Founders' Forum

From Solo Organizer to Team Leader: Janet Bernstein’s Journey to Scaling Success

• Marc Bernstein / Janet Bernstein, CPO(R) • Episode 88

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Can you truly balance the chaos of entrepreneurship with the joyful madness of the holiday season? Join us as we unpack this challenge with our guests Jess Hallahan and Janet Bernstein, who share their ingenious tips for maintaining sanity during the festive rush. From strategic advice on pacing tasks to the delightful suggestion of dancing stress away to holiday tunes, you'll find yourself equipped with new tools for juggling multiple roles. Adding depth to our conversation, Janet, a stellar professional organizer from England, takes us on her inspiring journey from Scarborough to leading Philadelphia's largest organizing team. Her story of transitioning from a dreamer inspired by her father's toy store to a successful entrepreneur is a testament to growth, grit, and holiday cheer.

Dive into the heart of entrepreneurship as we explore building a business from the ground up, highlighted by Janet's transformative shift from hands-on organizing to scaling her operations through delegation and systems. Learn how embracing the Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS) and focusing on personal strengths can catapult a solo endeavor into a thriving team effort. Our discussion underscores the importance of strategic planning and nurturing talent, illustrating how even the most daunting tasks can become manageable with the right approach and vision.

Finally, let's wander into the world of goal setting and global living. Janet enlightens us with her philosophy of tackling one major goal per year, making the overwhelming feel achievable. We share personal anecdotes of planning to escape the February blues by working remotely from different countries, starting with Lisbon. The conversation wraps up with insights on enriching company culture, emphasizing compassion and creativity.

About Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):
British born Janet Bernstein is the owner of The Organizing Professionals, greater Philadelphia's largest team of professional organizers and move managers. They are three time winners of Philadelphia Magazine's 'Best of Philly' and have been voted 'Best Professionals Organizers' for the last six years by Main Line Today magazine. Bernstein (not Marc!) graduated from The University of Pennsylvania, has lived in five countries on three continents and speaks English, French and rusty Russian!

Connect:
theorganizingprofessionals.com
instagram.com/theorganizingprofessionals
linkedin.com/in/janet-bernstein-cpo®-5269a518
youtube.com/@theorganizingprofessionals816

This episode is brought to you by The Organizing Professionals; your life transformed through our passion for organization. Go to theorganizingprofessionals.com to learn more.

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Announcer:

The following programming is sponsored by Marc J Bernstein. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of this station, its management or Beasley Media Group. Entrepreneur, author and financial consultant, Marc Bernstein helps high-performing entrepreneurial business owners create a vision for the future and follow through on their goals and intentions. Ang Onorato is a business growth strategist who blends psychology and business together to create conscious leaders and business owners who impact the world. Founders Forum is a radio show podcast sharing the real stories behind entrepreneurship as founders discover more about themselves, while providing valuable lessons and some fun and entertainment for you. Now here's Marc and Ange. Here's Marc and Ang.

Marc Bernstein:

Good morning America. How are you? We are here on a gray day in Philadelphia in early December Kind of typical weather around here that time of year but it's not gray in the studio, it's always sunny inside our studio here in Philadelphia. Anyway, I have Jess Hallahan again in the studio with us today. Welcome Jess, back. Jess is of Stress Less with Jess and Journey to Yourself is her brand you can find her that way and we have Nicole Darius here, who did our last show with us, and she's going to be sitting in our panel discussion in the middle with our guest today and I'm going to start off the conversation and have you all talk about it and then I'll introduce our guest. Go ahead, jess. You have a thought on that.

Jessica Hallahan:

I sure do so with it beginning the holiday season, being an entrepreneur and balancing the holiday stress. I would love to hear your lady's perspective on some tips and tricks that you're doing to balance all the different hats this time of year.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

My biggest tip is pacing yourself, because if you think of all the things that you have to do this time of year, it's overwhelming, and then you just get completely stressed out and paralyzed, right. So I'm a big believer in just pacing yourself. Even putting things on your calendar have a deadline for, even if it's wrapping gifts or if you're hosting and have everything not coming up to the right to the deadline of the day, but pacing yourself so that you can do things in bite-sized pieces and then you accomplish everything slowly and surely over the month. Love it.

Marc Bernstein:

That was Janet. We'll introduce Janet officially in a minute. And Nicole, your thoughts.

