How to Build a Million-Dollar Business Alone | Elaine Pofeldt

Elaine Pofeldt | How to Build a Million-Dollar Business Alone

[00:00:00]

Matt Edmundson: Welcome to Push To Be More. My name is Matt Edmundson and we are about to have another conversation with another fantastic person about what truly fuels the journey of life. Today I'm talking with the magnificent Elaine Pofeldt, author of the books Tiny Business, Big Money and the Million Dollar One Person Business, which has got some rave reviews on Amazon, let me tell you.

Now, before we get into that, let me tell you, you can find all the show notes, uh, and transcript, uh, with my conversation today with Elaine over at PushToBeMore. com. That's all one word, PushToBeMore. com. And there's more information about the podcast. And if you like, you can sign up to the newsletter, uh, because whenever we release an episode, we just send you the, the notes, the links, everything.

They go straight to your [00:01:00] inbox. Makes it super easy, super convenient. This episode is proudly powered, I love this phrase, proudly powered by Podjunction. That's a lot of Ps. Uh, the company that helps you build your business with podcasting. Uh, Podjunction is the magic behind the scenes that lets entrepreneurs and business leaders like you, like me, amplify our voices by hosting our own podcast.

Oh yes, but you might be thinking, why start a podcast? Well, let me tell you. My podcast journey has been nothing short of transformational. It's not just about marketing, although podcasting is a really good marketing tool. It's about community, it's about connection, it's about networking, it's about meeting amazing people like Elaine.

It's given me a platform to celebrate my customers, my team, my suppliers, and created a ripple of impact far beyond what I could have imagined. But I get it, the technical stuff can feel, well, daunting. So setup, distribution, getting the tech right, [00:02:00] all of that sort of stuff sounds like a bit of a nightmare.

And honestly, who wants to do podcast production? No one. That's who. It takes a very specific breed of person who wants to do podcast production. And it's just not me. I'm not going to lie. And that's where PodJunction steps in. They are my backstage crew. That makes sure the show goes on flawlessly. You know what you get to do what you love engaging with incredible people and Podjunction takes care of all the nitty gritty details.

So if you've been wondering whether podcasting is the missing puzzle piece in your own growth strategy, maybe it's time to have a chat, uh, chat with a wonderful people at Podjunction. You can find them at podjunction. com. Now, Let's talk about the guest, our wonderful guest, Elaine Pofeldt, is a business journalist featured in Fortune, CNBC, and Forbes, and as I said, she is the author of Tiny Business, Big Money, and the Million Dollar One Person Business, a Yale grad and former Fortune small [00:03:00] business editor, she lives in New Jersey with her four kids, and enjoys yoga, Kickboxing and Long Walks.

Oh, yes. Elaine, welcome to the show. Great to have you here. How are we doing?

Elaine Pofeldt: Oh, thank you, Matt. It's great to be here.

Matt Edmundson: You know what? Full disclosure, ladies and gentlemen, I have two podcasts. Well, I host more than two podcasts, one of which is called the eCommerce Podcast. If you don't know if you're an eCommerce, go check it out.

But we literally have just finished recording that podcast, had a quick cup of tea, and now we're back doing this one. So it just feels like a continuation of what was a fantastic conversation in so many ways.

Elaine Pofeldt: Oh, it was so much fun. Yeah, I can't wait to continue.

Matt Edmundson: Now, before we get too carried away, Elaine, because, you know, I have a habit of doing that, um, let's start with our opening question that we love to ask our guests.

Now, as I said, this show is sponsored by Podjunction, the podcasting geniuses that they are. So my question to you is, if you did have your own podcast, And you could interview [00:04:00] anybody as a guest, someone from your past or your present, the only, the only thing is they've had to have had a big impact on your life, who would you interview and why?

Elaine Pofeldt: It would be Thomas Pynchon, who wrote some of my favorite books, The Crime of Love 49 and Gravity's Rainbow. Even though I'm an entrepreneurship writer, I love literature and what he has in common with a lot of the entrepreneurs I write about was he is An innovator. He's also very elusive. I doubt he would ever be on a podcast anonymously, but I think I would like the challenge of trying to get him on.

But I don't have a podcast, alas, so I just have to read his books and, and hope that I can learn from him as a writer.

Matt Edmundson: So what is it about him and his books that, um, that draws you in?

Elaine Pofeldt: Well, he was very innovative in his writing style and, uh, even just his, uh, style. selection of names for the [00:05:00] characters. I, one of them was Benny Profane, you know, they were just so funny.

Um, but the books are very challenging and really you need to read them a few times to get the full meaning. And I feel like if I read them again now, compared to a few years ago, I'll get even more out of them. And I think that's a sign of, of the depth of, of what he's writing about.

Matt Edmundson: So what sort of stuff does he actually write about?

I mean, I've not actually read, I've not heard of him to be fair, but I've definitely not read one of his books.

Elaine Pofeldt: Well, I think a lot of it has to do with living in the nuclear age. I mean, if you ask what are his books about, there are professors at all the top universities who will tell you what they're about.

And I'm probably just scratching the surface.

A lot of

Elaine Pofeldt: it is about our existence now and the unique moment in time that we're in and what what it all means and kind of the nothingness [00:06:00] in a way that's out there and yet how in the nothingness there's somethingness you know and and where that is.

Matt Edmundson: So they're quite, they're what we would call a deep book.

They're

Elaine Pofeldt: very deep, they're hard work but I like a challenge honestly. I feel like we need to challenge ourselves and They're hard, they're a hard read, really. They really are. But I think it's worth having some time in your life that you put into doing things that are hard because they're so well done.

He's so brilliant. And as a writer, it's just incredible to see someone who is that brilliant and what they do with their gifts. I mean, it's just amazing.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, I love that. There's been quite a few books over the years that I have, um, how, what was, what's the phrase I would use to describe it? Wrestled with, uh, is, is, is probably a, a fair, a fair bet.

