Navigating Business Challenges with Honesty and Clarity

“It's about the exchange of possibilities.” - Aleksa Aishpur

In this episode, we discuss the essential elements of running a successful business, focusing on productivity, self-honesty, and the importance of building strong relationships. We’re joined by guest Aleksa Aishpur, who shares her insights on identifying misaligned efforts, navigating the entrepreneurial journey, and the significance of networking and community building. 

In this episode, listen for: 

• Evaluate and Refocus Efforts Based on Results: Entrepreneurs should regularly assess their activities to ensure they contribute to measurable success.
• Adaptability in Achieving Long-term Goals: While maintaining a clear vision is essential, the path to achieving it may change. Entrepreneurs should embrace flexibility and focus on projects that build foundational elements, such as trust and community, which ultimately support their broader goals.
• Passion and Focus Drive Sustainable Success: Pursuing projects aligned with personal passions helps maintain motivation and focus, even during challenges. 

What does it take for entrepreneurs to achieve sustainable success? It’s all about staying focused on your vision, adapting strategies based on measurable results, and aligning your efforts with genuine passion and community-building. How are you ensuring your work aligns with these principles? Tune into the episode to find out how! 

Connect with Aleksa Aishpur

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aishpur/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aleksa.aishpur/ 

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We’re Dana Johnson and Sara Lowell hosts of Entrepreneur Encounter, a growing and thriving entrepreneur podcast dedicated to soft skills development and we’re so grateful you found us. We started this podcast to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you feel more empowered, thrive, and be fulfilled as you reach your entrepreneur goals. 

We interview experts and thought leaders so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of yourself you’ve never seen before. 

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Transcript

Have you ever encountered a hurdle with launching or growing your business? Listen, there are two things that run a business, the backend and your soft skills. Telling you right now, if these aren't in place, you'll lose clients and you'll lose money. You don't want that while you're in the right place. Hey, I'm Dana. Hey, I'm Sarah. We're your hosts of the Entrepreneur Encounter and we're going to give you a behind the scenes glance into our businesses, give you genuine feedback, tips and tricks,

Plus occasionally bring on guests that care about supporting you to grow your business organically and nurturing authentic relationships. Are you ready?

Welcome back entrepreneurs. We are super excited for today's episode. So often we find ourselves caught up in the day-to-day grind of running a business. We're constantly busy, but sometimes we're not moving the needle as much as we like. You're at the end of the day and it feels like you literally did nothing productive. Thankfully, we have an amazing guest today, Alexa, who is a director of...

business development with Spirit Media, and she is going to help us in so many ways on being more productive and identifying misaligned efforts. So welcome, Alexa. Thank you. I'm so appreciate this possibility to be here and share my experience and maybe even some tips that we'll have to end the prayers. I've been looking forward to this one. I'm always trying to find ways to

be more productive or feel like I'm more productive at the very least. So would you like to take a few minutes and explain like who you are and what you do and how you got to this point of being an expert on being more productive? Yeah, I'm in the area of creating business, social projects and communities over 18 years.

I started in Ukraine because I'm original from Ukraine and I have been in USA only one and a half year for now. And I created events for 10,000 people in Ukraine. I had my own business project, crowdfunding platform, and we helped to do a lot of businesses and social projects to fundraise money.

And I created even fashion shows and very interesting events like marathons to promote some projects and build brands. So I have pretty big experience. And when I came in the USA, I had like a lot of thoughts where is better to work and what kind of projects to develop. And I'm happy that I found it because I run a couple of projects here and work in the company. So.

I'm pretty busy. I love that. So with this experience, especially with how busy you are right now, how can entrepreneurs identify activities or strategies that are not contributing to their overall business goals? I think very important to be honest with yourself because sometimes with so much love to do something and even if it not give some fruits for us.

We're still doing that and doing that and doing that just because we think that one day it will bring us something where I so much love it, it should give me. But the main thing is to see resolve. If you are not profitable in some things, or if we're talking not only about profit, but about some kind of success and you can't see measure this success, you haven't it, it's better to change your strategy.

And it's really great to have people around that you can share, that you can talk and figure it out to find what is not bringing results. love that. So at the time of this recording for all of our listeners, I had a coffee chat before this and it's with a potential client and he literally was like, I recognize that I'm the problem. Like he is on two boards. He has multiple businesses.

he has strategy and brain maps them, but he doesn't follow them. So I like how you mentioned tracking the success, but it doesn't necessarily mean profit and money, but like, is it working? Like you don't want to waste your time, but also be honest with yourselves. Are you actually doing the thing, steps in the processes that you committed to doing, or did you just do it for two or three days and then kind of let it.

trail off. know personally and in full transparency, I have lacked in that from time to time. So I'm a big 12 week year person and I have my two or three tasks that I want to reach my big end of year goal. And one of my goals was I'm going to be more active on Instagram and I'm going to build a community there. And so I did map out a schedule. I do have content and I do like comment on stuff.

