Have you ever had someone believe in you before you fully believed in yourself?

Not the polite kind of belief. Not the “you got this!” text with three fire emojis.

I mean someone who looks at you, sees what you could become, and is willing to place a sweeping bet on you when you’re still questioning whether you have what it takes.

I’ve had that person in my life.

Her name is Susan.

And this episode is about what she taught me.

Our story started in 2020 in one of the most 2020 ways possible: Clubhouse. (Remember Clubhouse?! What a TIME.)

I was building Social Curator and entering the world of SaaS without having built a software company before. Translation: your girl had QUESTIONS.

So every weekday morning at 7:00, before my daughter woke up, I listened to Susan talk about building SaaS businesses. Eventually, I worked up enough courage to raise my virtual hand and ask her a question.

The advice she gave me helped me raise $555,000 in less than an hour.

Yes. You read that correctly.

But what happened afterward mattered even more.

Susan stayed in touch. She offered advice. She checked on me. And every time I assumed she was finally going to pitch me something…she didn't.

So eventually I went to JD and asked, “How do I hire this woman?”

Instead of Susan pitching me, I pitched her.

And what followed became one of the most important mentoring relationships of my career.

One lesson Susan drilled into me was the importance of stepping away from the never-ending pile of problems long enough to ask: What do I actually need to achieve in the next 12 months?

Because entrepreneurs? We are GOOD at finding problems.

We find the thing that's broken. The person who needs help. The metric that's down. The project that's late. And then—POOF—we're six hours deep in solving something that might have very little to do with where we're trying to go.

Susan taught me to focus on the plan, not simply react to the problems.

Once you know where you're going, you can ask a much better question: Where does my time need to go to make that plan happen?

And then comes the uncomfortable part.

You have to look at what you're currently doing and decide what stays, what gets handed to someone else, and what needs to disappear entirely.

Because if you keep doing the same things, you'll keep producing the same results.

Susan shared an example from her experience at Procter & Gamble that I still think about: the company divested a significant portion of its businesses to concentrate its focus—and grew.

LESS…created MORE.

For founders, that's terrifying.

We want to keep the revenue stream. And the offer. And the project. And the idea sitting in the Google Doc from 2022 because what if?!

But diluted focus creates diluted results.

And after deciding what matters?

Execute.

Plans are beautiful. Strategies are exciting. Ideas make us feel productive.

But none of them change a business until somebody executes.

This episode, however, isn't simply about business strategy.

It's about what happens when someone sees greatness in you and refuses to let you forget it.

Near the end, I share one of the hardest seasons I've walked through. Susan unexpectedly entered palliative care shortly after one of our regular conversations. During that conversation, I felt compelled to tell her something I hadn't said quite that way before:

I loved her.

I told her how much her belief in me had changed my career.

The next day, everything changed.

When I learned Susan wanted to know whether I was coming to see her, I booked a ticket to Boulder. I got the privilege of putting my arms around my mentor and telling her—in person—what her investment in me meant.

And maybe that's the biggest lesson underneath all the business lessons:

Tell people what they mean to you.

Use what they taught you.

Pass it forward.

Susan's knowledge won't stop with me. If something she taught me can change the way you build, lead, focus, or believe in yourself, then her impact keeps multiplying.

And friend, during the hard seasons? Look for the beauty.

It's there.

Sometimes we just have to stop long enough to see it.

Click >>PLAY<< to hear all of this and:

[00:00] Why having someone believe in you can completely change your trajectory

[00:56] How I accidentally found the mentor who would transform my business

[01:48] How one piece of Susan's advice helped me raise $555,000 in under an hour

[03:22] Why founders need to give themselves credit for what's already working

[05:20] How to stop reacting to problems and build around your 12-month plan

[06:29] How to decide what to keep, delegate, or completely let go

[07:14] Why execution matters more than another great idea or strategy

[32:05] Why I finally told my mentor exactly what her belief in me meant

Listen to Related Episodes:

• Strategies that Have Transformed My Business with (My Coach) Susan Sierota
• Eavesdrop on a Private Call with Me and My Business Mentor
• Business Questions Answered: Roundtable Discussion with Brilliant and Successful Women

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