Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business Podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon, and today I'm joined by Shari Leid. Author, speaker, and founder of the Flip the Box Movement. Shari helps leaders and entrepreneurs turn disconnection into a strategic advantage, strengthening relationships, improving communication, and leading with more clarity and confidence. She's also the author of Table for 51, a project that took her across all 50 states.

exploring the role of connection in leadership and life. So Shari, welcome to the show.

Shari Leid (02:22.754)

Thank you. It's great to talk to you today.

Shauna Lynn Simon (02:25.426)

I'm super excited to talk to you as well. And so I want to talk about like some of the things that I kind of said in your intro there can come across as sort of buzzwords essentially for some of the people listening. I think we all get a little bit fatigued sometimes by some of the buzz that's out there, but we're gonna get it down to the actual meat of things. So when you talk about connection and you say that connection is a driver of performance, what are we talking about in kind of plain language? What does that mean?

Hey there and welcome back to the Real Woman Real Business Podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And today I want to talk about something that comes up more often than I care to admit in a lot of conversations that I have with women surrounding their business, especially in industries like home staging, interior design, business coaching and consulting, and really any service-based business where it can feel kind of like everybody is watching everybody. And the topic I want to talk about is actually competitors. And

As someone who comes from a background in home staging, in staging, we like to consider our competitors colleagues. It's a very collaborative industry, but it doesn't necessarily mean that we're always feeling super collaborative, especially when we're watching what other people are doing online and seeing. It's really easy to look around when you're building a business and you want to know what are other people charging? What are they offering in a staging business, for example? What are the rental terms someone else is offering? An interior design, what type of services are they offering?

Hey there and welcome back to How to Sell Your Home Staging Business, a Real Women Real Business Podcast mini-series for home stagers who are thinking about what it could like to eventually sell their business or at least make sure that they have some options in order before that day comes. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon, and I have been walking you through over the last few episodes many different elements of selling your home staging business. We've talked about

Exit readiness, sellability, numbers, valuation, inventory systems, systems and operations, team members, and transferability. And we've done this through the lens of what a buyer is going to be looking at in your business. And as we've identified, it's not all that different sometimes to selling a house. And of course, as home stagers, we know a whole lot about that. But today I want to talk about what happens once the business actually starts to move forward with the sale.

Welcome back to How to Sell Your Home Staging Business, a Real Women Real Business Podcast mini-series for home stagers who are starting to think about what it could look like eventually to sell their business. And they want to build a profitable business now that also builds a valuable and sellable asset for later. So I'm your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And in the last episode, we talked about inventory. And we talked about why your inventory matters, but it is not the actual business.

Inventory supports value when it helps the business to produce revenue in a clear and organized, transferable way. But a warehouse full of furniture on its own is not the same as a sellable business. And it does not contribute to the listing price of your business the way that you might think that it does, nor does your annual revenue that you're bringing in. So if you haven't listened to that episode, I highly recommend you go back and listen to that first. This is part five today. We've got four other

parts to this series that we've already recorded that you can go back and listen to. And all of the information in those, each one adds on to the next. So if you haven't listened to some of those previous episodes, please go back and do that before listening to today's episode. Because today we're going one layer deeper. Because once a buyer now understands what assets are included in the business, the next question they're going to have is can this business actually continue without the current owner?

Hello, and welcome to the Real Women Real Business Podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And today's guest is Kalee Boisvert, a financial advisor, author, and speaker who helps women build wealth while staying true to themselves. With over 15 years in finance and an MBA in finance, Kalee blends practical money conversations with honest reflections on identity, self-worth, and what it really means to create a life that feels good to live.

So we're be talking about why money is really just about money and how to redefine rich in a way that supports your business and your capacity. So Kalee, welcome to the show.

Kalee Boisvert (02:25.666)

Thank you. Thank you so much for having me.

Shauna Lynn Simon (02:27.982)

I'm so excited to have you here because money conversations are my jam. This is something we talk about quite often on this show. And I don't think we can possibly ever say enough things about it. So I want to dive in right away to something that actually came up in your bio there. And that is that you say that money is rarely just about money. Tell me what you mean by that.