So these sound like books I should add to my, my wrestling list. [00:07:00]

Elaine Pofeldt: Get them to the wrestling list for sure, they're not beach reading.

Matt Edmundson: So here you are Elaine, you've written two books, which you know, certainly the first one, I read them the wrong way round, I read the million dollar book second, but Small People Big Business is actually your new book, right?

Elaine Pofeldt: Tiny Business, Big Money. Same idea though. And, uh, it's funny cause I experimented with different titles.

Now, part of me is like tiny. I don't know if tiny resonates, but, but, um, basically the million dollar one person business was the first one. And I looked at solopreneurs getting to. 1 million US dollars and beyond. Uh, and how are they doing that? And then Tiny Business, big Money is the sequel. I kept in touch with a lot of the entrepreneurs I was profiling, and they [00:08:00] started hiring people and apologizing to me for it and saying they weren't one of my million dollar one person businesses, and I'm not against.

Hiring. I, I worked with Vern Harnish who wrote Scaling Up. He's the king of

Matt Edmundson: scaling. He also wrote the Rockefeller Habits, didn't

Elaine Pofeldt: he? Yeah. He wrote that as well. Yeah. Great book. He's a great student of, uh, scaling. And I think every business has its own natural size and that might change over time, but what I was really interested in was people in these million dollar one person businesses were really happy and they had great lifestyles.

Although it was sometimes a work in progress to get the great lifestyle.

Yeah.

Elaine Pofeldt: They had it and they had a lot of time freedom. And so I wondered, how do you keep that when you start adding one or two employees, because once you add other people into the mix and you have to tell them how to do something, it puts new demands on you as a leader.

You are a leader. And if you're a leader of one person. You're now a leader. And a lot of [00:09:00] people that start the one person business have the mindset of never have a boss, never be a boss, which comes from Jason Allen Scott, who founded a podcast company and some other businesses as well. They, they don't want to lose that.

So how do you be a boss without really being a bad boss, I guess, because people. One thing that we see with Gallup research is people quit bad bosses, not companies. The boss has a bad name here, at least in the US, but I think his research, I think the research at Gallup is global. Why is that? I think it has to do with Welcome back to the podcast.

digital age with data, employment structures that no longer serve us, that are very toxic both to the person who has to be the boss, as well as the people that work for them. And we're trying to force fit ourselves into something that really doesn't work in the digital age. And yet it's almost like with software where I think it's [00:10:00] called software debt or technical debt.

You know, where you're building on a bad system and trying to tweak it and you can never really fix it because it just doesn't work anymore.

Yeah.

Elaine Pofeldt: That's kind of what we're doing with the employment system. So I was curious about, okay, what does this look like if done well by people who are making seven figures and happy?

And I found out a lot about what they're doing. And it was just fascinating.

Matt Edmundson: So what was some of the, I'm sucked in, what were some of the things that you found out?

Elaine Pofeldt: Well, a lot of them don't have meetings. Think about what people hate. You know, what is the subject of sitcoms? It's, it's meetings where somebody is pontificating and, you know, wasting everybody's time.

They, they use tech tools to communicate with people. They don't lock themselves into old corporate ways of doing business. And there are ways to scale your messaging. I mean, people are doing things like podcasts within their team, for instance, or using [00:11:00] Notion. Um, they're using SOPs. I mean, that's one thing that sounds so boring, Standard Operating Procedures, but I found in, in my first book, Jamie J.

He wrote a book called Quit Repeating Yourself. He has a, um, a virtual assistant agency called Bottleneck Distant Assistants, and he's the king of the SOP, but a lot of, a lot of these entrepreneurs, they commit to paper or a video or some other form, how they want things done so that they don't have to keep on teaching people how to do it.

They allow people to sort self teach and therefore they can focus on the true job of a leader, which is Is being the visionary for the business and moving it forward and the R& D and all of, all of the things that will make it reach its full potential, whether that's the potential of a two person business or a hundred person business.

One interesting thing that I found because I've been following a lot of these businesses for quite a while [00:12:00] now. Is some of them will stay small and boutique y because the owner wants that. Some become a traditional small business, maybe like the size of your business, um, where they have a team, a regular team, and then others will become a tradition, a traditional startup.

And they'll really scale up. I mean, Brooklyn Inn was like that when I met them. Um, they were a husband and wife team in Brooklyn selling direct to consumer sheets by eCommerce. And then they raise a lot of venture capital. Um, another one is called Birch Benders. I met, they were also a husband and wife team.

They make a pancake mix, a healthy pancake mix. And they were just, Doing it outta their apartment, and then they scaled it up. They, they went to Boulder, Colorado, which is a, uh, a natural foods mecca in the United States. And I think it was sold, actually, I think it may have been sold twice even, but it entered that whole world of transactions and

Mm-hmm.

Elaine Pofeldt: you know, cashing out [00:13:00] and all of that. So. What I took away from this is that if you run a great one person business and your leadership of yourself is the best that it can be, that gives you options where you can go any number of routes that suit you at any given moment. But if you don't even master it at that level, Then you don't have the option.

So that's why podcasts are important.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, that's, that's really interesting. And I, my brain's going 25 different ways now because I, part of me is like, it's interesting, you talked about SOPs. It reminds me of the book, um, by Michael Gerber, The E Myth, you know, I don't know if you ever read that book, The E Myth by Michael Gerber, he talked about.

You know, you, you write everything down and it's, it's almost like McDonald's. You should, you, you should be able to get teenagers to run your business because they understand what the, what we now call SOPs are and they can just follow those, you know, without too much drama. [00:14:00] Um, and that's, so that's interesting.

But then the other part of it, the bit that you just said at the end there, where when you are self employed and it's just you, you've got to get the foundations right if you want to expand, because if you don't, when you try and expand your options are limited. Uh, somewhat. Did I understand that right?

