Episode 225 – A Toast to an Empowered Woman, and Gentlemen, You’re Absolutely Included!

Episode Transcription

This is the Ultimate Advisor Podcast, the podcast for financial advisors who want to create a thriving, successful and scalable practice. Each week we’ll uncover the ways that you can improve your referrals your team, your marketing, and your business operations, helping you to level up your advising practice, bring in more assets and create the advising practice that you’ve dreamed of. You’ll be joined by our hosts Bryan Sweet, who is moving fast towards a billion dollars in assets under management, Brittany Anderson, the driving force for advisors looking to improve their operations and company culture, and Draye Redfern who can help you systematize and automate your practices marketing to effortlessly attract new clients. So what do you say? Let’s jump into another amazing episode of The Ultimate Advisor Podcast.

Brittany Anderson 01:07

Hello and welcome back to the ultimate advisor podcast, Brittany Anderson here and today I have with me a dear friend, a wonderful human being an incredibly brilliant woman. Disha Solanki Disha is a visionary entrepreneur, growth strategist and partner at Hilton Co, a global business management consulting firm, specializing in the diamond gemstone and jewelry industry, you’re in for a treat here. Through her 18 years experience in strategy and business transformation. She has helped over 50 businesses to restructure to get clear on their audience, confidently increase their prices, and scale their businesses to seven figures and beyond her life’s work is to empower women to grow and scale their already vast business using the right strategy, guidance and support. When she’s not helping her clients grow a wildly successful business, she can be found traveling spending time with our family, or watching boxsets Disha. Welcome to the show.

Disha Solanki 2:14

Hello, Brittany. Thanks for having me.

Brittany Anderson 2:16

Oh, it is so my pleasure. So we’re going to cut to the chase here. You are all about clarity, confidence and scalability. So we’ve heard that a few different times. So how are you changing lives?

Disha 2:31

Well, I’m a huge advocate of enabling and empowering women to fulfill their dreams and ambitions to grow their businesses to where they want to be without getting stuck in. Well, what I would say is stage three of the business journey, which is the soaring problem stage where there’s revenue coming in, but there’s lots of jobs to be done. And actually, it’s really difficult to understand or see the word from the trees. So I help women by understanding and establishing a vision for themselves personally, and their business ambitions by developing a corporate growth strategy to take them to the next level of their business without the wanting to quit. I think most of us get to a point in our business journey where we think this is too much, we’ve got too many jobs to do not enough time, and far too much responsibility of bringing in revenue.

Brittany 3:22

You know, it’s so funny, do you shy because we’ve had these conversations too. And I bring this into the adviser space in particular, there are, I’ll say it’s better today. But there are not enough women in our industry. And even for our wonderful men that are tuning in our male advisors that are listening to this right now. He goes there’s so much to be said about creating that space for scalability. And I know that you have so many different applications and ways that people can take this and run with this right now. So I would be curious for our advisors listening, how can they implement these processes and concepts immediately into their business?

Disha 4:05

Okay, the first question I would ask and I probably say the most the one that will give you the most of them the most impact is ask yourself the question Am I best place to do this? Do this job do this task do whatever it may be at any point in time? Can someone else do it better than me and faster than me and then find a way of affording that better place to person and it doesn’t have to be best in class or best in business best in class business that you use. I always say that something or anything is better and perfectly done than Perfectly Undone. So start with that and I think that that will make the biggest impact.

Brittany 4:46

So good and you know I think about your background Isha and I mean come on now diamonds jewelry, every girl’s best friend, all that good stuff. So, you know for our listeners, what what kind of brought you on his journey, what got you to this point of how you serve, who you show up for, you know, really what you’re doing right now?