Jessica Hallahan:

My tip is to dance to holiday music in the kitchen.

Marc Bernstein:

I love it. I love that.

Jessica Hallahan:

Just enjoy this time of year. I love that. That's a good one too.

Marc Bernstein:

You know what I did that yesterday? I was in a room somewhere I forget where it was and they started playing holiday music and I started dancing and I thought this is what everyone should be doing. It's funny you said that I just had that thought yesterday, anyway. So our guest today is Janet Bernstein, cpo, cpor. You can explain that when we talk. Anyway, she's the owner and principal of the Organizing Professionals. Janet is British-born and the Organizing Professionals is Philadelphia's largest team of professional organizers and move managers. They are three-time winners of Philadelphia Magazine's Best Affiliate and have been listed Best Professionals Organizers for the last six years by Mainline Today Magazine. Bernstein not Marc, it says in her bio. Very sneaky there she's my British cousin. From another mother she said don't do this. This is my Liverpoolian accent.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Quit while you're ahead.

Marc Bernstein:

Marc, I know quit while I'm ahead. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania. She wanted to make a point that I didn't. I only went to the University of Delaware. She's lived in five countries on three continents and speaks English, french and rusty Russian. The Russian part is kind of interesting. We'll see if we get into that at all, but welcome Janet.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here.

Marc Bernstein:

So nice to have you here. I've had a great time speaking with you so far, so tell us how you got from your humble beginnings in England and how your journey, as to how you ended up in Philadelphia and started this company.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Right In less than half an hour. Okay, so I grew up in a small town in northern England, in Yorkshire, called Scarborough. You can relate to this because it's from Scarborough Fair the song, so I'm sure you know that very well.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

My dad owned a toy store in my town. It was very successful and I grew up working, you know, being in the shop the entire time. Both my parents worked in the shop and I think that I probably got the entrepreneurial bug very early on. I remember I think I was about five years old when I went to the local sweet shop and bought some sweets to bring back to our shop to sell them. I don't think I was getting the right kind of coaching because I remember selling them at cost, so Norm was actually helping me and showing me along the way to how to, you know, upcharge. But anyway, I think I learned that.

Marc Bernstein:

So you were a business person early on, but not necessarily a profitable one.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I think that's accurate.

Marc Bernstein:

Yes, okay, got it, okay, got it Okay. And then and then, what happened?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

And then when I think I remember telling you this, when you know, when other girls, I think, are planning out their life, I remember always dreaming up businesses as a teenager and I think that's. I think that's pretty unusual, for for a girl, no one was necessarily steering me in that, in that direction. My father passed away when I was I was when I was six so he was no longer. He was no longer there, but I was always coming up with crazy ideas, like it was a small town and I thought, oh, I could have a pizza delivery, which is a big deal in England. That wasn't a thing. So and I remember having a little van in my mind. It would be, you know, it would be branded with the pizza and running around and shuttling pizzas. And the irony is today I actually have that van. It doesn't have a pizza wrap on it.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

It has the wrap of the organizing professionals, but it's the van that.

Marc Bernstein:

I envisioned when I was 13 years old. Great Well, so I know it wasn't a straight line to be coming, you know, to just come here and create your company. There were some other journey along the way, any of that you'd like to discuss, and how you ended up at Penn and how you ended up creating your company?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I got married pretty early on life, when I was 22 and moved over to the States. My ex-husband was American, as is my second, but I'm planning on keeping this one so moved over here and when we were married for five years and then my ex-husband started a humanitarian aid organization and we got moved to Moscow and then Kazakhstan for nine years and within that time I got obviously very good at moving, moving with young kids and just being organized and living with less. And then when we came back to the States in about 2004, we lived in New York City for three years. The States in about 2004. We lived in New York City for three years and at that point professional organizing wasn't a thing.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

But I had a friend down in Florida and she goes I think I'm thinking of doing this professional organizing thing and I was like, oh, what's that? So my kids went to a small school in Manhattan where each of the parents had to donate three hours of their time a week and they asked me to organize the school attic, which was a horrendous mess. I mean, the teachers would go up there and throw the supplies. There was no rhyme or reason to it. So that's how I spent my time organizing. Then I put myself on the school silent auction and the winning bidder was a Park Avenue socialite, and she was my first client.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

So that was extremely helpful in just getting launching a you know a little, a little career here.