Elaine Pofeldt: Yes. Yes. And well, I think with the SOP, one thing that really gets lost in the whole discussion is you have to customize and we're going into an era where things are going to be more and more standardized, automated, etc. It can be very frustrating, right? If you're dealing with a bot, for instance, I'm sure there was an SOP that said that in this situation, the bot should be used, but then the bot is really stupid and you're going crazy.

You're trying to talk to a customer service rep, right? And it won't let you through and you keep saying it in different ways. So there has to be some element of customization. I think we're seeing some bad. [00:15:00] Sopism right now, usually at a grand scale at the bigger companies, but where the smaller companies can excel is there's a human being that's very close to the technologies and close to the customer and can say to the team, this is basically how we want a customer service email to go.

But you can go off script if needed, and I'm going to give you a certain amount of discretion to use your, Emotional intelligence to handle the situation the way you would like to be treated within a certain budget,

right?

Elaine Pofeldt: You're not going to hand over the keys to the company because somebody didn't like the product, but at the same time, maybe somebody could just give someone a refund and win a customer for life.

And even though technically you don't really want to do that too often. You empower them to use their best judgment and maybe incentivize them

to

Elaine Pofeldt: do that, to read, you know, maybe if there's a dissatisfied customer and you retain [00:16:00] them, then you get a bonus or something. I think that's the other thing where small companies have an edge over big companies because you can give more to the humans that you work with and make it a better experience all around.

Yeah. As opposed to a big company where they're saying to themselves, well, we have to be fair to everybody and we can't make exceptions and everything has to be the same for every person. It can be more like a family where you can, you can lean into what someone does well and reward them for it. Make, make the reward available to all who maybe are doing that work, but customize and make it more human.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, that's super powerful. The, the thing that we found, um, cause I would say that our classes as a traditional small business, you know, I think we've got a team of 15 people or something like that. We're a small company. We're not massive. But we're not tiny either, um, and one of the things that we [00:17:00] found was actually if we could, we can, we can create these SOPs for people to follow, but like you say, when, when it's time to deviate from the script, how do you do that?

And we found actually, if we took the time to, One, hire well. Um, and two, spend time sort of teaching, imparting, educating, whatever language you want to use about the values which matter to us most as a company. Um, and so we found that if a member of staff understood our values, And we hired well, then when it came time to deviate from the script, they would do it.

But the, the boundaries would be the values of the company, if that makes sense. Um, and that works super well, especially in things like customer service.

Elaine Pofeldt: That works very well. That's what Bern Harnish talks about in scaling up is you have your core values and you hire for them, your interview questions, ask about things related to it.

You might [00:18:00] ask people for examples of. How they live those core values. And then if someone, someone isn't following those values and they're not performing well, then you can make a decision about whether you want to keep them, are they, are they exhibiting the core values to their fellow teammates, their, um, customers, et cetera.

It gives you a framework to work from where it's not so personal because as the company grows, you may not know what each person is doing at any given moment, but you can score them against the core values. Are they living them? You know, if it's kindness, are they polite to your customers, are they polite to the other people on the team?

You can, you can evaluate based on that.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, absolutely. No, it's, it's, it's nice actually. And it becomes slightly, it becomes a lot more autonomous, doesn't it? When you, when you do that. Um, I'm, I'm curious about the family comment. Cause I, I, [00:19:00] again, I run a small. Company. We have a team. I would say we're very much like family.

Um, and so we, we tend to squabble like family. We tend to have fun like family. Um, but family in its own right is not always a good thing. You can become a bit over familiar. There can be a little bit of a lack of accountability. How have you, how have you found it, you know, with, with the, with the books and the research and the dealing with small businesses?

How do I, how do I avoid that pitfall?

Elaine Pofeldt: Well, they do have to be boundaries where something needs to be delivered. It has to be delivered and someone has to be accountable if it isn't done. I think it's good to be a family, but they're also dysfunctional families too. So we all have to be mindful of that, right?

But there can be toxic fighting and squabbling in a family or, or friendly fighting. It's good to have some ground rules. I [00:20:00] know, um, you know, with my own children and I'm sure you have children too, right? Someone might cross the boundaries with something, you know, cursing at another person or something.

And I'll say, we're not that kind of a family where we curse at each other if we're angry. Um, it's a little different in a business cause you're not their parent, but you can set a tone for things through your own behavior as a leader, as to, you know, You know, what is a fair squabble, or what do we do if there's a disagreement?

What is completely out of bounds and outside of normal where we would bring in outside help if that happened? And you might not really even be aware of all the situations where things will come up until they do, but that's where talking to other business owners is helpful. There are a number of groups, uh, like EO, for instance, where there are forums.

I'm a big believer in community, um, because you don't want to become too overly familiar either. I think it's also [00:21:00] important to have ground rules about why you're there. I know I had a long time business with Elizabeth McBride, another business journalist, where we would do scalable projects together, and our motto was no stress.

So, whenever We had to decide if we were going to take on something. We started it when our children were very little and we were both managing, working with having small children. We would say no to things that we thought it was going to be a really stressful client. Maybe it was prestigious, but not worth it really because we didn't have the bandwidth to do that kind of handholding for instance.

And it was a really helpful rule. We'd always go back to that. Is this Fitting our no stress rule.

Matt Edmundson: It sounds like a dream. Business, but no stress. I think that could be the title of your third book.

Elaine Pofeldt: That's a good idea. Along those lines, I, I don't have that nailed down [00:22:00] completely though. I was

Matt Edmundson: going to say, when you do nail that down, I think that's a bestseller.

The No Stress Business. Um, and, uh, so I, I'm intrigued. You live in New Jersey. Um, you've written two books, which sounds like, well, it doesn't sound like an easy task, Elaine. I'm not going to put it, uh, you know, I don't know. It just does not sound easy to me. You, you're a journalist, you're four kids. How do you, how do you juggle it all?

