Setbacks and Success: Learning From Missed Goals on the Road to Millions

Kym Yancey [00:00:00]:

We're having like a nervous breakdown. I mean, we're like, all we could do is hold each other like, oh my gosh, what's going to happen here? You know what I mean?

Briana Dai [00:00:06]:

But the definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over and over and expecting different results. Or is it insanity? It's both, honestly.

Kym Yancey [00:00:18]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:00:19]:

Tell you a painful lesson of mine. Short story, but it's painful.

Kym Yancey [00:00:33]:

Well, it's about time you got here. We've been waiting on you.

Briana Dai [00:00:39]:

We have, you know, we talk a lot about big goals and big wins and big milestones, but what we don't talk about enough are goals that maybe didn't pan out the way that we thought that they would. And you know, the ones that maybe quietly sort of disappointed us or made us question ourselves. And so today we're gonna get a little bit more um, transparent and actually talk about some of the goals that we didn't necessarily hit and why and how we learned from them. So looking back at those moments and how they've changed us for the better, um, so that we could have the wins that we've never had before. And so I think it's important to reflect and to recognize when— especially in the online world and you're comparing yourself on social media, you see all these big wins and these big milestones. What you don't see are the, the times that people lost. They don't post about the times that they fell down. They don't post about the times they didn't hit their, their mark.

Briana Dai [00:01:35]:

And, you know, you're not alone if you feel like that's you. Every single person does, including us. And so, um, you know, I think that we're going to kick it off and just kind of talk a little bit about how normal that is and to not let yourself, you know, retreat or feel lesser than because maybe you didn't hit that goal and to pick back up and say, what can I learn from this? Is really important. Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:02:02]:

I mean, one that comes to mind for me, and it speaks to— you alluded to it, but more succinct for me is when a goal has outlived its value, how we can stick with something because it's worked in the past, but that it's easy to not pay attention to the fact that it's run its course. And how do you— it's easy to let go of something that isn't working, but it's harder to let go of something that is working, even if it's not working as well as it had been working. And particularly if it's tied to revenue and revenue goals and all of that. I know that for us, we You know, we're, we're a 100% live event business until COVID hit. We, our business completely stopped. Everything about it stopped because we were 100% live event and we needed to make a decision whether we were just going to say— and it was our 20th year, so we had to make a decision of whether, you know, hey, 20 years is a good run. Good run. Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:03:10]:

And or do we want to regroup, you know, and retool? And what kind of investment will that be? How long? I mean, I remember when COVID hit, I was like, So is this gonna mess up our Memorial Day plans?

Kym Yancey [00:03:23]:

Yeah, right.

Sandra Yancey [00:03:24]:

Like, I didn't know how long this thing was.

Kym Yancey [00:03:26]:

A little blimp, right?

Sandra Yancey [00:03:27]:

Yeah. And Brianna was having a baby, so she was getting ready to go out.

Briana Dai [00:03:30]:

Sorry, I'm choking on my spit, so if you hear me coughing, I'm just clearing the spit out of my way. What? Have you ever done that?

Kym Yancey [00:03:43]:

Okay, like, choking type thing?

Briana Dai [00:03:47]:

Like I'm choking on my spit?

Kym Yancey [00:03:48]:

That happened to me. It happened to me yesterday.

Sandra Yancey [00:03:51]:

Okay, good.

Briana Dai [00:03:51]:

No, no, no.

Kym Yancey [00:03:52]:

No, you don't remember? You don't remember? No, seriously.

Sandra Yancey [00:03:55]:

Like you've never done it.

Kym Yancey [00:03:56]:

No, I mean really, I was like, oh my God. In fact, you were over by the sink. I don't know if you remember, I kind of nudged you away from the sink because I had to flush my mouth with a little water.

Sandra Yancey [00:04:05]:

Oh yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:04:06]:

'Cause like I had closed down my windpipe.

Briana Dai [00:04:08]:

Yeah. Oh, that's a serious goldfish spit.

Kym Yancey [00:04:12]:

Serious. I ate something with peanuts. Peanuts don't cause a problem for me, but for some reason they did yesterday.