Welcome back to the How to Sell Your Home Staging Business Podcast mini series, a real women, real business podcast mini-series, specifically for home stagers who are starting to think about what it could look like to eventually sell your business and want to build a profitable business now and build a valuable and sellable asset. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And in the last episode, we talked about your numbers. Hopefully, you have recovered from any stress that that might have caused, because I know.

We're not all numbers people, and it might not have been the most comfortable conversation, but hopefully you got some really valuable insights out of it. Specifically, what we talked about was how to look at your numbers through a buyer's lens. We talked about why revenue is not the same as value, why your net income may not be telling the full story, and why valuation is often connected to what the business actually produces for the owner. Now, if you missed it.

You're going to want to go back to that one and take a listen to that one before you listen to this episode because I promise you it's all connected and this episode will make way more sense to you if you've already listened to that last episode. So if you haven't done that yet, go do that now and I'll see you when you get back. Okay. So today we need to talk about one of the biggest valuation assumptions.

Welcome back to How to Sell Your Home Staging Business, a Real Woman Real Business Podcast mini-series for home stagers who are starting to think about what it could look like eventually to sell their business. And they want to build a profitable business now and build a valuable and sellable asset so that they can leave that as a part of their legacy when they decide to leave this industry. I'm your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And in the last episode, we talked about what actually makes a home staging business sellable.

And the big idea was this that a buyer is not looking at your business the same way that you are. You see the history and the relationships and all the effort, the late nights, the blood, sweat, and tears that you've put into this, the inventory investments, the agents you've nurtured, the clients you've helped, the jobs you've pulled together when everything was going sideways and you still managed to pull it off.

A buyer doesn't see all that. What they see is something a little bit different because they're asking, can I understand this business? Can I see exactly how does it make money? Can I see what would continue in a positive way, in a strong way after the current owner has stepped away? And can I see the value clearly enough in order to make a confident decision? So today we're going to be moving into one of the biggest pieces of that confidence, and that is your numbers.

For anyone who knows me, you might recall that I actually do have a bit of a numbers background. My original career path was actually in mathematics. I have a bachelor of mathematics degree and I worked as an analyst for several years before becoming a home stager myself. And while I would love to say that that makes me a financial guru, it's not necessarily the same thing, but I do admit that I do enjoy the data that numbers provide. And that's the same thing that your buyers are going to be looking at.

Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business Podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And listen, have you ever looked at your business and thought, you know, this is really working? So why am I not okay? Because a lot of "Accidental CEOs" who listen to this podcast, you don't necessarily build your business on what we would consider a sustainable system. Instead, we build it on survival systems, right? You're in survival mode. It's the kind that you know gets results, but ends up behind the scenes costing you things like your health, your relationships.

Your capacity, and honestly, at times, even your joy. So today's conversation is for the high-achieving woman who's been holding it all together with bubblegum, duct tape, whatever you've got to hold it together. And you've been doing this for far too long. And maybe you're starting to realize that your nervous system has been running your business. Well, I'm sitting down today with Christina Kantzavelos, a California licensed psychotherapist, writer, and chronic illness advocate.

And the founder of Begin Within Today and WithinMe. After developing severe Lyme disease and navigating complex chronic illness, Christina was forced to rebuild her life, identity, and career from the ground up. And now she supports people navigating chronic illness, trauma, burnout, and nervous system dysregulation through trauma-informed and somatic approaches. And she brings a rare perspective as both a therapist and an entrepreneur.

Shauna Lynn Simon (00:08.878)

Welcome back to the How to Sell Your Home Staging Business, a Real Women Real Business Podcast mini-series for home stagers who are starting to think about what it could look like to eventually sell their home staging business or at the very least, make sure that they have options. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon, and I'm so glad that you could join me today. In the last episode, we talked about why you don't always get to actually pick your exit date. And if you haven't listened to that one yet, I'd really recommend going back to it because it does set the stage.

For this whole conversation. The main point of it was essentially this that exit readiness is not the same as selling. So just because you're getting prepared does not mean that you're actually planning on selling tomorrow or even this year, even in the next 12, 24, 36 months. You may not even be sure if selling is something that you'll ever want to do. And that's totally fine too. But being sell ready is about building something that

Could continue beyond you. And if that's if that's what you want to choose to do, while making your business easier to run and more profitable to run now. So today we're talking about the next step. We're going to talk about what actually makes a home staging business sellable. And we're going to start with one of the biggest misconceptions about this. And that is that a busy business is not necessarily a sellable business.