Marc Bernstein:

By the way, I can relate to your story. I told you that we my wife and I, are thinking about downsizing one of these days soon, and I talked to her about your company. I should have told you this offline, but she said I don't think so. And then I remembered why Because she doesn't come across as the most. She's got a lot of great qualities, but organizing isn't one of them. But she grew up in the military and lived all over Europe and lived all over the world and had to get used to moving. So when it comes to moving and had to get used to moving, so when it comes to moving, that's when she gets organized. She's like she's really good at that. So I can understand where that came from. Okay, so you were in New York City. How did you get to Philly?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

We stayed in New York for three years and then moved to Philadelphia in 2007. And my marriage wasn't doing well and I hadn't completed my undergrad and I thought, if I'm you know I obviously I'm going to need some kind of education here. So Penn accepted me. I think I was the oldest undergrad at Penn.

Marc Bernstein:

You had started college in England.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I had a little bit, yeah yeah. So I completed my undergrad at Penn, which was an interesting experience in my early 40s. Right Then I assumed that I would make degree was in English, creative writing, and I thought I'll just go into publishing. But what I didn't realize was I wasn't going to be hired for anything other than an entry level job, and I couldn't handle that. In my you know, by the way, you were still raising kids while all this was going on. I was for anything other than an entry-level job and I couldn't handle that.

Marc Bernstein:

By the way, you were still raising kids. While all this was going on, I was yeah, how many, three yeah.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

So I was doing a little bit of part-time, organizing, finishing my degree, and once I graduated I said to myself, let me give it a whirl, Let me see if I can make something of it. And I don't know why. I mean, if you can say, set an intention, if you believe that and that's definitely something that I did I was like let's just see what happens here. And it just really took off. It was able to sustain me financially even that first year.

Marc Bernstein:

Right, so you didn't have a lot of the struggles that people have normally in startup businesses, I guess.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Right, it was completely bootstrapped. It was just me.

Marc Bernstein:

Yeah.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

So I wasn't hiring people back then, it was just myself. And I got very lucky early on with some great publicity Right off the bat. I think in that first year I won best of filling, which is a golden ticket in this, you know in our city.

Marc Bernstein:

It absolutely is. Yeah, that's amazing. So that was, it was just you, and now that's that's. Let's see that's. We're 17 years later and it's not just you. How many people do you have today? We're a team of 15 today.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Yeah, which is something? Yeah, yeah, and what's not? Just you? How?

Marc Bernstein:

many people do you have today? We're a team of 15. Yeah, which is something? Yeah, yeah, and what? What was the? What did the trajectory look like of your business over that period of time?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

At some point, I think within the first few years, I had more clients than I could. I could serve myself and I had a good friend who was also pretty organized and I said, you know, come and help me. So she was my first employee. That was around 2015. And then I took on somebody else as well. It was my husband's friend, that he grew up with his wife. He would say, you know, bridget's really organized. You should, you know, talk to Bridget. So Bridget came on board. Then Bridget still had younger kids than me and after about two years she said I can't, I can't work, I can't be traveling all over the city anymore. And I just finished reading Traction.

Marc Bernstein:

I had that written down.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I wanted to ask you about, right, yeah and I realized I, if I'm going to scale this larger than myself, I need to get myself out of the way. And I said, bridget, you don't need to work anymore in with clients if you can answer the phones and do all the scheduling. Uh, let's try that. And that's when we really had some great traction.

Marc Bernstein:

Did you, did you um get like hire an EOS person to do it?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I did not. I read the book.

Marc Bernstein:

I read it several times. So you self-implemented.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I did.

Marc Bernstein:

Pretty interesting.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Yeah.

Marc Bernstein:

So Traction, for those that don't know, is a book by Geno Wickman that um came out of. Um, well, I talk a lot about Dan Sullivan the strategic coach, that's where I heard of it. Um, they've Sullivan the strategic coach, that's where I heard of it. They've worked closely together. I think Gino Wickman was part of that movement, if you want to call it that, and traction is very popular these days and it's also the system is called the Entrepreneurial Operating System, eos, and we're looking at that for our own company actually at the moment. So, very interesting. I'd actually like to talk to you about that, because when you have, in our case, we have four partners and four staff, and I don't know if we have enough depth to implement it, but you probably didn't either at that point as well. Yeah, correct, yes, so I'd like to hear how you did that, or that could be another show. Actually, I'm sure there's a lot there. Jess, I know you've got some thoughts coming up. Anything you wanted to ask.

