of appreciating the daily blessings of life; in a lot of ways we were forced to because of the Air Force lifestyle. I subconsciously fought recognizing the little accomplishments for the first two years of business because I was always pushing myself to “do better.” With the grace of God I eventually I realized when I celebrated the small and big moments it created a thankful heart. The first two years of The Yes Girls I was grinding away and missing out on celebrating which is funny because I LOVE celebrating couple’s special moments – hence proposal planning. I needed to live out my brand and embrace celebration in the small things whether it was a new vendor relationship or a kind testimonial from a client.
6. The Definition of Failure
“If you decide that you’re going to do only the things you know are going to work, you’re going to leave a lot of opportunity on the table.”- Jeff Bezos, Founder, CEO of Amazon.
I’ve had ideas immediately take off and others that flopped at the starting line. It was so easy to get down on myself when we were having a slow month or if a new product wan’t selling as planned. Instead of seeing those things as failures, I first focus on what is going right, to remind myself of what I have to be thankful for; then I regroup, revise, and revise again. Giving up on something too quickly is my definition of failure; everything else is just an opportunity to cross off the list of what doesn’t work until you figure out what does.
7. Beauty is in The Details
Whatever you do, do it well down to the smallest details. In my business, the details of couples relationships is what makes their relationships unique. This goes for many aspects of the business too. If we overlook details while planning a proposal, it sets off bigger alarms later on. My team would be the first to admit I have a tendency to mico-manage. I am working on my desire to oversee every detail but in the same regard that does not mean we overlook details either. Having a team that understands details makes a world of difference.
8. He Has Bigger Plans
When I finally embraced that God actually does have bigger plans for me than I have for myself it was life changing. One of my favorite experiences with this truth is when I decided to make my main focus proposal planning verse wedding planning. I married my awesomely funny husband (Kyle) in 2009 who was training to be an Air Force pilot in Mississippi. I originally planned to start a wedding planning company until I realized how exhausting it would be to restart and rebuild my client and vendor network every time we moved. I was so discouraged when I first had this realization. Funny enough, that is what gave me the extra push to trying proposal planning instead; I could help plan them across the country and from (almost) anywhere. I understand everyone has their own beliefs but in terms of my journey God had bigger and better plans for me than I even had for myself.
8. People Who Inspire
When I was in high school I totally looked up to Mindy Weiss. She was (and still is) THE celebrity wedding planner and I was obsessed with looking at her inspiring work. She knew how to make a statement, especially with gorgeous flowers. I need inspiring people to look up to. I have a total business crush on Joanna Gaines from Fixer Upper because her story is one of restoration, taking risks, overcoming business hardships, and creating unexpected design. When I set goals I consider the woman that have made big impacts in their industries; I want to set goals that scare me a little bit just like they did.
9. Embracing Rest
Not going to lie, I’m still working on this. As a new mom to my 9 month old it’s hard to find rest between spending time with him, Kyle, and The Yes Girls. However I need to embrace rest. I have learned when I don’t give myself a day away from constantly checking emails and brainstorming ideas my creativity tank runs low along with my overall sanity. ;)
If others think your idea is a little crazy then you are probably onto something! I pray you go for it! I will embrace the celebratory and the “is this worth it?” days alongside you.