Elaine Pofeldt: That's a good question. It has changed over time because when my children were little, a lot of my day had to revolve around their needs. I always worked full time. I never took time off. I basically always worked really from giving birth, um, because I, when I worked at Fortune Small Business, the first four years, I had a really wonderful work from home arrangement and my oldest children were preemies actually, my twins, and they were in the hospital for three months.

So I [00:23:00] would, I needed the health insurance, et cetera. And I won't go into all the details of that, but basically I would work in the house for a few hours and then I'd go to the NICU and spend the whole rest of the day with them I always loved my work. I think that helps. I love writing. I'm a very social person.

I really enjoy interviewing people. I love the subject matter. So it doesn't feel like work. I do a lot of things and I feel like I'm just being paid to have fun because I love entrepreneurs. I, I love this world. I stumbled into it for whatever reason, it syncs up nicely with who I am. So that helped a lot.

I think choosing. The area that you go into wisely and not like I, as I mentioned, I love English literature. I was an English literature major. I never studied business. I just fell into it and I found I really enjoy it. I love reading about private equity and things like that. I don't know why it's mysterious to me.

I just like it. Go with it. [00:24:00] If you find that there's some weird interest that you, I'm not even saying business is weird, you know, just something weird for you. Never thought you'd be interested in it. Maybe go with it, you know, give it a chance. And in terms of balance, I always found that prioritizing my physical health was important when I had a lot of demands on my time.

I, I remember with my twins, when they came home from the hospital, they were colicky, I would do yoga, they'd be swinging in these chairs, these baby chairs, and I have it on a video. And it was insane, you know, to try to do yoga with these screaming children, but I tried to do it, or I'd go walking with them, then I had my younger daughter, they'd be in a triple stroller, but I felt like.

Getting out in the sunlight, doing something physical was a relief from just being on the computer or doing household things all the time. And then as I had more freedom, I tried to make more time for friends, you know, [00:25:00] just making sure that a few times a month, at least that I would go for lunch with somebody and keep my friendships alive, because that's really important too, for balance, just for your mental health.

And I kind of stuck with that all the way through. I've been in business for, since 2007 for myself, and it really served me well. I would say you have to keep evolving too, because a lot of balance is not getting bored with things. So I would keep on adding different things. I moved from doing only journalism to.

Content marketing. And then I started doing some ghost writing and private editing. And when I edit on the books, I found that project management is very important. You can't do a book all in one shot. There are people that say, Oh, I'm an all or nothing person. I'm going to write it in a weekend.

You

Elaine Pofeldt: can do an outline and book proposal in a year.

If you're lucky, I'm [00:26:00] talking about for a good book, because you've got to check out your idea. You've got to test it in the marketplace to see if people are interested, whether it's through your social media, YouTube, LinkedIn, whatever it is, you, you want to make sure you're just not screaming into the wind that people actually are interested in what you're talking about, because a book isn't a lecture, a one way conversation.

It's a conversation. It's a two way conversation, really, and it has to be about the reader. So I would first put the idea out there for a while as a journalist. And I had the advantage that I was writing about what I wanted to write the books about already, but I would pay attention to the feedback. And then that helped me with shaping the idea.

And my agent helped me a little bit with the, um, the proposal in terms of shaping it and teaching me how to do it. But basically I would say, okay. These are the chapters in the outline this weekend. I'm [00:27:00] going to work on the intro for this chapter only. And then, you know, during the week, I'll work on the section of the chapter that's telling us what the chapter is about and chunk it up.

And I think chunking things up like that. To maximize your attention is also important. Working when you don't have good attention is really not helpful. That would be when I would call a friend or exercise or do something else that would kind of recharge the battery, and I would usually have, and I still do have about three good chunks of work time every day, and I try not to work.

Outside of those chunks, if you try to go straight through, I know some people do cause they want to have boundaries around their work day. I don't think you're as productive and you don't get as much done. I don't know. Do you find that?

Matt Edmundson: No, I totally find that Elaine. I'm exactly the same way. I find that I, if I sat down at my desk at nine o'clock in the morning and tried to work three to five, I can [00:28:00] do it.

Um, but it's just not me really. Um, but if I, if I have, I find sort of two, two and a half hours are good slots for me. Um, And I have very specific moments in the day where I, I'll just cut up, I won't have an agenda. I'm just like, in this section, I'm going to do what Cal Newport called deep work. So you know, you switch off all the distractions and, um, and you just get into something and it's just, it's great.

And it works well for me, but I've got to then go and go for a walk afterwards, or I've got to do a workout or I've got to do something physical. Um, Before I, before I try and become mega productive again, if I go all the way through, I tend to, I tend to have a nap at three o'clock because I'm knackered, you know, um, I don't know if it's an age thing.

Elaine Pofeldt: One other thing I just thought of, as you said, that was working with nice people. I know that sounds kind of basic, but one thing I learned with having many different clients is if you [00:29:00] skew your client list towards nice people, it makes a lot of things easier. You know, people that are power mad, you know, demand that you be on a call on one minute's notice or whatever that really prevents you from serving all the other clients well, and it creates a lot of stress.

It throws your whole life out of balance. And over time, I just winnowed away anybody who was an egomaniac or really inconsiderate. And I feel like a hundred percent of my clients are now nice people. It has infinite value. I also just enjoy working with them and I learn from them. So I would recommend that to people as well.

Just really think about. Who you find nice. And it sounds so simplistic, , but there are a lot of people in the business world who are not nice at all. Mm-Hmm. . And you have to stay away from them, I think, because they will drain your work life [00:30:00] balance.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah. That, that, it's an interesting one, isn't it? I think one of the, the lessons you learned as I, as you've been in business for a little certainly that I've learned as, as you stay in business for a while, is learning who to say no to.

And actually having the freedom to say no to people, um, when I remember when I was, we first started out in, in business and I was, I was sat in my room doing website design and, you know, coding up websites and we had no money. At this point we were, we were quite desperate for money and, uh, my, I have three kids now, but I had one at the time, my oldest child, you know, newborn baby-ish, um, maybe eight, nine months old, something like that.