Sandra Yancey [00:04:19]:

Maybe you didn't chew it enough. Maybe it had to do with the peanut.

Kym Yancey [00:04:23]:

I did something not enough. I don't know what it was. But anyway, sorry.

Sandra Yancey [00:04:28]:

Carry on, you two. I'm just going to be the innocent one.

Briana Dai [00:04:32]:

I'm sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt the whole train of thought.

Sandra Yancey [00:04:35]:

Tennis match over here.

Briana Dai [00:04:36]:

I just heard you coughing in the audio, so I just felt a need to explain myself while I'm quietly dying over here, choking on my own saliva. But no.

Kym Yancey [00:04:47]:

Well, you know, the interesting thing about this topic is You do need context. You do need— like, you can misjudge yourself. Here's a prime example. I mean, we were averaging— when eWomenNetwork was started in the beginning, we were averaging really a couple of hundred.

Sandra Yancey [00:05:07]:

Hold on, everybody. We'll put a pin in my story. Let's turn over here. I was in the middle of the story when she was dying.

Kym Yancey [00:05:13]:

Oh, you were? I thought—

Sandra Yancey [00:05:15]:

No, no, no. You go because I can remember mine.

Kym Yancey [00:05:18]:

Seriously, you want me to go?

Briana Dai [00:05:20]:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:05:21]:

So we were averaging a couple of 100 members a month.

Sandra Yancey [00:05:24]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:05:24]:

All right. Now, we had no context at that time if that was outstanding. We didn't know. We weren't talking to Chambers of Commerce. We weren't talking to other women's groups. You know, we just had a preconceived notion of what we'd like to see. We want to have, you know, 800 members a month, you know. But we were doing a couple hundred, you know, 200, 300 members a month.

Kym Yancey [00:05:47]:

We didn't realize how good that was. You know, because of context. So sometimes, you know, you're shooting for a goal and you don't hit your goal or what you think it should be. You have to have some kind of context for it.

Briana Dai [00:05:58]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:05:58]:

You know what I mean? Yeah. I mean, I've seen numerous— I know when you do a campaign and, you know, you expect X to happen, but it doesn't. But if you don't have context for it to know that, you know what, really the number I did hit was a really good number. What— let me say it another way, because it's lots of little ways in which this stuff comes to light. When you do your tour. I remember if you had a notion or said our expectation was to have this number of people at the event, and let's just say 30% less showed up, okay, whatever the number is. Well, what did we learn from that? Well, we found out that your connection with a small, more intimate audience on the tour, especially that year, yielded better results than a bigger audience. I mean, you don't— yeah, I'm just saying people can prejudge the circumstances.

Kym Yancey [00:06:50]:

Oh, you've only got 200 people there, or whatever the case may be, when really you're even more effective at 100 people.

Sandra Yancey [00:06:57]:

It's about the right people in the room.

Kym Yancey [00:06:59]:

It is about the right people.

Briana Dai [00:07:01]:

And I think it's also— yeah, no, that makes so much sense. And something that you said that kind of reminded me of something is, you know, we set really huge goals. You know, in a previous podcast, we talked about how this year we're we've dedicated the next, uh, 1,000 days to 10x-ing our business, which is a really large goal. And it can be easy, like let's say we don't quite get the 10x, maybe we 9x, we're still going to be happy. Obviously we're really holding ourselves accountable and taking all the actions and all the steps. But one thing that we do do that I actually don't know that we've done with this goal because we're so clear that we're going to hit it, but we do do this for our conference goals, and that is we have our good goals. Are great goals and are excellent goals. So kind of tiering your goals so that you're not— you have the exceptional target, the moonshot that you really are going to do everything in your power to hit.

Briana Dai [00:07:54]:

But if you fall a little short, you're still excellent, right? And then there's the good, which is basically like that you passed, you know, and that you're still— your business is still running. You can still, you know, pay your people, pay yourself, and that's good. But really what you want is to be great or excellent or exceptional. And so kind of tiering your goals and setting yourself up for that kind of that window so that you're not completely deflating yourself if you're not exceptional every time. Because that could also set, I think, a realistic expect— unrealistic expectation that could be deflating. I get deflated if I'm not exceptional, but I could still argue, okay, I'm great. I'm still great. You know, I still, I still did great.

