Jessica Zweig – CEO of SimplyBe | Unleashing Your True Potential: A Practical Guide to Boosting Self-Worth and Wealth through Authenticity

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About The Guest

Talking Points

• 00:00 — Intro
• 01:27 — Jessica Zweig’s origin story
• 03:58 — The need to find yourself before putting yourself out there
• 07:40 — Building up an authentic business
• 10:43 — How to unlock authenticity in people
• 14:50 — The drawbacks Jessica has faced with her business
• 19:23 — Making an agency that can scale and differentiate itself from others
• 24:36 — The biggest issue in a business that can screw up an entrepreneur
• 27:05 — How to tap into the masculine side of being a female entrepreneur
• 32:27 — Some characteristics that come innately to women & their importance for a business
• 35:55 — Some advice for the listeners & where can people connect with Jessica Zweig?
• 38:19 — What does success mean to Jessica Zweig?

Show Links

• https://www.instagram.com/jessicazweig/
• https://twitter.com/jessica_zweig/
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessicazweig/

Podcast & Newsletter Sponsors

• HUBSPOT – http://hubspot.com/successpod/

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What is the Success Story Podcast?

On this podcast, you’ll find interviews, Q&A, keynote presentations & conversations on sales, marketing, business, startups, and entrepreneurship.

The podcast is hosted by entrepreneur, business executive, author, educator & speaker, Scott D. Clary.

Scott will discuss some of the lessons he’s learned over his own career, as well as have candid interviews with execs, celebrities, notable figures, and politicians. All who have achieved success through both wins and losses, to learn more about their life, their ideas, and insights.

He sits down with leaders and mentors and unpacks their stories to help pass those lessons on to others through both experiences and tactical strategies for business professionals, entrepreneurs, and everyone in between.

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Machine Generated Transcript

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

business, people, agency, women, create, company, masculine, authenticity, entrepreneur, built, simply, team, characteristics, radical candor, authentic, grow, clients, scott, leader, podcast

SPEAKERS

Jessica Zweig, Scott D Clary

 

Scott D Clary  00:00

Welcome to success story. I’m your host Scott D. Clary. This success story podcast is part of the HubSpot Podcast Network. The HubSpot Podcast Network has incredible podcasts like entrepreneurs on fire hosted by John Lee Dumas, entrepreneurs on fire Stokes inspiration and share strategies to fire up your entrepreneurial journey and create the life you’ve always dreamed of. Listen to entrepreneurs on fire or success story, wherever you listen to your podcast. Today, my guest is Jennifer’s week, the CEO of simply b agency and the author of the number one best selling book, be a No BS Guide to Increasing your self worth and net worth. By simply being yourself today. Simply B agency is an internationally award winning personal branding firm with offices in Chicago and Nashville. Jessica has been a guest on top podcasts. She has been featured in top publications for her work around personal branding, such as Forbes, create and cultivate and Business Insider amongst others. She has also interviewed impactful leaders on her own podcast such as Marianne Williamson, Danielle Laporte, and Rebecca Minkoff. Today we spoke about how to build a personal brand that actually works. Why gentleness is the new powerful how to tap into the masculine side of being a female entrepreneur, and the feminine side of leadership.

 

Jessica Zweig  01:27

Oh, my gosh, is that a great question? I, first of all, I’m so excited to be here. And thank you for having me on your show. I, you know, what came through and I’m just going to, I’m just gonna go with it. Because everyone, I think, sees my business and sort of story of success professionally, but who has made what what moment really made me like who I truly am, comes down to, I believe a mama when I was 19 years old, I was born and raised Jewish. And I always, you know, I grew up in a very predominantly Jewish community. So I had never in my life stepped into a church. And until I was 19, and I was traveling Europe by myself, I backpacked the summer between freshman and sophomore year of college. And I was in Ireland touring alone. And my grandmother had just died three years, three months or so before. And I saw this chapel and it’s really small town in Kilkenny, Ireland, and I decided I’d go in as like a tourist and like, I’m Jewish, I’ve never been to church, this is a tourist attraction. So I think I can go and I remember, like reconciling that in my brain. And I go in thinking that I would just stay for like, five minutes and like, look at it and leave. And I ended up sitting down and one of the pews and I felt my grandmother sitting next to me. And she was telling me that she had been looking after me and long story I hadn’t really grieved her when she died, I was sort of distracted with a with an ex boyfriend. And I just remember her holding my shoulders and me weeping and crying in mourning my grandmother for the first time. And, you know, it’s, it’s really, it was a dawn of my kind of spiritual awakening, like, doesn’t matter if I’m Jewish, or Christian, or this is a house of, of spirit. And it really set me on a path to deepen my spiritual journey, which is really the core central focus and sort of guiding light in my life. And yes, I’ve created a lot of success professionally, but at my core, that’s really what I think I’m here to do is sort of spread that message of light. So that that is really the catalyst that made me who I am to me, versus what I think, you know, the market sees.