But that's honestly, as far as I went in some days, I didn't do it. So like, I wasn't being consistent. I worked with Sarah on it. I talked to her. like, I'm just not doing it. And I got to recommit and then make the time and the priority to do it every single day. Because of course my Instagram isn't growing. Of course I don't have a full calendar of potential calls because I had to be honest that I wasn't actually doing it. Yeah. I can share my experience when I moved to U S like to Marifa before I had.

things, I know what I want to do. And in one day it was just rocking. So I haven't any plans, any possibilities, nothing. I just changed one country because I lived nine months in Romania and then I moved to USA. And when I came here, I realized, my gosh, so many possibilities. And I started so many things to try because I didn't know where will work.

I'm an author. My book is published on Amazon. I'm a jumpstart coach. So I help people to start projects. And I saw that, maybe I need to be like a coach for my first step. But I found that before I will do that, I need to have something to show people, like some kind of project, some kind of communities. So I tried to make this plan work like a coach and bring a lot of time in this, but it didn't work. Then I realized.

my gosh, it's not the work because first I need to have community and trust. So now I focused on my next project and this project is a community of Ukrainian and American entrepreneurs. have some schedule of events and everything. And I realized that through this project, I will build community and then this community, someone of these people will have the questions, will need coach.

will need some other products that I have and it will be easier for me. So now I will focus. I left this, like I took all my attention from this previous project to new project because I know that I will develop my project through this project. That is such a great point of your vision has not changed.

But I guess the journey or the stepping stones has changed, but your vision is still there. So I've noticed with a lot of entrepreneurs that we can fall into that trap of tunnel vision. This is the only way to get there. This is the only way to be successful. This is the only view for success. So what are some common pitfalls or misconceptions?

that you have seen through your coaching and building these businesses? And how can we avoid these pitfalls? I think the main thing is to have your green. Because sometimes people just try to find, I will do something that will bring me money. That's why they jump from project to project. Because if you do something not that you're passionate in, it's hard to have this one line. So I think the main thing that

person need to find before start on project is where is their passion. Like I know that my project was coaching. It's just one step to my other project, bigger one. But without this one, I can't build this like huge, huge dream. That's why I have focus. If person haven't focused like far, it's so hard to hold it. I don't mean that like

perfect picture that you draw and you know exactly. But I mean, for example, I want to be a coach. So I'm looking for ways how to do that and where I will be more useful and fruitful. I found this solution through talking with different people, learning marketplaces and see what really people need now. That's how I found this solution. But really it's, I can tell about man's psychology.

I know that if ladies, haven't this dream, they can't move. sometimes we think that this dream is such big that I never will be there. So they do nothing. But I can tell that even small steps, even small projects that can bring you there can open for you new possibilities. So when I started, Adores just started to open for me because I started to talk about it.

I want it. I don't know how. Tell me what I do. What is your experience? Can you connect to me with other people? So I started to search and this searching helped me, like, leads me how I can come here. Hey there, listeners. Ever feel like you're struggling to connect with customers or lead your team effectively? That's where soft skills come in. Entrepreneur encounter isn't just another podcast. We're a community dedicated to helping early stage entrepreneurs like you.

Master the soft skills that make or break a business. Technical skills are important, but without communication, collaboration and confidence, your business might never get off the ground to the next level. In our membership, Dana and I share actionable insights and tips to help you nurture the soft skills you need to thrive. Give you access to bonus content, workshops and a network of like-minded entrepreneurs who are all on the same journey.

We'll teach you how to boost your confidence, become a leader who inspires and motivates your team, navigate conflict like a pro, to resolve disagreements without drama and build stronger relationships, communicate clearly and concisely, get your message across, build trust and close the deal. If you're ready to take your business to the next level, join the circle by clicking the link in the show notes. feel like that search, however long it takes, especially bonus points if it's organic,

is a great way to build a referral system because you're taking the time to nurture a community and really get to know them. And that can only lead to generating consistent business. as you've been building your community, how have you been maintaining the community and guiding it or funneling it to a strong referral network?

I think my point with you can help someone, be someone can help you. A referral system is more about if you will bring me, I will give you. And what it can be in other company, we have a system that everyone who will refer us, person who needs like a website or any marketing solution or book publishing or book writing, they will have 300 bucks. So this is our referral system. We pay money.

The referral system can be something else. For example, if you will help me to find these people, I can connect you with someone. Who is that? Or I creating a series of events. Let's do event for you. We will share about you and you will tell about me on your social mobile. So that's how it works. It's like exchange of possibilities. Ooh, I love that exchange of possibilities.