Briana Dai [00:08:37]:

Yeah. You know, and I think that that's an important thing when you are your own cheerleader in business as an entrepreneur and you're doing it on your own. It can really be hard. You can be hard on yourself when you don't hit it. But if you have given yourself, I think, a little bit of a runway to do good, to do great, and then to do exceptional, that way it's not as, you know, defeating, make you wanna just give up or throw in the towel. I, I, I do think that's—

Sandra Yancey [00:09:02]:

or beat yourself up.

Briana Dai [00:09:03]:

Or beat yourself up over that.

Sandra Yancey [00:09:04]:

I'll not post. Conversation that goes on in your head, right?

Briana Dai [00:09:08]:

Because if you're not exceptional, you definitely beat yourself up. Remember that sore year? Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:09:14]:

Yeah. Yeah.

Briana Dai [00:09:16]:

And it was, it scarred you, but you learned from that.

Sandra Yancey [00:09:18]:

Yeah.

Briana Dai [00:09:18]:

You know?

Sandra Yancey [00:09:19]:

Yeah. It was a year that I, I, I didn't do as well as I'd always done.

Briana Dai [00:09:23]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:09:24]:

And I didn't like that. No, I didn't like that. And it, it, it really, boy, did I overprepare the next year and then hit it, had the best year ever. And so sometimes I feel like, you know, setbacks can be seen as a setup for a real strong comeback.

Briana Dai [00:09:40]:

Exactly.

Sandra Yancey [00:09:41]:

You know, it is easy. I do feel like disappointments when you've had a lot of success and we've had a lot of success, but it's also been— we're in our 26th year. We've worked. It hasn't come easy. We've worked for every bit of it.

Briana Dai [00:09:57]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:09:58]:

And and we're constantly improving. We absolutely believe in constantly improving. I do believe in that. I think it's Mark Twain that said, even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. So I do believe that you have to be ahead of the curve in terms of just really kind of constantly improving. But I do think that the power of a setback, more than anything for me personally, the takeaway that I take away from that for myself is You know, it's important, I think, to be humbled. Yes, I, I think it is really— first of all, it helps you completely identify with your client, right? But secondly, it just really keeps you on the straight and narrow. Um, I know people that have, you know, read their own headlines and gotten really full of their success, and, uh, that is a— that can be really dangerous on on so many levels, personally and professionally.

Sandra Yancey [00:11:00]:

And so I think that the way I look at it is sometimes when you— you've talked about this, Brianna, that success and failure aren't on opposite sides, right? They're really actually on the same road. It's just that success is a little bit farther down the road. And I have thought to myself, the trips that we've had, the results that haven't been maybe as great as we've wanted, or whatever it might be that we might be disappointed in, is a way for the universe to say to Okay, Sandra, we need to get your attention on this. You are on autopilot. You are flying right now. You're feeling really good about things. And this is a really important lesson to learn. And the reason why this is happening now is because you will probably see this down the road when the stakes are even higher.

Sandra Yancey [00:11:52]:

But now you will have the wisdom of I've been here before. What would I do again or do differently in order to manage through this setback or these symptoms of a potential setback so that you can overcome it before you actually fall? So I think I know that everybody has them. To your point, Briana, not everybody talks about them. I was mentioning when we first started the You know, one of the setbacks I think that has been most valuable to me is learning to pay attention to the cues and clues when something that you've been doing has run its course. And I think we had that. We came out of COVID we went online, we ended up doing an online event, and it was so incredible and so successful that we turned around and did it in 3 months. Again, it was really expensive to pull off. It was a big deal.

Sandra Yancey [00:12:55]:

It was— I mean, I think the, the check just for the production team was over $100,000. Yeah. And then we said, oh, this is so great, let's do it every year. And we started doing it yearly. And then about the 5th year, I think it was, we saw that it was harder to get the uptick on a multi-day online event because we were back in person and we were back in person and that our core audience, you have to know who your customer is. Our audience are women and women love the face-to-face, you know, heart-to-heart. And then everybody else. Plus it got real crowded.