 

Scott D Clary  03:57

And that, that, that moment when you felt very spiritual. How did that? How does that tie in to the message that you put out into the world about authenticity? Why did you need to find yourself before you were able to truly put yourself out there and I think, in turn, create a message and even marketing material and all that superficial stuff that actually resonates with people.

 

Jessica Zweig  04:29

So, you know, I used to run a different business. So simply be my company is my second company. And my first company was an online magazine for women in the city of Chicago, which which I ran for seven years. And we built this major brand, and we were super cool. And we got to applications every week for people who wanted to work for us and brands wanting to work with us. We amassed this huge audience in Chicago and was it was sort of like, you know, refinery 29. But for women and this was sort of the we were like the original food and fashion world. OG in the city of Chicago and blew up in the Midwest. And that really put me on the map as an entrepreneur, right? This was from like, 2008 to 2014, I ran the business. And I write about this in my book B, I talk about often, the whole thing was sort of, like, founded on sort of a of a lie, like we were so we were struggling inside that business so hard. We were my business partner and I, we kind of hated each other, we were super toxic. And yet we were preaching women empowerment, like to the to the masses, we had no money, we were broke, we could barely afford to pay our employees, let alone ourselves, I was sick, physically, mentally unwell, I was partying, I was going on, like, five, six nights a week, like super, super unhealthy on all of the levels. And yet, I was like, quote, unquote, successful and, you know, in demand and sparkling from the outside and, and so that was really, at the end of that business, when my in authenticity caught up with me, and I completely crashed rock bottom, financially broke $100,000 in credit card debt has had asked my parents at 33 years old to help me pay my phone bill, like it was a rock bottom for sure. And so when I started simply be my company, I, I had no other choice, to be honest with you, Scott, and to show up authentically, like to really take my story. And I was just so sick of the lie. And when I started to really tell the truth, in my own ways, whether that was in my blog, or sitting on panels, or writing, you know, longer form Instagram posts about what I was really going through, something shifted, and I was able to pierce through to my community into my potential clients to, you know, the media, like in a completely different way. And, and, you know, I believe that branding is an emotional experience, and it has to be clear. And we have to have that razor sharp, but at the same time, deep, impactful message designed in a brand, whether that’s in a look and feel, or a story or a message or a slogan. And so that’s really what informed simply be in our approach to how we build brands, that is all about authenticity. You have to at the same time have that that clarity, and I think that we’ve accomplished that really well with our company and our clients brands and you know, my brand, and I don’t think I can talk about authenticity as much as I do without having that experience of, of what being inauthentic really did to me and my life.

 

Scott D Clary  07:39

So then. So I think that’s a very powerful lesson, because I think a lot of people probably fall into the trap of that you fell into when you built your first business. And I think that’s actually a huge issue with entrepreneurs, because everybody wants to portray this ideal entrepreneur, almost a caricature of what they think it should be. And it leads to depression and anxiety and, and in some cases, like the business fails, because you’re so caught up in how you want to be perceived as opposed to what’s actually going on in your life. So when you dealt with this, and you had this, this moment where you hit rock bottom, and you built this company back up again, you’re more authentic, but being authentic on social. That’s like one piece of it. So how did you build the entire business up very differently than when you first built up? I guess, like an inauthentic business?