So for that with me, what I've been implementing lately is a mixture of in-person networking. I now, two days a week, go to a co-working space that's local to my area. I grab coffee, a chat with what they call their partners here, we're all business partners in the same office, we're in proximity. So I'm learning what they're doing, I'm sharing what I'm doing, which opens up the possibilities of them knowing.

someone in their circle, because there's a lot of people in my community that I don't know. So now, hopefully in their conversations throughout their day, someone mentions a service that I offer. And I've taken the time to just chat with them, not consistently sell. And hopefully my name comes up. But I also do a lot of virtual marketing and networking as well. I hop on community, coffee, co-working.

things. I was in one yesterday for three hours. yeah. But how it worked was we worked for 25 minutes and then we took a five minute break and we chatted about what we got done. If anyone was struggling with something, just kind of water cooler talk for five minutes. And then we refocused for another 25 and we did that off and on for three hours. So I actually got my to do list done within that time frame. So

It felt really good, but I also got to connect with other people. Other, this is bookkeepers. But I know there's so many Facebook groups that offer this same thing in so many different areas. So I think that's a great balance and strategy of if you're nervous about talking to people in person, start virtual. If it doesn't go well, you can always turn your camera off. So in general, networking is a power. I love that. I think that's the best way.

It may feel slow in the way that businesses and technology and everything is so fast, fast, fast, but the slow and steady helps you build strong business relationships for that long-term success. I'm going to use Jenna Kutcher as an example. Everyone knows who that woman is for the most part. I don't know how you don't know who she is, but when she started her entrepreneur journey, she was a wedding and lifestyle photographer. She got this cheap camera.

As of Marketplace, Craigslist, who knows? I don't remember, but she just started with that. But then she started building relationships. And when she pivoted to business coaching and she pivoted to being a podcaster and she pivoted to whatever else she's dreamed of, because she took the time to build those relationships, her audience literally follows her wherever she goes and cheers her on and shares her stuff. And that's essentially us as business owners. That's what we're trying to do.

is we have to take that time. So as you've been building your community, what do you suggest for other entrepreneurs to effectively network and to build those meaningful relationships? Yeah, I love this topic. I even created one event for Ukrainian community. share all the details. I'll just see all the communications. That's actually how I build all my projects.

and how I found the team and customers and how I built everything in my life. And I really love it because for me, every person that I met, it's like planet. And it looks like you came to a new planet and you discover. I really enjoy talking to people and discovering them because I, in my head, this...

planet and they try to find something interesting on this planet. And I found it all the time because we are so unique and each person is so unique, interesting, like absolutely unusual with different experience. That's why, first of all, is to have a joy in conversation with people because we have empathy. if meet that person who is really interested in you, you will have much more joy to talk to these people. Be honest.

and more open. And that's like a tricky part, just to be really interested in people. Ask person first about them, just listen them and then share about you something and exchange contacts and then contact this person. Because most of the time people exchange contacts and never write to these people, never met them before. Even after networking, I met so many people during all these years and just a few of them contacted me.

I contact with people more. I wrote the message like, it was so nice to meet you. Let's have a zoom call together. I really hope that in something that you are doing. So in one person will share with you what they are doing. They will ask you, by the way, what are you doing? And then the point where you can, of your project, the fans of your goals talk to this person like, Hey,

Let's do some kind of partnership. We have a referral system. What if we will do some kind of interview and how we can like exchange. And that's where the strongest part to give time to these people. love that. So I feel like that's the key takeaway for everyone today is honestly take time to reflect your own business strategies and consider making adjustments to

Spark joy in the conversation. Focus on getting to know the person. Like, what are they doing? Do they have kids? Have they just moved? Whether it's across town or completely from another country, like really get to know them and take the sales part out of it because people buy from people they know. So the referrals, the networks, as long as you are diligently, I feel like, and consistently touching base.

just asking, hey, what's going on in your business? What goals do you have right now? How can my skills as fill in the blank of your job title support you in that? Or how can my network support you? That's typically what I lean on is I have over a thousand LinkedIn connections that I try and stay in touch with as best I can on at least a quarterly basis. It's a lot to keep up with, but I do that so that when I share something,

from someone I'm networking with, whether they're a potential client or just someone I'm invested in, my network will see it. They'll get the notification. I do that with strong intentionality. And if you are listening to this and you're just getting started and you're just building your network, I feel like that's the key takeaway is focus on the joyful side of relationship building and just get to know people. Call it speed dating.

Actually, you can add some optimizations like chatbots or social media to support this contact. Like to share like you share. Yeah, like you can force something or write something and people will have notification. They will have something from you and this will be great if you will do that stable way. I love that. That might be a whole episode of like what chatbots and things to help you.

So we might have to have you come back on because that is so important because we are, we do only have so much time in a day. So for those that are interested in learning more about you and hopping into your community, where can our listeners find you? I will share some links, but of course you can find me on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram. It's the main social media that I use right now.

and we have this chatbot where we share our events, some very useful information. Perfect. So all of the information once we get it will be in the show notes and let us know, reach out to us on our DMs and tell us what strategies you're using and we'll go from there. Until next time, bye. you, bye.

Thanks for tuning in to another episode. Remember, soft skills aren't just some fluffy buzzwords that get thrown around in the corporate world. They're the key to unlocking your full potential as a professional and a human being. Don't be afraid to invest in yourself and seek out opportunities to improve your soft skills. Sarah and I have a variety of workshops, online courses, and complimentary clarity calls for you to practice in real time with us.

Links are always in the show notes. And be sure to join us next time for more insights, tips, and tricks to help you succeed in your entrepreneur encounter.