Sharon, my wife, um. was full time mum at this point she wanted to be a full time mum so we so income was was on me and I'm like we have nothing coming in [00:31:00] and a guy came to me and asked me to do a website and I thought oh great you know we've got we've got in a project we're gonna get some money in Until I found out that what he actually wanted me to do was write a porn site, to create a porn site, and I'm like, you know, it's one of those where my value set is such that there's no way I can do that, um, and just, and feel any kind of comfort with myself at all.

I just wouldn't have been able to do it. And so, I, I had to refuse. that on the basis of my values, but it's hard when you're starting out in business to say no to clients because you need the money. But as you get older, I think, and as your business grows, what it does do is it affords you the ability to say no to people and not stress about it as much.

Elaine Pofeldt: Absolutely. Because you, you realize that it will cost you more than it's worth. You'd be better off [00:32:00] hustling up other work or doing some bread and butter boring work that's been on the back burner that you should be doing, or even just planting seeds. I think for a lot of people this year, because of inflation, which is a fairly global problem right now, their businesses were slower.

I hear this. I think one of the, you know, Things that happens as an entrepreneur is you see all the other people kind of crowing about their achievements and things that are going well, and you can feel very lonely if things are slow. I know from the off the record conversations, a lot of people are hurting this year and their costs are very high.

What do you do in those years? Well, you and I have both been through a few recessions now in the course of our businesses, you plant seeds.

And a lot

Elaine Pofeldt: of times there's a lot of output, you'll have a period of. Trying new things, experimenting, collaborating with other people, building, building, building, and nothing comes to fruition.

And then all of a sudden something happens [00:33:00] externally, like the interest rates go down and your clients are spending again, then you have more work than you can handle. I think in those periods where it's lean, sometimes cost cutting in your personal life can help. There might be one or two things you can just drop.

And find some other thing to do in its place, you know, shop around for a better phone plan or something like that, where. You know, or one week of camp instead of two or little things like that, where you can get through it and meanwhile reap all the benefits of planting the seeds and really reverting to what you should be doing anyway, but we don't do, and we're busy, which is being the leader of our business and being the visionary and doing business development.

One of the things I learned in doing both, uh, the million dollar one person business and tiny business, big money is. Business development, most of these people spend a good part of the week on that, like on R& D [00:34:00] or business development, sometimes the whole day out of the week, but how do they get that day, they lean heavily into automation on the mundane parts of the business, use their CRM very effectively, they master that, or whatever is valuable to that particular business, so that they do have the time for it.

The creative and higher level thinking of an entrepreneur.

Matt Edmundson: That's really good. That's really good. I like that. Work with nice people. And I think that applies to staff. I think that applies to customers. Um, and I like the idea of business development, um, being at the forefront, uh, and I just love the phrase planting seed, you know, seed time and harvest, uh, what you sow you shall reap.

Um, and you, you can't reap unless you first sow, you know, it's a, it's a very logical step. I'm not a farmer, but I can figure that out. Right. And so, um, I, I, I love that kind of thing. I think it's so true. I think it's [00:35:00] so true. How do you, um, how do you In all of that, um, Elaine, I'm listening to you talk and I'm hearing you just casually drop phrases like, Oh, I had twins and they were premature and they were in the, uh, yeah, I think you call it the NICU, the, the, and I was working a full time job and I was like, it was just, you just sort of rolls off your tongue.

How do you build that level of resilience? Because that's, that's what I hear when you talk. I'm thinking, man, this is one resilient lady. How did you do that? But where did that come from is maybe a better question. I think

Elaine Pofeldt: it was pretty clear on what I wanted. I wanted to have a family and I wanted to do what I was doing to do the career that I had.

I wanted to find a way to combine both of them. So I was highly motivated to find The Solutions That I Needed. If I was doing a job that I hated, but had to work and was angrily doing it and had the [00:36:00] kids, I may have not been as resilient. So I think one key is to really orient your life around what you love.

And both things were very important to me. I mean, if I had to choose, I would choose my children. I think like most mothers and parents, you would choose your kids. Then, but I didn't have to choose because I had a very flexible type of career. Being a writer, I'm very lucky. But e-commerce, you know, you, I know you're heavily in that world.

That's another world where you have a lot of control over your time. Mm-Hmm. . And that's why I got so interested in entrepreneurship in the beginning because. There are a lot of systems that take control of your time. The traditional employment system does for the most part, it's gotten a little bit better since the pandemic, but I see on LinkedIn, a lot of young women with small children are posting about how.

They've been squeezed out of the workplace or the workplace is really inflexible. And I feel like it's such a loss [00:37:00] to those companies because these are really talented and smart people, but the system is so rigid that it can't accommodate the fact that women and men's lives are very different and every family is different, but for the most part, you know, if a child has to go to the doctor's office, I've seen surveys on this in almost a hundred percent of the families in the U S.

It will be the mother who takes them. That's just reality. I don't know why it's like that. It's probably true in many households. If something happens with the car, that the dad will deal with that. But not always. There might be some women that love cars and they're the one who deals with it. There's some stereotypes to that.

I think there's some reality in people's lived experience and when you have more flexible structures in your life, like having your own business, you're not so subject to that. You can just live your life, live your family the way you and your mate have worked out. Or if you're, you don't have a [00:38:00] mate, maybe you have friends or whatever, you live the way that you want.

And no one can tell you it's wrong because it doesn't fit into this system. And that's what interested me because the system, it seemed logical from the point of view of the owners who are profiting, but more and more really, since the Jack Welsh era, it has become so worker unfriendly.

Matt Edmundson: And

Elaine Pofeldt: it hurts people.

They feel like something is wrong with them. Why can't they fit into this? Why can't they travel 25 days out of the month when they have small children? It's inhumane. And people are saying enough to that. And it's. I have to find another way. And what changed over the last 30 years that was very positive was the cloud.