Disha 5:06

Yeah, sure. To where I am in business today, I would say I was doing my masters at university and one Lecturer in one of our lectures said, How many of you would like to work for yourselves. And it was a lecture theater full of students, I was one of three that put my hand up. So I was clearly not going to be working for anyone for a defined period of time. And I was going to get there at some point, right. And then 16 years ago, I got pregnant with my eldest. And I was a project manager for a pharmaceutical wholesaler, at the time, I was on the road a lot. I couldn’t be in the north of the country, one day, the south of the country and other day. And actually, once I had him, I was struggling to understand how I was going to work as a mom, while my husband works full time, as well, as earn, earn, earn money with flexibility and fulfill my own dreams and ambitions at the end of the day. And that’s what’s brought me to this place now, where I really am committed to helping women understand what that road looks like. Sometimes it doesn’t have to always be at one moment in time, you have to queue up your ambitions. And I’m not saying you have to but I think sometimes to keep your sanity from my own experience, it’s a good idea to queue them up is all I would say. I thought I was a capable stay at home mum to be truthful, or I’d be happy with a part time job or something like this. And to be honest, with you, Brittany, it just turned out completely different to that. I think I’m a better person is the conclusion I’ve come to when I’m in business, and when I’m helping other people, better mom, what I’m there to,

Brittany 6:52

you know, I can I can relate to so much. And I think you know, our audience tuning in as well. And I love you know, that idea of how did you say it, it was like about prioritizing of, you know, making sure that you’ve got kind of things stacked properly. So I think there’s so much value in that. And, you know, also the self discovery, I would bet that our advisors listening in that they would have been one of the three that raised their hands as well in that class saying, Yeah, I’m gonna work for myself, that’s a lot of times why advisors get into this business couple, like a two fold, I would say, number one, they want to truly build relationships and change lives. And number two, they want to work for themselves and create their own destiny. So I think there’s so much value in what you said there. So we’re gonna flip this for our ladies, in particular, for our female advisors that tune in to this, what is the biggest issue that you see women in business tend to make,

Disha 7:49

I’ll say the biggest one is they don’t look after themselves. They don’t even take the time to spend even 15 minutes a week for themselves. And this is asking too much. And actually, when I speak and coach to women, Coach women, sorry, that’s the biggest thing I come across. It’s the biggest hurdle to so I say, You know what, your day is really packed, it’s jam packed with everything. But I don’t see any bit there or 10 minute window during your week, where you’ve even just spent time by yourself having a cup of coffee going for a walk sitting in the garden on your own whatever it might be. And believe it or not, Brittany, that’s the one that gives most women the biggest anxiety is finding this 15 minutes to spend on their own a week.

Brittany 8:37

Yeah, you know, it’s actually funny that you bring this up, I was on a call with a health coach that I’m working with. And we were talking about habits and food and exercise and all that good stuff. And I’m looking at my calendar, and I was like I literally like, oftentimes don’t even block time to eat. So then what ends up happening, you grab whatever’s convenient. And that’s what your meal and I use air quotes, if you’re listening to this, yeah, that’s what a meal turns out to be. And that’s crazy. But I know I’m not alone. And again, I want to make this you know, so relevant to our audience is that as you’re listening in, whether you’re a man or a woman tuning into this as a financial advisor, if you’re a man and you have women on your team, which I know many, many of you do, you know, think about this, make sure that your team and you two are blocking time to be able to give yourself space, give yourself enough margin to actually have meaningful things happen along the way versus being so stacked. So I love that I think that’s so powerful. So, you know, when I think about your path in your journey, in particular, what is one of the most difficult lessons that you’ve learned it could be in business or in life,

Disha 9:56

I’ll give you one of each in that case. So in business, I would say trust. So I’m quite a trusting person, when I bring somebody on, I trust them to do their day job. I’m not a micromanaging type of leader at all. I probably maybe be described as some as not a great manager because I don’t micromanage and I just want the end job, I don’t care, I’m not really bothered how long it takes as long as it’s done to a great standard. And actually, not everyone that you bring into your business will be trustworthy. And that’s something I learned the hard way, after a lot of soul searching, you know, there was this one particular guy that worked for me when I was running an executive recruitment business. And he was picking up the phone every day. So I thought that he wasn’t getting any results. We weren’t getting candidates. And we’re an we were an executive search firm that charged a premium. At the end of the day, we’re really proud of the work that we do. It turns out after training, and you know, I’ve taken everything out the hat, right, sat with him, helped him write emails, drop lists, everything. The guy wasn’t making phone calls, he was pretending to speak to people.

Brittany 11:09

No.

