Episode Summary
Although we live in a male-dominated world, women beat all odds and challenge the dominant structures everyday. Further, many women are in leadership positions; they are managers, directors, and even independent entrepreneurs and founders.
But to be successful in business, women still have to work harder than men. They have to invest in themselves to learn, and considering that their mentors and bosses are mostly men, they lose the will to advance because it seems impossible for them to be in a higher position than men.
In this episode of Taking the Lead, our host Christina Brady welcomes AmyK Hutchens, Founder and Intelligence Activist at AmyK International Inc. AmyK describes her journey from being a school teacher to entering sales and starting her own business. AmyK and Christina discuss leadership, how to lead your team successfully and how the She Gets It community helps women with self-development.
Guest Profile
- Name: AmyK Hutchens
- What she does: AmyK is the founder and intelligence activist at AmyK International Inc.
- Company: AmyK International Inc
- Noteworthy: AmyK is an award-winning international speaker, the Amazon #1 bestselling author of the books “GET IT: Five Steps to the Sex, Salary, and Success You Want” and “The Secrets Leaders Keep”, and is the founder of the global community She Gets It. In addition, she has over twenty years of experience training and consulting with hundreds of clients. AmyK received her M.S. from Johns Hopkins University and has been seen, heard, or read on Bloomberg, NBC, ABC, USA Today, Entrepreneur, and U.S. News & World Report. She resides in San Diego, California.
Key Insights
- The importance of having a conversation with me, myself, and I. Women, especially in male-dominated industries, often lack confidence, lose their sense of self-worth, and don’t get the support they need to become the best version of themselves. That's why AmyK created the She Gets It community, which is full of resources — from free YouTube training videos to monthly workshops to a global She Gets It mastermind — for women ready to be brilliant at work and happy in life. AmyK points out that the most important thing for self-development is communicating with me, myself, and I, and she explains who can become part of the She Gets It community. "Any role, any industry, any female identifying leader who says, 'I want to invest in myself. I know that the more that I lead myself well, the more I can lead others well.' And then, if you've got a very specific sales or marketing team, we can do training on that, but this is about self-development."
- As you adapt to change, you must not forget your customers. While many dream of a leadership role, being a leader is not always straightforward. When things are uncertain in your industry, the onus is on you, as a leader, to take the helm and steer your organization. The world is changing, and you need to determine which changes are relevant to you and prioritize your focus areas. According to AmyK, once you've decided that, the most important thing is to figure out how to leverage them in a way that's best for the clients you serve. "If you're really there to serve, if you're there to problem-solve, if you're there to raise the critical thinking [levels], then you're asking two questions: what do we need to capitalize on for the best service for our customers? And then, you need to ask yourself, 'Who am I up to being?' or 'Who do I need to become to lead through this season or to lead through these changes?'"
- How can leaders create a strong relationship with their team? The role of a leader is to coach, guide, and inspire others; motivate teams through challenging times; and guide individuals through their career progressions. But to succeed in all this, a leader must have a strong and open relationship with their team and build trust. AmyK suggests that leaders consider co-creating all of their meetings with a question-based agenda to gain respect. "Let's say I'm the sales team leader, and we've got five people on the team. So, what I would do is I would send out that inclusive invite that says, 'Hey, how might we fill in the blank? How might we make the new person a more integrated, successful team player? How might we shorten our sales cycle? How might we grow by 12%? How might we upsell to get rid of some old whatever?' Whatever it is, it's a ‘How might we…?’ because that ‘we’ is inclusive; it says, 'Your ideas matter, your voice matters.'"
Episode Highlights
From Teaching at a School to Corporate Sales
“I started off as an elementary school teacher, and if you think about that, that is like the ultimate sales position. And so, little did I know that that was going to be this incredible training ground for then becoming a teacher-trainer and convincing them that there were ways to buy into ideas and to do things differently. And then, I literally transitioned into corporate sales, and I worked for a billion-dollar consumer product company. My territory was Asia, Australia, and Europe. And it was fascinating that a lot of what I had done with my fifth graders was working in sales, and it was like, ‘Oh, I see this connective thread.’ So I joke that I’ve been a teacher my whole life. If you’d said to me 25 years ago, ‘Your career would end up where you’d speak on stage in front of like 5,000 salespeople,’ I’d be like, ‘No way.’ And yet that’s exactly what I’ve been doing my whole life; I’ve been a teacher, and I’ve been selling ideas and learning my whole career, and here I am.”
The She Gets It Foundation
“In the pandemic, I got fired up that women didn’t have enough places to go that were a sacred container for their own development. And so, that got me jazzed, and that was when we started She Gets It, and She Gets It has now taken off around the globe, where women leaders — strong, capable, amazing women — can go and have this sacred portal to be like, ‘Oh, these are the tough conversations I need to have with me, myself, and I.’ And I’m going to be a little provocative; I have grown up, and I have played. Despite my elementary school start, the rest of my career has been in a male-dominated industry. And so, the majority of my mentors, my bosses, have all been men. And so, for me, it was like, ‘Where do women go to have a mentor, a coach, a woman who kind of gets it?’ And so that’s the She Gets It foundation — we’re on a mission to advance careers and self-leadership of women around the globe.”
Leaders Should Maximize the Potential of Each Individual
“What we need to do as leaders is take charge of, ‘Are my people focused on the right things with the right sense of urgency? Are they focused on the things that matter most, that might move the needle?’ But, really and truly, it’s also knowing who your individual is. And this is really important. I have fallen into the trap of trying to do it like somebody else, and the way that somebody else does it isn’t always the way that it works best for the next person. That doesn’t mean that we can’t share best practices, but what I’d rather do is hear, ‘Oh my gosh, Christina, you’re having tremendous success with this; Mary’s having tremendous success with that; which of these pieces is going to fit my personality? Which of these pieces could I take and run with?’ And that’s what leaders are helping to do — maximize the capacity and the potential of each individual.”