You know, so many tools are available to us if we're willing to learn them, so we can work from home. There are so many women, for instance, with small children now have home based businesses, but men too, there's a lot of [00:39:00] men. Including, um, Richard Branson. One of the things about him that's really interesting, he has very close relationships with his children.

He always worked from home and many men have a lot of pain about that, that they've had to travel so much and they couldn't spend as much time as they went with their children. And that's really time you cannot get back. Now we can make that choice. And I think. I have never met anyone who made it, who regretted it, even if the business failed, they knew they made an attempt and they also learned from it and they can now apply it to something else in the future.

Even if it's going back into a company, if you can think like a business owner, you're so valuable.

Matt Edmundson: Oh, without a doubt. You are. I love. Yeah. I mean, my, I think my creed, I suppose I've said this to a lot of people is, um, I always wanted to succeed at home first. And that was always one of my driving things, you know, and it didn't matter what the [00:40:00] business did.

If I wasn't succeeding at home, it, it, it never made any sense to me. So I've been married for 26 years. I've got three great kids. We get on really well. I feel like that's a good job done. And one of the, the other thing that I was thinking, as you were talking, one of the things that I realized, um, a few years ago, um, was there is a, or there was at the time it's in, I think it's slightly shifted now, but.

There was a bunch of ladies who had had kids, you know, they'd had two or three kids and they'd maybe been stay at home mums with the kids while they were growing up. The kids were like nine, ten years old now, you know, whatever sort of age, um, but they're sort of full time in school, you know, and so the mums are like wanting to return back to work, but they've been out of the workforce maybe for, I don't know, eight, 10 years.

And so their confidence has fallen. And I remember we hired somebody, a friend [00:41:00] of mine, a mom returning back to work, who before she had kids was insanely competent. I mean, high level executive, kind of very, very good at their job, um, came to me, wanted to work, uh, she was returning back to work. The money was not the issue, the flexibility was the issue.

And so I just thought to myself, if I can be flexible here, I am going to get one of the most astounding people because she had all these skills and then she became a mum. A mum, I think, looking at my wife, you learn how to be resilient, how to juggle 25, 000 balls in the air, how to get things done, how not to panic, you know, in stressful situations.

I'm like, These are ideal qualities. And so I would say that most of the really good hires I've made over the last, I don't know, five, six years have been mums returning back to work.

Elaine Pofeldt: That's great to hear that, that you're recognizing the value. I, I. [00:42:00] I do a series for the New York Public Library, the Tiny Business Big Money series, and imposter syndrome comes up all the time.

We have a spreadsheet where people can submit their questions, and I think many people feel imposter syndrome, you know, when they're starting a business or taking a new job, but I definitely think for mothers, It's particularly true because they've been so devalued. But I agree with you, all of the skills of being a successful mother, the organizational skills, the creativity, the networking and gathering of informal information.

You know, what is the best camp in this town for a 14 year old boy? That kind of thing. It's very valuable in the business world. And I'm surprised more people. Don't recognize it. Yeah. I, I really am, but I think they're too caught up in enforcing rules and this sort of top down hierarchical thing and power and all that stuff.

Those are not good companies for that many [00:43:00] people to work for. They're only ideally suited for a few and. What I see with the growth of these small businesses is more people are just voting with their feet and getting out of those systems. Yeah. Or they're doing something on the side so that if they have to leave, maybe they need some of the structures that come with it, like a weekly paycheck.

Maybe they haven't totally nailed their revenue model or in the US a lot of people do it for the benefits for the healthcare.

Yeah.

Elaine Pofeldt: We don't have the same as other countries, unfortunately, um, and it can bankrupt you if you don't have health insurance. So people have to do what they have to do, but they're still learning constantly in that role.

But yeah, I agree with you and I really applaud you for, you know, For giving those moms a chance. Jenna Kutcher, one of the entrepreneurs in tiny business, big money, her whole team is women seeking flexibility. And one of the benefits she offered was, uh, if they meet certain revenue goals, giving them [00:44:00] July off, because one of the things I find as a work at home mother, it's gotten better over time, but, uh, A lot of times you wish you could be, you know, at the pool alongside the state for mothers all day, you know, and, and spending that time with your kids, but you do have your clients and you have your responsibilities.

And so I was always kind of toggling where, you know, maybe my friends could go for the whole day, but I could go for two hours or something like that. And I felt like, well, it's better than nothing. If I was in New York city in my office, it would only be on the weekends. If that was the case, I would have to make the best of it, and I would, but it's always nicer if you have control.

And you can also flex your attention, where maybe sometimes your business needs more attention, or a client needs more attention, and your kids are kind of, you know, they're off in school, or they're in camp, or whatever. They're with their friends and they don't need your attention. So you lean into the business and sometimes your kids need more attention and [00:45:00] you have to flex to that.

My son, uh, he recently had mononucleosis and then he had his appendix out like in short succession and. It put a lot of demands on me because there was a lot of medical stuff going on, but because I had the flexibility, I didn't have to keep telling a boss, Oh, you know, this week my son has his appendix out.

I could just do what I needed to do as a responsible mom and attend to his emotional needs too. It's not just racing him to the doctor,

but,

Elaine Pofeldt: you know, there's other parts of being a parent too. That this lends itself well to.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, no, I agree. I, I, it's great that you can do that. I think that's one of the benefits of running your own business, isn't it?

Um, and I, yeah, I can just say for employees listening out there, mom's returning back to work right deal. They need confidence. You've got to give them confidence and you've got to give them flexibility. And if you can do those two things, you will find very talented people who will be very loyal and have a really big impact on your business.

[00:46:00] Um, in so many ways, I think about. There's a lady that works with us, um, Michelle, she's one of my long standing employees. I have two people that have been with me, I think almost the same time. She's been with me like 18 years and she was a mum returning back to work, um, and retrained, you know, when I owned an accounting company, she retrained as a bookkeeper, has been with us all this time and just stayed and she's She's now the, you know, the group CFO and she's, she is just adorable and I owe a lot to her.