 

Jessica Zweig  08:32

Yeah, I love that question. So it started with my culture. It started with my values. So I was a business of one me one person. And then I hired a contractor who is now my VP of Marketing and my co founder, but this was six years ago. And I decided I was gonna write like a company manifesto. Again, just me and Alexa who was $2,800 on contract, Chase Quick Pay. You know, like she said, she was full time. I created core values I created because I had taken a jaunt into corporate America for two years. It’s a whole other story, but they were massive billion dollar company and they had quote, unquote, core values, and they meant nothing, the company was completely toxic. And so I decided that I was going to create my core values, but they weren’t going to just mean something they were going to mean everything and be the bedrock of the DNA, of how we run this business, which is rooted in core values of being relevant being extraordinary being of service being true and being kind. And that is now our that has been our our bedrock of success. I truly believe that having that written into the DNA from day one has allowed us to have the right messaging attract the right clients, attract the right talent, let go of the wrong talent like over the wrong clients, you know, really oriented to how we do business on a day to day level. How we treat each other. And, you know, I’ve listened I started this business as a one woman shop six years ago, I have a staff of 30 people, I’ve really grown and stretched and learned. And it’s, it’s been one of the most difficult and beautiful journeys of my life becoming a CEO of a company like this. And is it a perfect science? No. But that has been my number one priority, frankly, no matter what is the values, ensuring that we are authentic from the inside out, I say this all the time to my team, we can’t preach love, light authenticity, and have anything but that inside the four walls of our organization, and that has really been I think, the secret sauce to my success.

 

Scott D Clary  10:43

So So authenticity in a business is that radical candor it like how do you unlock that and people because you unlocked it in yourself, but it’s like, it’s very scary, right? Like, if you ask anybody, be authentic, and go on social media. Like they usually they have good intentions, but then they put again, they put on this like persona. So in a company as well, like that’s, that’s always like nerve wracking to be authentic to tell your boss what you really feel, which I think is the most importantly, that’s why radical candor is such a great concept, but how do you actually get the employee to have that psychological safety to say what they want to say to voice their opinion to tell you when they feel that you’re wrong, whatever it was all that has that all like is like, that’s all authenticity, right? All that all that type of communication?

 

Jessica Zweig  11:34

Yeah, I have so much to say about this. First of all, love the thought of radical I make I make my entire company read that. That’s one of my favorite books. Kim Scott found the author and founder was on my podcast, and I told her I’m like, getting you on my podcast is more exciting than getting Gwyneth Paltrow on my podcast, like she’s my hero. I’m Scott, the woman who wrote that book changed my life changed my career. So we we practice radical candor, although it is is challenging, right? The concept of radical candor is being able to challenge directly and care deeply at the same time. And, and not everybody has that muscle. And so a couple a couple things, I think it’s really important to hire really good managers, really good leaders that at the very least know how to do that, how to know how to practice radical candor. And I’ve got some phenomenal managers at my company that really read that book, love that book as much as I do, and practice it with their teams, I think you have to be as the leader as the tip of the spear available and able to take feedback yourself, you know, and to create that safety with your direct reports so that when they manage up to you, because managing downside, the side is, is a skill, but I think Managing Up is an even harder skill. And so I as the CEO have had to create that psychological safety to use your words with the people that directly report just to me, and that’s not 30 people that’s for that have really been able to deepen their trust and safety with me that, you know, comes from me taking accountability, me being open to feedback and hard conversations me making time to have those one on ones. We also have, we also follow the book traction, which is another great book that I love by Gino Wickman. It’s the Entrepreneurial Operating System. And every 90 days we get together as a team and a full day off site. And, and we’ve made it a priority. It’s a ton of time for my team to do that quarterly. My whole team does that. And I always do a CEO report at the top of the day. And I reiterate a lot of our values in that. And we’ve got something written into our handbook called gossip is gross. Because that’s really what was the demise of my first business that was trauma from my high school and middle school days, like gossip is not allowed it simply be in if you at the very least have an issue with someone else in the company, which is bound to happen because we’re all people, you have two options. You one you go to your manager about it to help you resolve it. If you’re if you’re struggling with another peer, or you’re an adult, and you go directly to that person and you have that difficult conversation, but you cannot talk shit and poison the well and create a gossip trained or you’re out like I will not have that. And I we emphasize that point Scott every 90 days. And it’s really beautiful. Like my team will come to me and be like, I’m struggling. I know gossip is gross, and bla bla bla bla bla, but this person, like they’re very aligned to that policy, because I’ve I’ve kind of like beat it into their heads. And I live it you know, you have to be the example as the leader. I think that’s my last point at the end of the day. You can’t expect your team to do anything you’re not willing to do yourself. So that is, you know, hopefully the answer to your question. It’s a really good question.