Disha 11:13

And that was it, I thought was incredible. I could not have made it up, Brittany, that’s the truth of it, right. But it taught me a lot of lessons, it taught me that there has to be systems and processes in place. And you can’t just operate on trust, which is what I was doing. And even though I had processes in place, they weren’t the right ones. At the end of the day, and I needed different ones, I had to reinvent that a lot, I would say. I would say in life, it’s burnout. This affects every aspect of your life, including business. If you’re not continuously working on your A game, you’re not capable of leading anything is the truth of it. Because you’re not leading from a place of calm or clarity with your CEO hat on or your parent hat. Because you genuinely feel exhausted. And I didn’t know what burnout looks like look like until it was too late. And I think lots of entrepreneurs get to that point. Because we just think it’s normal, we carry on we do we go through the process and the motions of doing what we have to do, never stopping long enough, because we never took the 15 minutes a week to really figure out where we are with ourselves.

Brittany 12:32

You know, I think both of those examples I want to press on here. So number one, going back to, you know, the structure and the systems and the guy who is pretending to make phone calls. You know, I think a lot of times when you’re leading from a place of current pureness, you know, call it, you have a mission, and you know that you want to impact lives, and you bring these people on, and you might have connected with them in some way. This is why it’s so important to I mean, we talk all the time with an ultimate advisor coaching with our mastermind members is the right hiring practices. Yeah, you know, and it starts there. And then you’re so right. It’s the systems and procedures, and I am so much like you and that I hate micromanaging. I’m not going to do it. I’m not one that’s going to make people check in with me every second of every day, I just can’t mentally, but I don’t want to know. 

Disha 13:28

I just wanna know what’s on their calendar. Or if they went to the gym this morning and they started an hour late or they’ve got a doctor’s appointment. 

Brittany 13:35

It’s okay. I don’t care. I just care that the work gets done. Right. But I think too, there is. And this is the analogy that I like to use with our teams in any of our businesses is that I want you to know what it means to win. And I want you to know what it means to lose too. So if we can put those definitions I think that’s how the people who have the world’s who are like us who don’t want to micromanage can help put those systems in place. So if we can’t define the when it’s really hard for people to know the track to run on. Now, the whole thing with making the phone calls, I don’t know, I still gotta get my head around that. But don’t worry, I didn’t get my head around it. Still scarred I get it. Right I am. So the other thing too, on the topic of burnout, and I’ve had many, many conversations with advisors from all across the nation, on this topic, and I think to the last few years, you know, depending on when you’re listening to this, if you don’t know what I’m talking about, you might have been living under a rock. But with with COVID With all the stuff that came with it. You know, people kind of went into maybe overdrive a little bit. It’s a lot of stuff for people to process. So then you dive into your work or you dive into maybe a healthy habit or maybe a not so healthy habit or you know, whatever that is. I think burnout is becoming more and more Real. And I love what you talked about their D show just about how to be aware and tune your ears and your eyes up to it. Because if you’re just head down and you’re going through the motions and you think it’s normal, your body is going to say one day, that’s not normal. And we’re going to stop. So I think those are just wonderful pieces of advice and tidbits for our listeners. So I want to slip into the topic of fear. One thing that we talk about a lot on this podcast, and I really like to ask our guests is giving me an example of a time where you strategically overcame fear. And you didn’t let it stop you from a moment of growth of learning of, you know, going after what you want. So can you speak to that? A moment of fear you overcame?

Disha 15:51

I use a personal one on this one. Because I’m really scared of heights. So I don’t know if any of your listeners are scared of heights. But if you’re scared of heights, it’s not good. Like I’m scared of heights to the point where I won’t go in the sea, because I don’t know what’s below.

Brittany 16:12

For that fear, I’ll tell you. 