Sandra Yancey [00:13:32]:

So there were a lot of different options. It was hard to get people to stick with the show for 3 days. I mean, just a lot of things. And then we started saying we want to increase our goals, but it took 4 months to lift that, that show off the ground. And we started talking about, you know, what could we do that, and I think both of you were saying, what could we do if with that time with our whole team, if we got 120 days? Yeah. To put it into other things.

Briana Dai [00:14:00]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:14:01]:

Right. And we made a very, I mean, like I said before, it's easy to let go of things that don't work. But it actually was still very successful for us financially. But it was just a lot more work and it wasn't as fun anymore. Yeah, we just noticed we didn't have as much fun doing it and we just said, okay, not only are we not doing this, but we're saying no to all the revenue that it creates. And we've got to come up with something else that won't start paying dividends until probably second quarter when we're used to doing this. In January, you know what I mean? And so it felt like a really big risk, but we took the clue of it being harder to, uh, exponentially grow the audience, right? And we needed that year to see that.

Briana Dai [00:14:53]:

Yeah, every year you want to grow.

Sandra Yancey [00:14:55]:

Yeah.

Briana Dai [00:14:55]:

And when that attendance wasn't growing, it was kind of like, oh, it should have grown. But we didn't hit that mark. Yeah, so yeah, that was definitely a clue. I think that the reflection piece is so critical, um, and you know, because in business and in life, like, the failure is inevitable. Like, everybody's going to fail, everybody's going to miss the goal, everybody's going to miss a mark at some point in life. But choosing not to learn from it is optional. And I think the thing that eWomenNetwork is exceptional about is always doing an analysis of our performance when it's good or bad. We always do what we call a spot analysis, which if you're in the corporate world, you definitely heard of a SWOT analysis, which is strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

Briana Dai [00:15:41]:

But we don't really call anything a weakness because like, what does that mean? When something doesn't work out, you're not like, well, that was weak. You're like, no, that was a problem. You know what I mean? Like, it's like that doesn't— weakness doesn't resonate, but problems resonate because you can solve problems, because you can solve a problem, you know what I mean? But it's harder to fix a weakness. So when we talk about the difference between problems and threats, and so the success is obvious, but the problem, it's different than a threat because problems are things that are chaotic behind the scenes.

Sandra Yancey [00:16:11]:

You don't see it.

Briana Dai [00:16:11]:

You don't see the problem, but we see the problem. Our team feels the problem. They feel it in the, oh my gosh, this fell through the cracks. Let's save it before everybody else finds out about it versus a threat. Which is a problem that is outward-facing, where the client sees the problem, where they feel the impact of it. And that is a threat to the business because now it's impacting the customer experience.

Sandra Yancey [00:16:34]:

So we've gone from SWOTs to SPOTS. What are our SPOTS?

Briana Dai [00:16:37]:

What are our SPOTS?

Sandra Yancey [00:16:38]:

So the S is for shine. Where do we shine? Where do we get feedback? Not what we think are just our strengths, which is the SWOT analysis, but where do we— and I think brands are really built on where they shine. Yes. So knowing that is really important. What are the problems? You know, that we need to fix that is just creating havoc behind the scenes. Opportunities and then threats.

Briana Dai [00:16:59]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:16:59]:

Yeah. And we are really— I mean, that is that to your point, the one thing we— that I think a lot of opportunity for small business owners because they get something and then they run to the next thing.

Briana Dai [00:17:10]:

And then they run to the next thing. They don't take the time to pause and reflect and really ask themselves and people around them, you know, you don't know what you don't know. And sometimes there's threats or even opportunities that are in your own blind spot. So unless you ask your contractor or the person that's working with you how they saw it, you would never know. For example, for the conference, I am responsible for our media team and I had no idea that this was happening. But one of the things that we promised on day one of our conference, we feature a lot of our community on our stage at our conference, and it's a huge benefit to them. And one of those benefits is also getting footage of them on the stage and photos of them on the stage. And so we had kind of these like really quick kind of short, sometimes even 5-minute slots, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, but they were back to back.

