hey it's patti scharf CPA and co-founder of catching clouds the leader in e-commerce
accounting and welcome back to another Saturday slow down where I like to
remind everybody to work on their business and not just in their business
all right today's video is going to be on women in business and particularly
self-limiting beliefs now I know that self-limiting beliefs is not unique to
women but I do think that it runs rampant through the female populations
so I'm giving a shout out to all my women folk today and I just want to talk
about that so when I was a kid just like most little kids do they just blurt out
whatever stupid thing runs through their mind I was the same I would just say
whatever came to mind and I had this really strong sense of justice or
injustice so I had a brother who was three days short of I still have a
brother but he's three days short of being a year older than me and he you
know he got to run around with all the other boys in the neighborhood with
their shirts off in the summer and why couldn't I do that which I figured out
some son but or they would they got to be altar boys and I didn't get to be an
altar boy or they got to be in Boy Scouts and I didn't get to be in Boy
Scouts which is super unfair because Boy Scouts is totally achievement based
whereas Girl Scouts basically you would go up a level every time you went to a
new grade and in elementary school it was it was just really annoying anyway
so I was super vocal about all these sin justices and things my parents would say
Patti one of these days you know your mouth is gonna get you into trouble and
I I guess from the time I was like six till I don't know like 39 I really kind
of took that to heart and I learned how to assimilate and I learned how to not
raise my hand in class too often I learned that I always had more to learn
than I had to offer other people and I learned how other people's opinions and
suggestions were almost always more valid than my own especially if it came
with strong conviction from a man
and although I think a lot of people Thais self-limiting beliefs - maybe a
lack of self-esteem I really don't think that's it my parents instilled a really
good strong sense of self-esteem in me so I kind of know how badass I just
purposely fly under the radar I make myself just small enough to still be
good but not really embrace all the greatness I can be because you know
that's just a little bit too flamboyant or it's - it's just not acceptable in
society and I I think that's wrong I think it I think it's just wrong I think
a lot of women have this problem where we're purposely making ourselves small
we're purposely not doing the things that are going to get us noticed because
we don't want to be noticed because that is uncomfortable because we were taught
to not draw attention to ourselves when we were young so so I did that for
decades I kept myself kind of just good but just kind of flying under the radar
so right as I was approaching 40 I had had a couple of back-to-back like
massive failures and I was starting to just kind of reassess everything in my
life and I was questioning things and trying to look at things from a
different angle and just you know what just kind of take stock of where I was
at and it was a couple of years after that that I read lean in by Sheryl
Sandberg which I highly recommend if you have not read and I was just blown away
by how many different ways I had been hiding myself or leaning back and
pushing myself away from the table instead of really fully embracing it and
so so then I started swinging the total other way where you know Scott was like
hey I think we should go to Red Robin for dinner and I'm like no I do not want
to go to Red Robin for dinner and he was like
okay somewhere else and I was just practicing
yeah reclaiming my voice and stuff like that but seriously I found it kind of a
daily challenge where I was crushing myself and and thinking you know am i
getting into these situations because I'm not using my voice in the proper way
and now I've got a story for you so in the I think was the summer of 2014
Xero had just opened up their office in Denver which is not too far from where
we live and they invited Scott me over to the office because they they were
kind of new there we could we got a little tour and they I think it was the
marketing department really wanted to talk to us and say hey you guys have
been using Xero for a few years and you're you know power users like how do
we get other accountants to like learn about Xero because I think once people
learn about it then they love it and embrace it and all that stuff and so
they actually asked this question of Scott me and Scott spoke up and he's
like well you just have to tell them that about all the advantages and you
have to tell them why it's secure and everything else and I was like I love
you but no that is not what accountants want to hear accountants are naturally
averse to change their naturally averse to scary new technology and stuff they
don't want to be on the cutting edge they want to make sure that everything
is safe everything is going to go find that it's gonna take care of what they
need they're gonna be like they're gonna adopt it like two years after mainstream
a lot of them well because it's just the nature of accountants we're risk-averse
so one of the people there at zero was like Patti you you know since you're an
accountant I would really love to have you speak to some other accountants and
tell them about your experiences and things like that because I think that
people would really love to hear from you
and I was like no no no no Scott is the speaker I'm the writer I'm not gonna do
that and we took a break and I was like what am i doing like if I want there to
be more female leaders in the world when I am presented with an opportunity
I need to take that regardless of whether it's comfortable for me or not
like what am I like is it true that I'm not a speaker I don't know I've never
spoken before and um maybe I maybe that's something that's really suited to
me so we came back from the break and I was like you know what I was thinking
about it you know I need to be a role model for my daughter I need to when
presented with an opportunity I need to be the change I want to see in the world
so yes I will I will speak at some point if you want me to so soon thereafter
they sent me to the accounting and financial women's alliance conference in
New Orleans and I had my first speaking gig and I'm I'll tell you like I tripped
over my own name like my introduction I was like blah but then it was fine after
that and I found that actually I'm a really good speaker who knew and I've
had quite a few more speaking engagements since then I'm not sure I
really want to do the whole speaking circuit thing but that's not the point
the point is I had to step out of my comfort zone I had to not just believe
in my head whatever narrative I had come up with which is I'm not a speaker and
go decide for myself you know go try it and find out if I really am a speaker
and I think that that's a big problem with a lot of women where they've kind
of gotten used to whatever narrative they've come up with along the way and
they haven't taken time to take a step back and reassess who they are what
their values are you know try something new and things like that so I think one
of the big challenges for for raising up women in this day and age and having
them become leaders is to give them the opportunity and kind of nudge them along
give them a little bit of you can do this you know you even if you haven't
done it before think about it try it you know you might like it
here's the other more important things the more I speak the more people listen
and the more people listen the more comfortable I am speaking up and with
each passing year I'm more and more comfortable in my skin I'm more
comfortable saying what's on my mind and I think that that's the change that kind
of needs to happen in the United States for sure but probably worldwide
particularly when it comes to women it's like when we are comfortable being
ourselves and being out there and showing people who we are it's gonna
become more acceptable to everybody that everybody is just saying what they think
and and getting more comfortable with being who they are and everybody's
voices are going to be easier to rise to the top I guess so I want to circle back
to the topic of women in business and why there aren't as many women in
leadership roles I think one of the big reasons is that women are simply
limiting themselves that they're not putting themselves out there now I don't
think it's the only reason and that's why I have another video coming next
week I want you to subscribe if you haven't already and click the bell it's
gonna be notifying you when my next video comes out but um I I think that
you can argue that you know women you know it societally imposed that women
aren't in these positions or it's self-imposed but I think that both are
true I think there are a lot of different dynamics going on and you
can't simplify this into just one point issue it's not the men aren't keeping us
down women it's just something that we need to be aware of because when we're
aware of then we can take action and and make change
I do think it doesn't really matter what what it is that's been limiting knows us
to this point I think that we have the power to take action and make the world
whatever it is we want it to be for ourselves so that is my soapbox for
today hopefully this story resonated with you if it did or if you have your
own story please leave it down below I'd love to hear it this like I said before
this is one of my like my most heartfelt issues I
I'm really passionate about this topic so I hope you like this video if you did
please like comment and share if you haven't already please subscribe and
I'll catch you later
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