Jessica Hallahan:

You know I have thoughts, so I was thinking too. When you're talking about the systems, there's a couple of things that I heard you say. So one you didn't get rid of her, like okay, fine, like go back to you know, stay at home, mom. You're like how else can I bring you? What else can I use you? What other skills can I use you with? And I think that's such a great skill as a business owner. And then you brought in the systems. How do you feel systems play a part in growing your business to what it is now?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Oh, 100% everything at this point, but also because I think I've been able to identify what my strengths are and what I'm not good at. So, even though I run a professional organizing company, I don't think my first skill is being the most organized person, but I'm very, very fortunate to have really organized people and detailed people in the business that help me. So I've identified over the years oh, I'm a visionary. I love strategy planning, seeing the big picture, but implementing it is not my strong suit.

Marc Bernstein:

You're like me in that regard. That's my thing too more vision and strategy, and I need other people to be the implementers. So you're not. So I assumed you were a very organized person because of the way you took to the attic in New York and all that, but it sounds more like you had a bigger picture in mind from the beginning.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I can be organized for sure. I mean, I still work with several clients one-on-one helping them get organized, but I love delegating all of that to the rest of the team.

Marc Bernstein:

That was a great question, great answer and a great time for a break, and we will be right back on Founders Forum.

Announcer:

Is clutter taking over your home or office, moving soon and feeling stressed out by everything that needs to be done, it's time to call in the experts At the Organizing Professionals. We do more than just organize we transform your space and simplify your life. Preparing to sell your home, our team helps you declutter and stage it to perfection, and when it's time to move, we're with you every step of the way. We'll pack up your home efficiently and unpack it at your new place so you're settled in without the stress. From decluttering and staging to packing, unpacking and beautifully setting up your new home. The organizing professionals are here to make your moves seamless and stress-free.

Marc Bernstein:

Visit TheOrganizingProfessionalscom today to schedule your free consultation. We are back on Founders Forum with our guest today, janet Bernstein. No relationship that we know of, no relation that we know of, anyway, but it feels like I've known her forever. I don't know where that comes from, thank you. I think that's because of the anglophile in me and I won't get into it again because I don't want to annoy you, but anyway. So we are one of the things that's come out of this. So Janet talked about the use of EOS, entrepreneur's Operating System, and traction, and I know we were talking offline about the fact that your unique ability is not really your organizational skills. It's more about strategy and vision and, as a result, I know that we've talked before that you're a goal setter and talk about that and your use of that personally and in your business, and then we want to talk about your future goals.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Yeah, love goal setting. Every December around this time I will sit down and, because we're a small company, it's basically a meeting with just myself, and I will sit there and strategize, and I have a big notebook and I'm just writing a lot of notes about what do I want to see for this next year. It can be revenue goals. It's just taking a look at who we have on the bench and how we can implement them better. And then every year, I take one big, hairy goal. That something that I don't want to do, but I know it's necessary for the business. And instead of like, because when you're a small business, there's so many things that you want to change or improve on, but you can't do everything at once, and so my strategy is just let's just take one big goal each year that otherwise I will just procrastinate on and let's attack that. And so every year we take. This year we completely revamped our website Horrible job, hated it, but it looks fantastic now.

Marc Bernstein:

Were you the implementer on that or you were just? You had the vision and other people implemented.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Exactly yeah, we hired, we hired, we hired a team, but it was still a lot of writing and creativity on my, on my part.

Marc Bernstein:

OK to get it, but it was you internally, it wasn't somebody else that did that.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Yeah.

Marc Bernstein:

I like your website. I was on it. Recently I went to look at it, it's a good work on that, thank you. Do you so? One big goal, but you wrote a book full of stuff. You write a book full of stuff. Do you only focus on the one goal or do you have other goals that come out?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

It depends on the year and how big the goal is. I didn't expect the website to take me. It actually took us about eight months from start to finish. Last year we worked completely on our standard operating procedures Again something that I hate to do so necessary.