I know, annoying, right? But how often do we hear people say, you know, how are things going? you know, I'm busy. Well, busy is good, right? Is busy always actually good? We're gonna talk about that today because as business owners, we tend to look at what we consider visible proof of our success. The calendar is full, the warehouse is empty, and the phone is ringing nonstop. Agents know who you are. You have a strong portfolio, you've built relationships, you've built a reputation.

Welcome. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And today we're starting a short mini series specifically for home stagers who have ever wondered, could I sell my hostaging business someday? Or perhaps maybe a little bit more honestly, what happens to this business when I'm done? And although this mini series has been intentionally designed specifically for home stagers, and it's going to have staging business specific references in it.

The information that we're providing is honestly quite valuable for any small to medium-sized business that wants to plan out their exit strategy. Now, hold on a second before you go and flip to another podcast because you say to yourself, you know, I'm not really planning on selling my business anytime soon. So this isn't really going to apply to me. Before you turn away from this, I just want to share two very important things that you need to know. So the first is that just like staging a house for sale, the power and the profit.

Is in the preparation. And you need to ensure that you are preparing sell-ready financials at least two to three years before you even want to sell. Even if you've been keeping great books, how you see your books and how a buyer might see them are two different things. So you really want to ensure that these are in a buyer-ready state, sort of that move-in ready that we're doing for our clients. And that can take two to three years because you can't actually go backwards to fix your books. You can only go forward.

Hey there and welcome to the Real Women Real Business Podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon, and I got a question for you. Do you think about money? Like I think about money. Do you think about money? I think about it a lot. and I don't just mean though in the how do I make more money? Where's my money going to come from? How do I get money? Although all that, of course, matters, but I want to talk about the way that money affects our decisions, our confidence, our boundaries, our pricing.

And even just the way that we show up in our businesses. So something that I've noticed over the years, and especially more and more recently, I'm having so many conversations with entrepreneurs about this. And that is that money itself isn't always necessarily the actual problem. The bigger issue is generally the pressure that we're feeling from the money, around the money. So we don't have enough money. We need more money. You know, money isn't coming in the way that we want it to or in the amounts that we want it to, all these different things cause this pressure around money. And what that does is it starts that pressure starts making decisions for us, decisions that we might not make without that pressure. And the problem is that a lot of us don't realize that pressure even exists. So today I want to talk about a couple of things, but one of them is a really big question that I want us to think of before making a money related decision.

Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And today we have really exciting guest. I'm joined by Joy Lynskey. She is the founder and CEO of Jewel Toned Interiors, which is an award-winning women-owned interior design studio based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Now Joy is known for pairing design excellence with operational strategy, leading projects across luxury, multifamily, workplace, wellness, and residential spaces.

with many projects focused on the underserved communities. Joy also brings a broader leadership lens though to the built environment. She served as the first woman president of the Construction Executives Association. So today we're gonna be talking about what it really takes to cultivate a culture of creativity and contribution, how leaders build trust without lowering standards and where to start if you want a stronger team culture, but you're already feeling stretched a little bit too thin. So Joy, welcome to the show.

Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And today I'm joined by Danielle Kepics. She is the founder of Empowered Mind and Body and co-founder of Unconventional Collaborative, a community for practitioners who want to elevate their work. Now Danielle's background is seriously multi-layered. She's worked as a physician assistant, had a master's in counseling psychology, and now blends that experience and expertise into an integrative coaching approach.

that helps people improve energy, hormones, digestion, sleep, libido, and so much more. So in this episode, we're gonna talk about a whole lot of things here. I think we're gonna get into a little bit about what it looks like to leave conventional medicine, start a business before it's perfect, and build something that's sustainable that actually fits your life. So Danielle, welcome to the show. Hi!

Hello and welcome to the Real Woman Real Business podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And today I am challenging the idea that the newest strategy, the loudest expert or the latest business trend is automatically the smartest path forward. For many of my "Accidental CEOs", as I affectionately refer to my "Accidental CEOs", these are people who followed more passion than plan and woke up one day and realized, oh my goodness, I am the CEO of a company.