 

Scott D Clary  14:49

It’s a it’s a it’s a tough thing for leaders. It’s easy to say it’s tough to do, right because again, like to your point like we’re all human and it’s very, very uncomfortable that have these conversations? Has there been any? And I just sorted like because your organization lives it and because you had such a negative experience that sort of led to you championing this in your organization? Has there been any drawbacks? Has there been any times where the business has side rails or a project has like Gone askew? Or maybe information that shouldn’t have been shared was shared? Like, has there been any negatives at all?

 

Jessica Zweig  15:26

Oh, yeah. Yeah, I mean, I’m not I’ve not created Utopia over here. It’s a business and it has its own issues. Um, yeah, I mean, I think that just like with any company, listen, one of my favorite all this,

 

Scott D Clary  15:41

like, what do you have to worry about? Like, what you have to watch for like the almost like the red flags, if you’re going to adopt this mindset, which is a good mindset. But you see what I’m saying, I just want people to understand what they’re getting themselves into, so that they’re prepared.

 

Jessica Zweig  15:54

Yeah, I mean, listen, it’s like, it reminds me of my favorite marketing term, which is one of my favorite marketing terms, which is when you when you try to be everything to everyone, you will be nothing to no one, like, that’s just marketing one on one. And so when we build our culture, which is our brand, which is like any brand, you have to take a stand, you have to be willing to not be for everyone. That’s a beautiful thing. And so when I crafted my culture and created this environment, I recognize that it’s not for everybody, you know, we are very high vibe. We’re very loving. We’re very awake. We’re very spiritual and conscious here, that’s me, started this conversation with my story in the church in Ireland, like I have had, that, that is unapologetic here. And honestly, not to sound like I have this other phrase like vibe up or vibe out, right? So we’re vibing up all the time, like we are like growing our business has been like a rocket ship and very blessed. And with that has come attrition, Scott, like not everybody can ride, I actually heard a statistic, this is a good one. From a really respected entrepreneur. I know Dan Martell, I saw him speak this year. And he said, If your business is growing 20% or more year over year, you’re gonna lose 95% of your people every five years, it’s just like the nature of a high growth company, like people just they come in, they help you get from A to B, but they’re not necessarily the people that are gonna get you from B to Z, right. And different people will help you get from B to j and then from j to Q, you know, like, you have to just accept that not everybody can be with you in that current moment. And so what I, what I really look out for however, is like, you know, negativity, not to say that we’re like toxic positivity over here, but we we do live, an energetic, high vibe, passionate, authentic, deeply loving, very open culture. And that doesn’t make people always feel comfortable like that. People don’t buy it, it’s not their style. You know, it’s just not the way they look at the world. Fine, simply B might not be the place for you. And I typically suss that out pretty quickly, and I don’t hire them or they’re here for a short time. You know, the problems I’ve had is when people stick around too long, that aren’t aligned with the culture, and they create some toxicity. And you know that, that just comes with the territory when you’re building a company. No place is perfect.

 