Briana Dai [00:18:00]:

And the opportunity, not so much a threat because thank God it didn't impact the client, but an opportunity that I would have never known about had I not asked my team to perform a spot analysis for me as well. Was that those short segments made it really hard for the team to make sure they got the shot because they're up and they're off the stage and they're just clicking away hoping that they got the shot. They don't have the time or the luxury to look at the back of the camera and see if they got a good shot. They're just spraying and praying, kind of hoping they got a good shot of the client. And that quality control piece becomes a kind— it could turn into a threat. And so because I asked that question and I got that feedback, I was able to bring that to the team and say, okay, you know, in the run of show this year, let's maybe not have those 5 or 10 minutes. Let's get at least 15-minute slots. If we're getting, if we're promising people professional photos as part of their opportunity to be on our stage, we need to make sure that we're getting them quality photos, not just photos.

Briana Dai [00:18:58]:

And it's really hard for our team to make sure that they're doing that and to deliver the exceptional quality of products and service that we believe in providing to our people. And that was a, that, that was an example of, and it's not just an internal thing.

Sandra Yancey [00:19:12]:

What's so beautiful about your example, Brianna, is that it's not only preventing it from becoming a threat, a problem, preventing it to become a threat, but it also took that problem and made it an area in which we could shine. Yes. And then the client was obsessed with, oh my gosh, and like, when are you doing it again? And can I have a, I wanna add this to my reel. I, I wanna show, myself on these big stages to other big stages that I'm trying to apply. And so I'm willing to do this next year because I felt so good about the results, right? So you could take a problem and it not just be about avoiding a threat, but taking a problem and turning it into an area of shine. We call this process plan, do, review. We plan the conference, then we execute the conference, and then we take a couple of months actually of meetings. It's about, what would you say, an hour or two every Monday.

Briana Dai [00:20:04]:

Yeah. To wrap everything up.

Sandra Yancey [00:20:05]:

To wrap everything up. And we've got a list of everything that needs to be done, and we're capturing things we want to do differently while we're doing that. And everybody is on the meeting until everything is done. Yeah. So it really makes people go, like, I got my stuff done. Do I have to be on the meeting? Yep. Because you're part of the team. That makes other people want to get all the wrap up and button up things.

Sandra Yancey [00:20:26]:

But part of that, the review process. So it's a system, plan, do, review, the process of the review is the spot analysis.

Briana Dai [00:20:34]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:20:34]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:20:35]:

Do you feel like you're drowning in your business? Like you're doing everything and something has to give, but you're afraid it might be you? What if I told you there's a network of over 500,000 women entrepreneurs all dedicated to supporting each other? A network of women helping women. I'm Sandra Yancy, founder of eWomenNetwork, and I'm inviting you to join us and become a member. Ewomennetwork.com. We can't wait to meet you.

Kym Yancey [00:21:05]:

So we have some context for this. There were two things, two situations that just really stand out for me. The first one was our first conference, our first international conference in May of 2001, right? And at the Adolphus Hotel in Dallas, which is a 5-star hotel.

Sandra Yancey [00:21:21]:

I mean, wanted to really come out and, um, you know, and we all—

Kym Yancey [00:21:26]:

it's It's almost comical now when I think about it because we wanted to sound good to the hotel too. I mean, they wanted to know how many people you expecting and we're saying 350 to 400 people.

Sandra Yancey [00:21:35]:

And to put in context, we had just launched the September before, September 18th.

Kym Yancey [00:21:39]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:21:39]:

Just opened the doors to eWomenNetwork. So it wasn't that far, you know, out of launching the company.

Kym Yancey [00:21:46]:

Totally. And we learned a lot of lessons from this, but we, you know, we had a lot of fantastic speakers, female speakers that we were bringing on board. Flying in. But this one sponsor, we brought them on board and again, they asked what we were expecting. We said, you know, 350, 400 people were expecting for this. Rah, rah, rah. Well, 2 weeks out from the event, we've got 74. I mean, we're having like a nervous breakdown.

Kym Yancey [00:22:11]:

I mean, we're like, all we could do was hold each other like, oh my gosh, what's going to happen here? You know what I mean? And so, because I was doing all the marketing, I was writing kind of like in Sandra's voice. I was Sandra's—

Sandra Yancey [00:22:23]:

I was still at home. I was your home office.