But again, just, she's, she's, she reminds me a lot of my own mum in the sense that very stoic, very resilient, nothing is too much trouble, um, doesn't complain a whole great deal. Um, And when she does, you usually listen because there's something really wrong. Um, but just wonderful. And so, yeah, I, I'm very, very grateful, uh, for mums, uh, going [00:47:00] back into the workforce.

Very grateful. It's radically changed our business in so many ways.

Elaine Pofeldt: They bring a lot of soft skills too, I think, that are valuable. They're the hard skills that they have maybe from their previous career. But also just being a mother, EQ is so important in today's workforce and things like collaboration.

I mean, when you, you have a family too, right, trying to get your kids to all collaborate on something, you have to really read the room and you have to understand that each person is different and has different things that will motivate them and has different skills, different things they need to learn.

different ways you need to communicate with them to get the message through and has things to teach you. And I think being a parent really teaches you those things. Those are not necessarily things you're going to learn in a Silicon Valley startup. You might, but you might not. And it's valuable. And, and I think it has a monetary value to the business because that [00:48:00] person with the EQ is talking to your customers or collaborating with your team members and making it a better place to work.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, yeah, it is. The soft skills. Love that. And I'm, I'm aware this conversation is just, is wonderful. Um, and I've not asked you half the questions I had planned today. Uh, what do you do to refill your tank? How do you stay on top of things? How do you recharge your battery? I know you mentioned yoga. We talked about kickboxing, which I, I'm in awe of.

Um, but what sort of, what sort of, how do you stay sharp?

Elaine Pofeldt: Well, those are the, those are the yin and yang of my workouts. Sometimes you need the yoga, sometimes the kickboxing and, and it's, it's good to really have a physical outlet. I think if you're working on a computer. You know, because just tension builds up in your body.

But I find making time to talk to friends is really important. And a lot of times I combine it. I also like to go on long walks simply because it gives me a [00:49:00] chance to talk to my friends on the phone and catch up. And I do a lot of brainstorming with them. A lot of my friends have come out of the work that I do.

Um, I sometimes do these super long interviews that are like five part series and in the course of that, I get to know people and I've really become friends with them and, um, it keeps my life very interesting. I've had a long period where it was hard for me to really go into New York City much and go to business events and things because my family was here and I had a lot of obligation.

And now my kids are a little bit older. And I can do that more. So I try to do that, go to events and lectures and things where I can, or even join a Zoom event if I can. I think we all need a lot of different inputs so we get out of our own head.

Yeah.

Elaine Pofeldt: Reading is really important. I love listening to podcasts.

A lot of times, if I find a writer that I like, I just go into YouTube and I look up every single [00:50:00] podcast. And I listen to them all on my walks in between calling my friends. And that helps me a lot too, because I learn a lot about their ideas, but also, um, packaging of information and communication and how they're getting their messaging out.

Cause I'm a professional communicator, so I can always get better at what I do. And I also help other book authors and I try to see where. Maybe, you know, someone else might be better at being a YouTube star than me or whatever. I think about the people I'm serving and who would have the skill set to excel at this, you know, and do what this author is doing.

I mean, some people are public speakers, some are on video, some are on social media, etc.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, no, it's great. I have to be honest, I do the same sort of thing. If I come across somebody or piece of content that I like, I'm like, okay. I am a, I'm a sucker. I go down the rabbit hole. I am, you know, finding out all the stuff they've done on, [00:51:00] uh, YouTube and, and, and, and all that sort of stuff.

It's, I find it super helpful. So, uh, in, in closing, uh, Elaine, what does, what does more look like for you? What does growth look like? What's tomorrow look like? Is there a third book? Um, what's, what's the future hold?

Elaine Pofeldt: I'm doubling down on the million dollar one person business idea right now because there has been so much growth in the number of these businesses and I think with AI, although there are some negatives to AI that we're still working out as a global society, There are a lot of advantages for the one person business who can learn the prompts and everything else.

And probably today's tools are going to seem so clunky, they'll be like the old mobile phone that you had to carry in a suitcase. And we're not even going to believe this is what AI was, um, but that will empower more people to start their own businesses and grow them. And it's going to remove a big barrier to entry.

Which is capital [00:52:00] because a lot of things will be done for free or for a very low cost using these AI tools. So deploy whatever money you have for the business into the things that can't be done by AI or automation or an app or a tool. So I think that's going to be very exciting and interesting. I'm not sure of the topic for the next book.

I think it will probably be. In that area somewhere, um, my reporting usually shows me the way because I start to see the unanswered questions. That's why I always encourage people to write to me because I really want to know how I can be helpful. I have these skills at asking questions and finding the entrepreneurs and I want to be of service.

I think we all do. We don't want to just be, you know, guessing at what people need. So I try to really listen to the marketplace and readers. And I have three girls who will be in college this fall. I have twins who are sophomore, going [00:53:00] into junior year. And then I have one who will be a freshman. So it'll be me and my son at home.

And, um, so I'm transitioning, you know, like I'm not an empty nester. Um, And I won't be for a while, but I have a little more space in my life

for

Elaine Pofeldt: friends and for travel and things that were put on hold temporarily. So I'm looking forward to that. I'm looking forward to doing more speaking, not just on zoom, but in person, because I always love that.

I'm going to new places. Um, More reading of fiction and then other things like that, more yoga. I actually, I, it's funny, cause I was thinking if you like simpler things, then your life is always happy. You know, if, if, if everything depends on material things, then you're really subject to a lot of, you know, External forces make you unhappy.

But if you just enjoy daily life, however it is, I was telling one of my friends this morning, I feel [00:54:00] like I'm on vacation, even though I'm working every day, because I really, I like where I live right outside of New York city, but I'm not right in it. So I don't have to worry about where to put my car and things like that.