Scott D Clary  18:33

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Jessica Zweig  20:23

I want to hug you for this question. This is an amazing question speaking to my soul, Scott, you know, I called my business. So I have a little tattoo on my wrist. Okay. It says simply be, I started this business as a one woman shop, this was inspired. This inspired the company name, and I added the word agency to it because I thought it sounded good, like simply the agency, not really knowing myself six years ago, what I was signing up for, right, because I was just really good at marketing and branding. And I was consulting with people. And then my clients kept coming and coming and coming and then was like, they’re like, can you help me write my blog? Can you help me do the PR? Can you help me execute the social and I was like, Sure, I can just bring on some freelancers to help outsource. And then we became five full time people. And then in our full service, literally, so full service agency. So I’ve been kind of making it up as I’ve gone along and sick to answer and like, it’s, it’s a beast, it is no joke at a business model that isn’t for everybody, for sure, you have to have your process in place, your systems and efficiencies in place. So we use a software called teamwork, which is all about project management, time tracking, your team has to be trained and on boarded into that effectively and efficiently. There has to be capacity planning tools and accountability markers that your managers know how to ensure that your teams are being utilized, right, because we’re in a services based business. And time is money. Right? And so how do you how do you actually have metrics and measurements? Why an agency? Why an agency? It’s a really good question, Scott’s million dollar multi million dollar question. Yeah. You know, honestly, I didn’t mean to become an agency, I just, I called my business simply be agency and named after my tattoo on my wrist simply VT agency, because I thought it sounds cute. Not really knowing at all, what I was signing up for back in the day, I mean, I started the business six years ago as a one woman shop. And I was really consulting mainly on marketing and branding, which felt really good. But then my clients kept asking me for more, and I kept getting more business. So I needed to hire people who could help me and it was, you know, executional requests, like, can you go start my blog? Can you help me with my Facebook Lives? Can you help me with my PR outreach, versus just helping them with the strategy. And so things just sort of naturally unfolded, and we became, you know, a bigger team, and then a bigger team, and then, you know, a full, a full sized sort of boutique team, that is now you know, structurally organized across different departments of content, creative PR and Account Services. And I’ve had some really amazing advisors, executives come in helping to really structure what an agency needs to do and how it needs to operate, which is a very specific kind of operating model. And you know, we’ve grown so fast, like my business has really exploded, and it’s, it’s not been like, picture perfect, it’s been a little messy, frankly. And we’ve had to really catch up with the growth by bolstering it with process and, you know, metrics and time tracking and account management, I really think that the linchpin of an agency is account management, like internal project management, ensuring that you’re managing, you know, scopes, like dollars, two hours, because that’s the business we’re in. And that’s how you make money. And so that has been its own journey for us. But right now, we’re really hyper focused on profit, profitability, which is all dependent upon process. And if you can get your products, right, your clients, your client, target market, right, like you can’t be a Jill of all trades, Swiss Army, as much as you might want to be and can be, you have to really find your lane, with your products and services, and then build process around that, rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat, get the right people to drive it. And, you know, I believe in the power of a brand power of strong culture. And you can really, I think scale. And you know, we’ve done that we’ve not done it beautifully and perfectly every day, but we’ve we’ve done it for sure.

 

Scott D Clary  24:36

I think that agencies are probably the most unforgiving business model. Yeah. Because Because you even even the profitability is significantly less than if you had a software company. So like the scope all the all the things that could go wrong in a business that you may not even notice are going wrong to later on and a lot of other types of businesses, agencies, it’s like per second, something is slightly creeping out of scope, and it’s not perfectly dialed in, you start you’ll notice it immediately. So the question is, what are what are the biggest? What is the biggest issue that an entrepreneur would have in a business? Like what have you noticed in your businesses, the number one thing that can basically screw over an entrepreneur can stop their business from growing can derail the whole thing, because I think that you will have seen it much earlier on and somebody else who, for example, is running a software company is spinning up SAS and AWS service use me. And maybe they’ll they’ll notice the thing that you noticed in month one, maybe they’ll notice it in the year. So what is that thing?

 

Jessica Zweig  25:44

I mean, I think you have to honestly find the right it kind of comes down to your people like you who you hire in those initial stages. And I think this does go for any company has to one put you in your genius zone as the founder, and like really take things off of your plate so that you can grow the business like that, to me is like step one, if you’re looking at hiring up a team. And also, though, really, truly clients X expectation setting, like I wanted so badly to just win the business that I would say yes to things I really fully couldn’t follow through on just because I’m scrappy, and innovative. And I figured out as I went along, but that’s not scalable. And so being willing to say no to business and turn down the wrong clients, to set you up for scaling with the right clients is really, really hard, because that’s like money you’re turning away is losing, at least it’s how it feels. But it’s a short term loss for a longer term gain. And I really, I think it just comes down to people finding the right people to work with in your company, and finding the right people to work without, with outside of your company or your your clients, your your partners. And if you can be discerning from day one, you’re gonna you’re gonna be in a much better position.

 

Scott D Clary  27:06

One of the one of the points, I always find it interesting, you know, when you work with so I was I was speaking to your, to your, your executive assistant, and they sent over some talking points. And sometimes I like go with them. And sometimes I’m like, oh, whatever, I’ll do my own points. But one of the points that was actually written down, which I find interesting, because I don’t really understand it. So I’m going to ask you what it means. Because there’s a lesson in there somewhere, and I want to unpack what it actually means. So one of the points that your team sent over that we should chat about is how to tap into the masculine side of being a female entrepreneur. I have had it what what in the world? Does that mean? I don’t even know how to ask a question around that. That’s why I had to like give the whole backstory because there’s no in no world but understand how to actually ask the right question that will give a good answer. So why is that important? Why is that one of the things that you know, you want to speak about? And what does it actually mean for somebody who’s listening?