Kym Yancey [00:22:25]:

I was your AI.

Sandra Yancey [00:22:26]:

Yeah, exactly.

Kym Yancey [00:22:28]:

So I'm writing out an email to be sent out to everybody. And I remember the email was really around this whole notion of now's the time for women to come together and really support each other. And this is our time, that kind of thing.

Sandra Yancey [00:22:43]:

And bring a friend.

Kym Yancey [00:22:44]:

Bring a friend. But we realized after I wrote it and we sat down, we read it, we thought, Something about this feels a little crybaby-ish. Whining, whining. You know what I mean? And so we tore that up and wrote a new email. And the email was very simple 'cause the email just says, hey, we are so excited to see you. We're 2 weeks away. Can't tell you how awesome the event's going to be. I mean, it was our truth.

Kym Yancey [00:23:06]:

We knew the event was going to be great with what we had and what we had planned for. But that increased our attendance by 5.

Sandra Yancey [00:23:17]:

People.

Kym Yancey [00:23:18]:

It got up to 78 or something like that, you know. So the day of the event, I mean, Sandra and I are like, just, we're feeling very sad about the attendance not being where it was. But there was an energy, there was a vibe that was going on there. And as we're walking into the event, we saw our sponsor, our bank sponsor, was walking toward us. And as we're walking toward us, I learned about your mother's— has a skill She's able to talk with her mouth closed because as we're getting close to them, Sandra's saying, yeah, she's talking to her. Oh God.

Sandra Yancey [00:23:52]:

Oh God.

Kym Yancey [00:23:53]:

What are we going to say? As she's smiling. And we get up there, we get up to them and they hug us and tell us, this is unbelievable. Remember, our context was we bombed. They're saying this is unbelievable. Now, we did do a couple of things here that helped us out. You know, we had these big round tables, and we had the catering people put 4 to a round instead of 8 to a round, right? So kind of spread things out a little bit to help the appearance.

Sandra Yancey [00:24:23]:

The seats are the seats, and the tables are the tables, you know what I mean? They're bankers, they know their numbers. Yeah, but they love—

Kym Yancey [00:24:29]:

but they love the event, they love the energy. And I'll never forget these keywords. Don't forget these keywords. They hug us and they said, oh my God, there's got to be 400 people in there. I thought, God, did somebody sneak in?

Sandra Yancey [00:24:41]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:24:42]:

You know, that's the day I learned that when you spread out the tables and fill out the seats, people can't really count.

Briana Dai [00:24:49]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:24:49]:

You know, the point of the matter is, though, is that they bought the energy, the vibe, the camaraderie, the connectedness, the speakers and their themes and their stories. And more than anything, it was an incredible women's focus event back in 2001. But it was something that we didn't hit our goal when it came to attendance and all of that, but we learned a tremendous amount from that. And then the second story, the second story briefly is we launched our own movie, The Glow Project. And I'll never forget that it was so incredible that people were buying previews of the movie, you know, like basically a trailer for the movie. People were buying trailers of the movie 10 and 15 at a time at our event because the movie hadn't come out yet. But the trailer gave them a vision of what the movie was. And so they wanted copies of the trailer so they could give it to their girlfriends.

Kym Yancey [00:25:57]:

To share them about this incredible movie getting ready to come out. Now, what's so interesting about that is that that movie was on fire. The woman in charge of marketing for the NASDAQ in New York City so loved the movie, she invited Sandra and the group to come out to New York, and she put up a big picture of the Globe Project and the group on the Times Square video screens.

Sandra Yancey [00:26:19]:

Well, we rang the NASDAQ bell. You know? We premiered it in SoHo.

Kym Yancey [00:26:24]:

We were moving so many— people were buying the movies left and right. And then there comes a time when they don't. And it's almost like a switch. It's like they're buying— it was like if you remember the movie The Secret, which was a phenomenon because it showed us how to communicate a personal development message in a way that people digested differently.

Sandra Yancey [00:26:50]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:26:50]:

And the Glow Project was all about women, and it was selling, and people were buying it like crazy until they didn't. It was almost like a light switch. Almost like one day, sales—

Sandra Yancey [00:27:04]:

it's like watching Billboard, right?