You know, I, like, especially now with my all four kids at home temporarily, I enjoy my family life and I have my work and my family. So I I'm very blessed and my friends.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, that's lovely. That's lovely. And I, uh, yeah, I think it's, um, it's an interesting phase of life, isn't it? Because my similar story with my kids too, one has just graduated from uni.

I, I mean, he's at home now, but I don't think he'll ever move back into that. I mean, he might do, but I don't think he'll move back into home. He's got no plans to. Um, my middle child is away for the whole summer lifeguarding on a beach in Jersey, as in the Island off the North coast of France. Um, but he'll graduate next year.

Um, [00:55:00] and now he's a qualified lifeguard. He'll be traveling for the next few years. I'm not going to see him. He'll be on a beach somewhere in the world for the next few years. And then my daughter, she's sort of 17. Is now looking at university. Does she want to go to university? Yes or no? I think there's some conversations that she wants to have around that.

I don't actually know, but it's just a really interesting phase of life where some of my kids have left, some of them haven't. I'm kind of in this in between stage, but I have a lot more capacity in my diary. And I still don't seem to have more money in my bank account. They still seem to take all of that, but you know, um, it's just a really interesting phase, isn't it?

It's an interesting phase of life that I think, um, I, I've enjoyed having them at home. Don't get me wrong. And I, I love having them back, but I'm also quite enjoying this new sense of, oh, I wonder what's next, you know,

Elaine Pofeldt: It's funny, one of the Million Dollar One Person businesses said something about not being afraid to leave one shore [00:56:00] when you can't see the next one, and I think that's very much this, this phase of life is a lot like that, where you really don't know what's next and you're open to it, And you're kind of saying universe, tell me what's about to unfold.

But it's just becoming clear in small increments by the day.

And

Elaine Pofeldt: you have to be open to the journey. That's where yoga helps me, reminding me that I can't be impatient as to what's next, but just keep putting good inputs in and surrounding yourself with good and stimulating people. So that you go in the right direction and you get good ideas about what to do with your time, because time is finite.

You can go in a lot of different directions. I do know, like for me, I have no desire to retire because I love what I do. And I see a lot of people, they retire on their own terms. They're not really retiring. But they may scale back so they can travel more. And I think that's going to become very interesting in the years to [00:57:00] come because of digital nomadism and so many interesting trends that are intersecting.

So and plus people are staying healthy for such a late age. I mean, both of my parents are in their 80s and they still work. And They love it. My dad's a working photographer. He goes on trips to Africa with his girlfriend. And I feel like that's really changing things. We have a much longer horizon to do interesting projects and things.

And the key is really taking care of ourselves so that we can avail ourselves of that. There's an element of luck and good fortune to that that is out of our control, but to the extent we can control it, It's, I think it's really important to really prioritize our, our wellness and whatever that means to us so that we can enjoy a creative life for a long time to come.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah. Very good. Elaine, listen, I love our conversations and I feel like I could just, we could do five of them, you know, [00:58:00] five deep interviews and just keep going and going and going. Um, but you know, how do people reach you? How do they connect with you if they want to do that? What's the best way?

Elaine Pofeldt: They can reach me on LinkedIn, Facebook, or X under my full name, which is in the show notes and on Instagram under million dollar one person business.

Please do write to me. I write back. I love to know what's on your minds, what you'd like me to research as a reporter or in my next book. It really helps me to get better. And I also feel like we all need to connect and support each other in this entrepreneurial community because it can get lonely. You can feel like you're the only one.

But one benefit I have from talking to so many people as a reporter is I can almost guarantee you that you're not the only one, whatever it is, you're not the only one. But there's more of us and, uh, I really love to hear from people that thank you so much Matt for what you do, by the way, because you're a catalyst.

You're bringing people together around these ideas and this incredible journey that we have of [00:59:00] entrepreneurship and what you do is so important. I mean, sometimes. I think the content creators and the catalysts, they don't always get the recognition for the enormous work that they're doing, but this is so, so important and so valuable to so many.

Matt Edmundson: Oh, it's really kind of you to say so, Elaine, and uh, I appreciate it very much so, um, and appreciate you coming on the show, obviously, uh, and it's been wonderful to get to know you. And so, uh, if you haven't done so already, do check out our podcast recording over on the eCommerce Podcast, where we talk a bit more about the book, so learning from the book, um, and how it works for EP, um, and so, yeah, do check that out.

And of course, we will link to, Elaine's info in the show notes, which will be on your podcast app. You know, just click on the show notes and Elaine's links will be in there. Um, there'll be also on the website, pushtobemore. com. Um, and also if you sign up to the newsletter, there will be in your inbox, but Elaine, you're a legend.

Thank you so much for coming on. [01:00:00]

Elaine Pofeldt: Thank you so much, Matt. What a pleasure.

Matt Edmundson: Well, that's a wrap on another great conversation, a massive round of applause. In fact, let me, I really should get this queued up better. Hang on a second. A massive round of applause. There we go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, for joining us today.

Elaine Pofeldt: We want a copy of that to play for myself when I'm feeling low, right?

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm just not feeling great. Hang on. There we go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, uh, I just have so much fun with this sound desk. Anyway, uh, a huge thanks today also to our champion sponsor, Podjunction, for all you changemakers out there contemplating podcasting as your new marketing thing.

Have a look, check them out, podjunction. com. Uh, they're great people. Now remember to keep pushing to be more. Don't forget to follow the show wherever you get your podcasts from, because we've got some more seriously compelling conversations coming and I don't want you to miss any of them. And [01:01:00] in case no one's told you yet today, let me be the first.

You are awesome. Yes, you are created awesome. It's just a burden you've got to bear. Elaine's got to bear it. I've got to bear it. You've got to bear it as well. Now this show, as I've said, is produced by PodJunction. Transcript show notes all on the website. Big kudos to the PodJunction team that makes this show possible.

But that's it from me. That's it from Elaine. Thank you so much for joining us. Have an awesome week. I'll catch you on the flip side. Until then, keep on pushing.

[01:02:00]