 

Jessica Zweig  27:59

I love this. So the masculine versus the feminine, is really what I want to zoom up and talk about before I can answer that. So the masculine and the feminine aren’t man. And, and woman, they’re not they’re not a gender, they’re an an energy and, and values basically. So the masculine is valued based upon some key energies of assertion, focus, action, doing problem solving, linear thinking, firefighting, you know, protecting right, these are like the this is a masculine vibration. Women and men both embody that. And we have societal values on that, right. And it’s, it’s, again, less about a person and more about how we show up in the energy. The feminine values are rooted in empathy and compassion and stillness and beingness and slowness in doing and beauty and flow, right. And I think that women have a, an opportunity. And when I when I wrote that down, I’m really speaking to women. And not to say that we can be in symbiotic relationship as men and women with both the masculine and feminine. But I think women have to grow a muscle in business to be less apologetic for being strong and assertive, and bold, and, and linear thinking and protective of their keep and non emotional. And not to say that Being emotional is distinctly feminine, like we all have emotions. But one of the things that I pride myself on frankly, is my ability to do that is to be in my masculine savvy, as a businesswoman and make moves and make hard decisions and put out fires and think strategically and linearly and sometimes compartmentalize and step into what I would call situational leadership. Where I have to put away how I feel about a situation to get the job done, even if it’s uncomfortable. And so that’s a muscle inside of a lot of women that I see that they can work on. Because we are innately feminine because we’re women, and we’re deeply feeling and we care a lot, we lead from our hearts and not saying that men don’t. But we want to be more than that. That space that comes naturally to us. And that is really what I want to coach women on and help women see that you don’t have to sacrifice your good hearted kind of empathetic soul to be a leader. And it calls you forward into a new state of empowerment, actually, when you’re able to find those masculine values within yourself, and to truly embody them.

 

Scott D Clary  30:48

And I think that’s a great lesson. So I actually think to your point, that you sort of alluded to those those characteristics, I think that it actually extends to both men and women, because women can lean more into their masculine characteristics. And men should lean more into their feminine characteristics. And I think that that’s actually some of the feminine, I put that in air quotes, characteristics that men don’t necessarily champion as much. I think that’s actually that’s a I’m blanking on the word right now. It’s, it’s, it’s the reason why men in some positions are not as effective as women leaders. So I think that actually some of those feminine characteristics, when you actually see those characteristics implemented at a C suite level, like the empathy and all these different things that will actually tie to tangible positive business outcomes that I think need to be seen more often. And that’s why you actually look at data points, statistics at like, companies that do have women in C suite are more effective, like everything, every KPI that they want to accomplish, all the way down to the most important, which is like revenue, profit, all that stuff. All of that is amplified when you do have women at the top. So I think that yeah, straight like, I think that the point is, of course, women can be at the top, and they should be, but also men have to understand why it’s a benefit to embrace them as characteristics. And then also, for women to get to the top, I think they also have to understand that there’s some reason why men champion those characteristics and why those are effective for a portion of business as well. So I actually love that point. And I think that that’s something that has to be discussed more often. So I appreciate you bringing that up. But I also want to double down on what not just women embracing more male characteristics, but also let’s speak about some of the benefits of women leadership, some of those, those women characteristics, female characteristics that maybe you know, as a guy I don’t think are valuable. I’m saying that again, sarcastically, I think they’re very valuable. But many, many men may not think that empathy has a place in business, right? So that’s what I want to go into now. So let’s speak about women in leadership, some of the characteristics that do come innately to women, and why those are so beneficial for a business.