Kym Yancey [00:27:05]:

It rises and rises, and it holds, it holds, it holds, it holds, it holds.

Sandra Yancey [00:27:08]:

And then one day, drops.

Kym Yancey [00:27:11]:

Exactly. No. Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:27:12]:

I'm sure movie premieres are the same way, you know?

Briana Dai [00:27:15]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:27:15]:

Watching just kind of that opening, that rush. And then at some point it trails off.

Kym Yancey [00:27:21]:

And so you ask your question, what do we do? Where do we miss? How do we, you know, we had expectations, you know.

Sandra Yancey [00:27:30]:

Or did it just run its course?

Kym Yancey [00:27:31]:

Or did it just run its course?

Briana Dai [00:27:34]:

It's interesting. Is there maybe a lesson or something that's happened that was a hard lesson to learn that maybe you had to learn more than once? This really isn't an episode about lessons, but I feel like it's kind of lent itself towards that direction.

Sandra Yancey [00:27:58]:

I've had to learn more than once.

Kym Yancey [00:28:01]:

I mean, a lesson, you know, there's a mantra that we have. We even, we even teach this to our managing directors, is book topics, not speakers.

Briana Dai [00:28:11]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:28:13]:

And that's a really— because it's really easy to think, hey, Jane Doe is going to be at our, at our, at our event, and she's an expert in this, this, and this, and that kind of thing. All right, that's not what people buy. Because unless you are a household name, unless you are an Oprah or a Martha Stewart where your name, your name alone is a brand Right? It's its own brand. People buy topics. So the strength of your topic means more than the name of the speaker if the speaker isn't a household name. And that's a real important lesson because of all the events that we do. I mean, we're doing over 2,000 events with all the different kinds of events that we do, 2,000 events a year. And so it's very important.

Kym Yancey [00:29:03]:

These are just, I think the big thing that we've learned is the importance of language, of what you say and how you say it and what you're offering is, don't you think?

Sandra Yancey [00:29:16]:

I'll tell you a painful lesson of mine, short story, but it's painful. And that is, I have had to learn the lesson that that I have, you know, wanted to grow my girlfriends. And I have learned the lesson that I meet someone that I like and I respect and I think they're talented and I befriend them. And then I bring them into my world, the eWomenNetwork world. And I feel like we've become— this is hard to say, you know, the closest of friends. And then I have noticed that when the opportunity has run its course, you know, in eWomenNetwork, there's no falling out or anything, but suddenly the phone quits ringing. I have to get in touch with the fact that part of the friendship was on on me bringing them into my world and that it wasn't always reciprocated. And that when it ran its course in eWomenNetwork, that I really wasn't their friend anymore.

Sandra Yancey [00:30:34]:

That's a hard thing to say, but it has happened to me more than once. And it's become an eye-opener for me. And it's been painful. It's been hurtful. Yeah. And something that I've had to just learn to kind of accept, lick my wounds. It's also made me— I've had to test myself because I've also become more cautious because I didn't want to get hurt. And so I've had to do some real soul searching and around still reaching out to create friendships.

Sandra Yancey [00:31:19]:

Because it's easy to say, I'm not going to do that anymore. And that's not the— that really great people are out there that just really like you for you. And not just because you have stages you can put them on or your endorsement of them that could have impact on them. It's a It's a hard thing. And I'm a, I'm a blip on the scale of, you know, people that probably have to deal with this issue who are real famous, really famous, you know what I mean? And that kind of thing. There is like, how do you trust people that they just want to be in your world because they like you as a person, as opposed to who they can introduce you to or what your endorsement might mean or the access you can provide them. And it's tricky. And I think that comes with it.

Sandra Yancey [00:32:12]:

But it's been interesting to me to see how those relationships can disintegrate pretty quickly, much to my surprise, once it has run its course in that way. It's been hard.

Briana Dai [00:32:26]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:32:27]:

The good news is, because I I totally relate, right? I totally understand. We've also been blessed at the same time with extraordinary, extraordinary friendships that transcend everything. I mean, everything from Hyrum Smith, Ken Cragun, Laura Herring, you know, just different people that have come into our life that would have never come into our life.