Disha 16:15

Yeah, that probably is right. So for my birthday, I thought this was a while ago when I turned 40. Um, I will try a high ropes course. I have never done anything like this before Brittany never been on a zip line. I mean, I just about a gondola, and and I and that’s because it was in a cage. And I was stood in the middle of the cage by myself practically. But like, I was like, If anyone else drops out of this cage, there’ll be loads of other people. I’d be left in the middle. Obviously, that doesn’t work out in reality. Okay. And so I left it to my husband is all sorts it all out. Okay, he’ll be gentle with me. So he books, the highest high ropes course in Europe. Oh, my gosh. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, the fear was real. And you have to get zip, you have to go on a zip line to get to the beginning of the course. Okay. Which is like a multi storey car park by itself. Right. And I’m not going to lie to you, I was fine. I thought, You know what, I can do this. This is something I have to overcome. I really want to do things with the kids because they’re not scared of heights. And new. There’s my husband. So I always felt left out on that account, right. So I got to the bit where you jump off and go on to the zip line. And I just couldn’t do it. It’s all I froze, I thought it was going to be sick. Like, there’s so much going through my head, I cried at one point, I was like, and in my head, I’m having a conversation, like the conversation to cut, like, bring me down. This is ridiculous. What are you doing? Just get on with it. Like I was having all of these things go on. And then my husband said to the instructors are leading us just give her a push. And the instructor said no. And I thought, I wonder why she said no, that’s really interesting. And she and then she explained the psychology of why she wasn’t going to do it, she said you have to be invested. Because when you get to the other end, she has to get down from the other end when she gets the course. So if I push her off from here, there’s no way of her getting down at the other end. And when when she was saying it, she said it a bit more. So I said to him, you’ve got to carry on, just do your own thing and leave me to it. Because sometimes I realize you’re better off without the external input and talking yourself through it. And what I said to myself in the end is Disha, you have to just do it, because action will speak louder than anything else. And I’m no word of a library need, I closed my eyes. And I just took the jump. And I did it. And I opened my eyes halfway through. And then I thought, keep them open because you’ve taken the action now. And you’ve got to carry on with it. And so I got to the other end, and you know what? The first let’s say 1520 minutes that were really hard. My heart was pounding. And I thought I’m not going to get to the top of the course. But it became a lot easier. After about 20 minutes, I can do this. And I was I was okay, I was safe. I had somebody with me. And just taking the action of the first 1015 minutes meant that I was good. I will do it again. I’m not bothered now. I get it. I’ll get I’ll get on a tree and do tree climbing as long as I’m harnessed, by the way.

Brittany 19:28

I mean, obviously yeah. Oh, what you know, that is that is packed with just so many lessons in there. First of all, congratulations for doing that. I could feel that fear of you’re up there. And there’s this moment of indecision where you’re like, I’m either going or I’m not and what happens if I’m not. So I think you brought up something that’s interesting that I’ve never had somebody say on this podcast before. And that was really about kind of clearing away the outside noise is, and going a little bit more introspective, and letting yourself kind of talk to yourself. So this is something I mean, I thought I was a little alone in this realm because I’m constantly in my own head talking to myself, like thinking about the things that I’m thinking about. Actually, it’s funny because Dan Sullivan, the creator of strategic coach, he has this whole concept of thinking about your thinking. And I heard him talk about it. And then I read his small little book about this. And literally the show, what you just talked about is exactly that. It’s like you’re in your head. And you’re thinking about the things that you’re thinking about going. This is ridiculous, I know that these thoughts are not real, this isn’t reality. So I have to kind of talk myself into whatever this is. And I think that there’s so much power in that, because when you can have that level of self awareness, to make the leap to dive into your fear. I can’t think of another metaphor, but there’s just so much value packed in that. And there’s so many lessons that are to be learned that you know, what the fear is only as big as we allow it to be. And sometimes we’re the only one that can really kind of push ourselves off that ledge to make it reality. So that is just so awesome. So do I want to know, what has you really excited right now, kind of what’s next for you?

Disha 21:22

Okay, my most exciting venture at the moment is a one I’m have with you, Brittany, I’m not gonna lie. Enabling more women to know that running a successful business doesn’t have to be lonely, there are plenty of us, and we can help you help you then get to the next stage of their personal growth journey or their business journey. And it’s okay to not have it all together at all times. That’s the most exciting thing I think we’re working on right now together.

Brittany 21:53

Well, I am so glad you went that direction, because I’m equally as excited about that. And you know, just what we’re able to bring to so many of the wonderful entrepreneurial women out there. So fellas listening in, if you know, some amazing women send them our way, because we’ve got some cool stuff in store. So even you think about your future, and you think about what you truly value like what the show wants herself. What is one of your biggest or most important dreams or aspirations.