 

Jessica Zweig  33:01

I think this question is actually incredibly timely, given the world that we’re living in, in the world of business coming out of a post pandemic, culture and work world, it is an employee driven work world, we are living in a time where the the seas of power have flipped. And we have, you know, we’ve heard the great resignation, the great reshuffling, quiet quitting the whole thing, it’s happening, it’s real. And in order for your business to succeed, your businesses, your people, and you have to ensure that they feel valued, and that they stay and not just for retention sake, but the the impact that it has, when you have a fully engaged employee to your bottom and top line revenue is felt and seen and executed against every part of their job. And so people who think that like culture and empathy and making your team feel good and valued and seen as not worth your time, that’s like saying that your time isn’t worth focusing on your revenue, your people are going to be what drives your revenue. And so I think, understanding now more than ever, that your staff needs to have a space that can come to where they feel safe, where they feel seen, where they can express themselves, where they can, you know, be held and whatever they’re experiencing outside of work like that is not necessarily even a feminine quality, I think that’s a human quality and to be able to create an environment like that. And so dudes who are listening who aren’t, you know, empathetic, who want to just drive their business forward,

 

Scott D Clary  34:31

or even like they shut off for some reason they feel like showing empathy is a weakness and they feel like they almost go the extra mile to shut off that part of their personality.

 

Jessica Zweig  34:40

I mean, I think that it goes down to just what people are comfortable, comfortable with based on like, who they are and where they came from and how they were raised. But I think that when you lead a team when you lead a company, it is the it is the most incredible personal development school of your life and your business. And I firmly believe this to be true. You will grow more if you grow as a person. And I think the best way to really stretch your capacity and step outside of your comfort zone is in dealing with people and stepping forward into the type of leadership that has feeling involves at its core, and I think at the end of the day, makes you a far more attractive company to come work for. That’s what that’s what people are looking for today. They want to work for people who care.

 

Scott D Clary  35:31

Amen, and it’s going to become even more important now that people have opportunity to work anywhere. I mean, every everything about remote work and all that it’s all just pushing towards the best company wins and the best company is the one that cares about its people. That’s That’s what business is at the end of the day, right? People coming together trying to build something. So people have options now see, you got to you got to get your shit together. You got to be a better leader if you want to attract the right people. Okay, so I’ll I have one question I asked at the end of every interview, and we’ll go there in a second. But before we close this out, any final thoughts? So So floor is yours final thoughts for listeners, any last bits of advice you’d like to give over? And then make sure you drop all your socials where they can get your book all that stuff?

 

Jessica Zweig  36:15

Awesome. I mean, people think of personal branding as something that only like egomaniacs do or like Tony, the Tony Robbins of the world want or need. We don’t work with anybody like that. It’s simply be you know, my philosophy is a personal brand is a universal business tool that will take you from where you are today to the end of your career, because you’re going to do a lot of different things, but you’re always going to be you. And so when you architect a personal brand that is rooted in authenticity and service, not you know, what you can get and all the likes and the followers that will only come if you’re showing up and adding value. And people do business with people, not products, logos and company websites. So when you really are putting yourself out there in a way that is strategic and clear and authentic. At the same time, I don’t think that there’s a better marketing vehicle that people can have today in today’s business world, then a personal brand. So get the stigmas out of your mind that it’s for those that only care about, you know, image and projection. But really, those that want to make a bigger impact. And that’s, that can only be done by people. So that’s my one two on those final words and I’ve got you know, a bunch of places you can come find me I’m you know, would encourage you to go simply be agency.com to check out my business, you can go to Jessica zweig.com To learn more about me. I have a very active Instagram at Jessica Zweig, and I’m very active on LinkedIn as well. So

 

Scott D Clary  37:44

okay, perfect. And then also, like we didn’t even honestly, we didn’t even go into this because we ran out of time. But like you have a ton of great advice on building personal brand, which is actually like we spoke about the business you built and all the lessons for entrepreneurs, which is highly valuable. We should like 100% In the future, do something just some personal brand that’s like a that could be like another probably like hour plus long conversation just on all the different nuances of personal brand and the type of content you create and how to do it properly. So looking forward to part two Okay, and last question I asked everyone you’ve had an incredible career you’ve built built your own personal brand out you built simply be you’ve achieved all the success but what does at this point in your life success mean to you?

 

Jessica Zweig  38:33

Success to me means peace. It means the day filled with nourishing soul giving activities without having to stress and work and be in the fire you know, which is what you kind of have to deal deal with when you’re building something but I used to think success you know, I’m building a house right now I’ve you know I’ve got a nice kind of life I have built but my my truest moment where I feel like I’ve quote unquote, made it is when I’m sitting with my husband and my two dogs on the weekend like with nothing to do and I can be present and embody a sense of peacefulness because being an entrepreneur’s kind of anything but peaceful. So the more I can cultivate that experience in my life, that to me is really how I actually as of this year, have redefined what success means to me.