Marc Bernstein:

I'm getting something out of what you're saying that might be different than what you intended, and I'll bring this up to both of you as a little discussion, because I watched a video recently Mel Robbins. I don't know if you know Mel Robbins. So Mel Robbins had a guy on named Dr K and he talked. It was about motivation, and he talked about motivation and I have my own thoughts about, you know, motivation and companies and all that. But he said really, people are always motivated. You know, it's a question of what they're motivated to do. It might be they're motivated to lay on the couch all day, you know, but they're motivated to do something and that, more effective than motivating yourself or others through goals, is taking one step, and that's a big news for me, because I do the same year-end planning process as you.

Marc Bernstein:

I start often in September. I'm a little late, but I've kind of started. But the rest of this month is going to be dedicated to that and I usually come out with all these things I want to get done this year and I realize that's you know. So I'll end up at doing 60 or 70% of what I wanted to do, maybe 80, if it's a really good year. But it's frustrating because I don't hit a hundred. So I've started to look at what's the one thing I need to do right now, or what's the one thing the company needs to do right now, right Before you take one step and take the next step and take the next step. Is that your experience too? Is that why you pick on the one thing?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

It is, and it's always one thing that I don't want to do.

Marc Bernstein:

Right, I like that, I like that aspect.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Absolutely, because then, if I'm, if I'm, if that's the goal, I know that I'm going to hit it, and then I'll break it down, like you said, into into 90 days as well.

Marc Bernstein:

Right.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Because doing a website is like. There's so many different steps that you need, and that's what has to be broken down.

Marc Bernstein:

Jess, how about you and your experience with that?

Jessica Hallahan:

Yeah, the two things that came to my mind are two books that I highly recommend the Essentialism, I think it's by Greg McCoy, and one of the quotes that he says in there I don't think it's from him, I think it's from somebody else but he says stick to the main thing, and we talked a lot about focus and goals and stuff like that, so sticking to the main thing, but another thing.

Marc Bernstein:

What's the name of that book again?

Jessica Hallahan:

Essentialism.

Marc Bernstein:

Essentialism Got it.

Jessica Hallahan:

The other book that actually you know you talked about traction, my book that got me just like on the right path and focus is literally called the one thing, Um, the guy that started Keller Williams and stuff like that.

Marc Bernstein:

Oh, gary Keller, right, yes, yes.

Jessica Hallahan:

And so he talks about very similar to what you're saying, like that one thing and I think that's really important it really eliminates a lot of the distractions, and I think that's kind of what you're talking about with the motivation is, what is our distractions? Can I have a follow-up question?

Marc Bernstein:

Sure, go ahead.

Jessica Hallahan:

So we talked about a lot of your that one big goal and that's something I always thrive on like one big goal for my business.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

But I also have one big goal for me personally every year. May I ask what your one big goal for you personally is? It's pretty exciting actually. Yes, my husband and I have decided that every February, we want to go and live in another country, and so 2025 is the launch of that, where we decided we can both work remotely. It's not like we're, you know, going on vacation. My husband would say I hate February. February is just so bleak here, and I was like, once the kids are, once we're empty nesters, let's do something about it. So we're spending February in Lisbon this year. Next year.

Marc Bernstein:

Very nice. That's a very popular place.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Isn't it for digital nomads? Very much so.

Marc Bernstein:

My daughter's I can say future in-laws. I believe her boyfriend's parents are doing that. In fact, they want to go there every year. That's going to be their thing every year. I like the, but it sounds like you'll be trying different places each year. Yeah, so I'm going to foreign country this winter, to Florida.

Marc Bernstein:

To me that's a foreign country, but anyway, that's another story. So so, talking about goal setting, and so I know you work one year at a time, so what is your one year vision? And it's and obviously you, and obviously you've added the personal dimension already what is the one-year vision for your business and for your life.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Look like For goals for 2025, I'm just trying to shore up our team training.

Marc Bernstein:

That's a big goal right now Is that the big, hairy, audacious one.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

It is, it's quite big. And then shoring up legal and HR as well as some things that just I just want to make sure that everything is. You know that we're dotting our I's and crossing all of our T's and those are things everyone hates to do.

Marc Bernstein:

Completely Right, right, right. So training, I'm just curious. In your business, because you have people that are already good at organizing, I sense that maybe some of the training skills are in other areas besides just the organization skills.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

They are when we're interviewing and looking for people to hire. Being organized is not the number one skill we're looking for. We're looking for people that love helping other people. That's what you've got to. Your heart has got to be in helping others.