What I find for many of them is that the problem is not that they don't know enough. It's that they have started ignoring what they already know works in favor of whatever is currently getting the most attention online. Whatever that latest fad is, whatever that latest trend is, that latest hack. And there's a very good chance that one of the smartest strategies that's available to you right now is actually something that you are already doing or something that you used to do, but you've started to dismiss it because it doesn't feel new, exciting.

Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business podcast. am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon, and today's guest is Tre Balchowsky, a coach who helps founders and entrepreneurs build influence, win trust and close clients or funding by finding their voice and learning to tell their story clearly. Her clients have closed an incredible $142 million in funding. She's helped deliver 17 TED and TEDx talks and her work is grounded in the

Very simple belief. Public speaking and storytelling just aren't optional extras for business owners. They are learned skills that make your ideas understandable, memorable, and easier to say yes to. So Tre, welcome to the show.

Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon, and today's guest is Carrie KC West. And she is an international and award winning bestselling author, speaker and narrative coach who helps entrepreneurs and leaders to reshape the stories that quietly shape how they lead, earn and make decisions. With a background in filmmaking from the American Film Institute and counseling psychology from Penn State, Carrie blends storytelling with

deep insight into human behavior. Her work is centered on authorship, helping people recognize the internal narratives running in the background and consciously write what comes next in business and in life. Carrie, welcome to the show.

Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Real Women Real Business podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And today we're talking about visibility and about some of the assumptions that we make around this and some of the simple tweaks that we can make in both our mindset as well as our actions that can make a really big difference. So first, let me start by telling you a little story. I was driving to my run the other morning for those of you who have been here for a while.

you know that I'm one of those crazy runners who runs at around five o'clock in the morning. And I actually oversee a women's running group because of course at 5 a.m. it's dark out and we, know, safety and numbers and all. And so we meet at different locations around the city, depending on what day of the week it is. So it's around five o'clock in the morning and I am driving to the run meetup spot. Completely dark out of course. And as I'm sitting at a light, I watch this cyclist come just flying off the sidewalk.

Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business Podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon, and today's guest is Sherry Andrew. She is the owner and financial coach at Money Mindset Financial Coaching. Now, after being fired from a nearly 17 year career, Sherry rebuilt her relationship with money from the ground up, starting with the systems that helped her manage real life finances without shame or restriction.

She later launched her coaching business in 2018 and she now helps individuals and entrepreneurs and especially those with ADHD to create simple supportive money systems that bring clarity, confidence and consistency and actually work with their lives. Sherry is an accredited financial counselor, Canada and a certified professional financial coach. And her clients are known for making meaningful progress like paying off debt, saving and hitting financial goals.

Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon. And today's guest is Shannyn Schroeder. She is the founder of EF Bomb Coach. Don't worry, we're gonna explain what that F really means. It's EF Bomb Coach. And Shannyn helps neurodivergent women better understand executive function, hint, hint, and build supportive systems that make business and life feel more manageable. She's got a background in executive function coaching, special education, and years of real world business experience.

She blends practical tools with self-acceptance to help women to stop blaming themselves and start working with their brains instead of against them. And so in this conversation, we're going to be talking about ADHD, executive function and why business can feel so much harder than it needs to when the advice you've been given was actually never built for the way that your brain works.

Hello and welcome to the Real Women Real Business podcast. I am your host, Shauna Lynn Simon, and today is a very special two year anniversary episode. And I just want to say, first of all, thank you so much for joining me today. If you're new here, welcome. I hope that you enjoy the show and you will continue to join us each week. But if you've been here for a little while, I just want to say thank you so much for your support. It truly means the world to me. That started as a passion project of mine a couple of years ago, and it has grown incredibly.

beyond my wildest dreams. has been something that has not only fulfilled me and a passion inside my heart, but I hear from you guys constantly about how much these episodes are helping you. So I just want to say thank you so much for inviting me into your car, your home, wherever you're listening to me and allowing me to be a part of your journey. I want to ask, let me start this episode by asking you, how many times in the last few days have you said, I'm going to deal with that later?