Disha 22:27

And my big dream, which is a big one right now, and I’m queuing it up for future Britney is at the moment, there’s lots of amazing work being done, I think, especially in recent times of enabling your young women to get access to education, up until they go to university, especially if they’re from a less well off background is what I would say. But what happens after that, what do their futures look like, and many women and young people drop out of their dreams, ambitions and aspirations if they’re not with the right network of people. So I would look eventually, to set up a foundation where we can reach these young women, and have enough mentors to guide them to the next stage of their careers or their business. So they can talk to successful business women. I know they have role models, who have got their back or help them find solutions. Because I do genuinely believe. And I know, Britney, you have daughters too, that we need more aspirational female role models. There’s nothing wrong with making money. And I think that more people should be proud of that fact, we can do so much good in the world. If we all had the aspiration to make money and put it back back into the world as well.

Brittany 23:51

You know, I think there’s so much so much power in that. And, you know, I think we all have those moments in time that we can reflect back and think about people that have been truly influential and impactful in our lives. And, you know, while you kind of brought up I think you made the comment about loneliness at one point in time, how it doesn’t have to be lonely as a female entrepreneur. You know, a lot of times we do have to kind of go head down and just force through. But when we really stop and think some of those biggest moments, some of those biggest breakthroughs that we have are because we connect with somebody who is able to help bring us to that next level, whether it be through encouragement, through opportunity through an open door, whatever that is. So I love that and I am excited to be part of that with you. So if you could only leave our audience members with one piece of advice, what would that piece of advice be?

Disha 24:50

And I think we can be guilty of procrastinating, especially as entrepreneurs or, you know business owners. We wait for the right conditions. In wait for the business to get better or bigger before taking action on decisions that really should be made sooner rather than later. Start taking action, no matter how small it might be, the solutions will come along the way. I don’t ever truly believe there’s perfect conditions and perfect times for everything in life or in business. And it’s better to take imperfect action than leave tasks Perfectly Undone. Start living more, I would also say in the, in the present, as entrepreneurs, we’re really guilty of living in the future, what’s going on in the future? What am I going to achieve? When will I achieve it? And we forget to appreciate what’s right in front of us. And to capitalize and maximize our team in front of us or, you know, whoever, whatever it may be going on right now. It’s great to have future aspirations. Of course it is because that’s where you’re marching to, just don’t forget what’s going on right now. And then use it as a way of procrastinating.

Brittany 26:02

I love it taking imperfect action. As you’re talking about procrastinating. I’m like, slowly, the little hand inside my head is raising it. Yeah, I’ve been guilty, you definitely have done it. So that’s there’s there’s so much value there. So my last question for you the show before we wrap up number one, actually. Okay, two questions we’re gonna say. So number one, if somebody wants to reach out to you wants to talk about some of the work that you do. Once a mentor, whatever that looks like, how do they get a hold of you.

Disha 26:37

Just drop me a message on LinkedIn. So it’s just forward forward slash dishes to lanky and you’ll see me right there. Chief growth strategist at hilling company. And I’d be I look forward to replying to your messages and connecting with you on there.

Brittany 26:51

Love it. So my last question for you is, what haven’t I asked you that I should have?

Disha 26:57

Who am I really on the inside, all end all of this Brittany is a woman on a continuous journey of personal and business development. I’m a real person at the end of this with and I struggle with juggling it all. And I’m sure that many of you women across the country in the world can understand that. While here in the UK, we’re on summer break. And summer break can feel real even with two teams in the house. Because, you know, my son’s very entrepreneurial. So he was and he gets bored. He wants to make loads of money. But that all involves parents being the guidance, or, you know, parents being disguised as an Uber driver or a personal shopper for the grocery shopping or personal chef, meanwhile, trying to run you know, all the fashion businesses that I have going. And so I don’t have it nailed all the time. I have it nailed sometimes. And I try and hold on to that, Brittany.

Brittany 27:53

I love that so much. You know what we show up when we need to and we fall apart when? Perfect balance. Disha thank you so much for sharing your wisdom, your time, your energy with our audience today. 

Disha 28:10

I still appreciate you all thank you for having me, Brittany, it’s been great chatting to you.

Brittany 28:14

Awesome. That wraps up today’s episode. We’ll catch you right back here next week. Hey Brittany here. We hope you got a lot of value out of today’s episode to access the key takeaways, the show notes and any deliverables go to ultimate advisor podcast.com. And while you’re there, check out the ultimate advisor mastermind. If you want to learn ways to maximize your income, your impact and your legacy through an automated practice, a self managing team and a killer culture that clients can’t stay away from. We look forward to seeing you back here in next week’s episode.