Marc Bernstein:

Right.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

So that's the number one thing, and if you can be organized as well, that's wonderful.

Marc Bernstein:

How do you train the heart to be serving others?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Oh, you can't.

Marc Bernstein:

Right, so how does training? So how do you use training towards that?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

So we also part of our business is senior move management and so that's a whole other education on how to help seniors with downsizing and moving and the patience and the empathy and that's part of it.

Marc Bernstein:

With that training that you would conduct or you bring people in to do that. Some of both? Yeah, definitely Nice. What kind of people for that? I'm just curious. Would that be like?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

psychologists? It can be. I'm a member of the national association of senior move managers and I go to the conferences every year and I meet people there lots of resources yeah, definitely gotcha, yeah, gotcha where?

Marc Bernstein:

where does a group like that meet?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I'm just curious every year it's a different location makes sense it was in chicago this year, next year it's in dallas.

Marc Bernstein:

So it moves around how large an organization.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

I think they probably have around a thousand members that's something people don't think about.

Marc Bernstein:

You know all the time and you do. I know you're the best in Philly. Do you have um? Do you have much in the way of competition?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

it's funny you should say that yesterday I was just conducting a competitive analysis. That was my goals, okay, and so I spent a lot of time just seeing who the competition is, because we specialize in both home organizing and moving and senior move management. That's an unusual combination. I don't think there is any other company that specializes in all three to the level that we do.

Marc Bernstein:

So they might have some that are just senior move Exactly to the level that we do, so they might have some that are just senior move, exactly, and but a lot of moving specialists, I would imagine, are corporate relocation and things like that.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

That's a whole different animal. That's something different, gotcha.

Marc Bernstein:

Jess, I know you have more on your mind. Anything else, we have a couple of minutes left.

Jessica Hallahan:

Yes, yes. So, when you're talking about you know you have all these resources and things like that. What kind of resources do you provide for company culture? Besides training? What other kind of resources do you provide to support your team?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Let's see, I'm a huge believer in culture. Because we're spending so much of our time with our clients, we don't get together as a team as much as possible. So we'll have a couple of in-person team training days throughout the year. I have a massive holiday party on Friday night at my house, so the whole team is coming together with spouses. I mean, so that's fun. We played Topgolf a couple of months ago, we did that. I mean so that's fun. We played Topgolf a couple of months ago, we did that. And so coming together is, you know, is very important, especially. So having fun together because we're a small team is, you know, we probably should do it more One of my goals as well, more than we do, but we definitely try our best.

Marc Bernstein:

I'm guessing you're not all in the office every day, it's not?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

that kind of thing? No, exactly, it's not that kind of, it's all virtually right.

Marc Bernstein:

So it's important what I know you're a voracious reader and we talked about traction. What book are you currently reading?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Personal or business?

Marc Bernstein:

Your choice.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Oh, I want to do both. So personally, I just finished the autobiography of Agatha Christie.

Marc Bernstein:

Oh interesting.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

It was one of the best autobiographies I ever read.

Marc Bernstein:

Interesting, very interesting. She's British, correct. Yes, it was.

Announcer:

It was yeah.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Fascinating read and for business if you've never read Organizational Muscle by Kevin Nolan, who was a local guy from Kevin Nolan Painting.

Marc Bernstein:

Oh yeah, he's a member of Entrepreneurs' Organization. That's right, yeah, yeah yeah, fabulous book.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Oh, really I think almost every page is earmarked.

Marc Bernstein:

Really. Yeah, I'm going to have to get that. I lost my pen so I'm going to write it down after the show. Jess has it, that's okay.

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

One last question, if you could speak to your younger self, janet, what advice would you give you? But everything always works out. Nice, because when you're in the midst of just really tough times, it's hard to believe that Everything always works out.

Marc Bernstein:

Yeah, that's true, isn't it?

Janet Bernstein, CPO(R):

Yeah.

Marc Bernstein:

That's a great way to end, and the sun just came out in Philadelphia, so perfect ending to our show today. So I'd like to thank you all for listening to Founders Forum today. Look forward to seeing you next week. You can find us on all your favorite streaming services and live on the radio on Wednesday mornings WWDB AM 860 in Philadelphia.

Announcer:

Have a great day. Another episode of Founders Forum on WWDB Talk Radio and always at the Founders Forum show page at WWDBAMcom.

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Marc Bernstein

Host