Sandra Yancey [00:32:53]:

It's just like you keep trying. You have to keep putting yourself out there, exposing yourself, so to speak. You know what I mean? And know that getting burned by the sun, as wonderful as it is, can hurt sometimes. But that doesn't mean you don't go back out in the sun again.

Kym Yancey [00:33:12]:

Go back out. Yeah.

Briana Dai [00:33:14]:

I think that that's the thing that I love about the both of you is that It doesn't matter if you miss a goal, it doesn't matter if you fall down, it doesn't matter if you misstep, it doesn't matter if you get burned. You have to get back up and you have to keep trying. But the definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over and over and expecting different results. Or is it insanity? It's both.

Kym Yancey [00:33:40]:

Honestly, it is both.

Briana Dai [00:33:43]:

And I— and, and you are really great at not giving up because of a misstep or a missed goal or because you got knocked down. You reflect and you learn from and you approach it differently the next time. And I think that's why Human Network is 25 years strong is because, you know, if you just stop trying every time something didn't work out, we probably wouldn't have a business.

Sandra Yancey [00:34:08]:

No question.

Kym Yancey [00:34:09]:

Yeah.

Briana Dai [00:34:09]:

Like oftentimes goals get missed, things don't work out, and that is just the cost of doing business is knowing that that is going to happen. You are going to miss a goal. But how are you gonna learn from it? How are you gonna grow from it and make sure that you don't make the same mistake or miss the same goal the same way ever again?

Sandra Yancey [00:34:25]:

Right. Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:34:27]:

Yeah. Amazing things happen on the way to being who you are meant to be ultimately.

Sandra Yancey [00:34:33]:

Mm-hmm.

Kym Yancey [00:34:33]:

You know, I mean, you know, music, a musical context is really important for me because it's no different than what an entrepreneur's life is really. You know what I mean? You have to be willing to be marginal in the beginning. You know what I mean? You have to spend a lot of time honing your own craft. I mean, you have to. I mean, you have to. In the music business, we refer to it as woodshedding. You know, I'm a drummer. So you go into a room and you're practicing beats, you know, for hours.

Kym Yancey [00:35:03]:

And, you know, Brianna, you played saxophone. You know how many countless hours that you have, you know, like who you were at the beginning. But you have to be willing to be really bad in the beginning and squeaky and everything else. To begin to all of a sudden—

Sandra Yancey [00:35:17]:

to zero when the environment changes, when the market changes, when, you know, technology changes.

Kym Yancey [00:35:21]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:35:22]:

And all of that. I always say, for me, every master was once a disaster. Anybody that's developed mastery on something at one particular point didn't have it.

Kym Yancey [00:35:31]:

Yeah.

Sandra Yancey [00:35:32]:

You know.

Kym Yancey [00:35:32]:

Yeah. You know, but the, the, those— you can try really, you know, you It's a fact. It's just how it works for a lot of us. You do have to be willing, like you said, Briana, to do the same thing over and over again without making a change or saying, "Hey, what did I learn from this?" It's very important to tap into what did I learn from this? What was the good? What was the bad? But I also think it's important that you know when to crack the bottle of champagne. In other words, it's a question for you as you're listening to this. Is where do you crack the champagne and say, I did it? What does I did it look like for you? Yeah. You know, people, believe it or not, have a hard time answering that question sometimes.

Briana Dai [00:36:20]:

Yeah.

Kym Yancey [00:36:20]:

You know what I mean? What does it look like? You know, what does it feel like? You know, and having that answer, that also helps shape what you're trying to do.

Sandra Yancey [00:36:31]:

Yeah.

Briana Dai [00:36:32]:

I love it. Amazing. I mean, I think there's so much wisdom here, and for anybody listening, I hope that if you take away anything, it is just to stop and reflect. Reflect on the good, reflect on the bad, and learn every step of the way so that you can replicate what worked, so that you can evolve and improve on what didn't, and just continue to climb to the top. Because she doesn't just mean business, she means millions. Make sure you subscribe right now.

Sandra Yancey [00:37:01]:

Right now.

Kym Yancey [00:37:02]:

Yeah. Don't put it off.