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How to Build a Disaster Proof Business Plan with Angela Groeneveld

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0:00 | 43:07

Plan for the unexpected—because in business, it’s not a matter of if a disruption happens, it’s

when.

In this episode of The Karas Wright Show, Karas Wright sits down with Angela Groeneveld, CEO of Emerge Agency and rural economic development leader, for a powerful conversation about business resilience and recovery. Together, they unpack the hard lessons learned from the 2013 High River floods and explore how entrepreneurs can protect their legacies through strategic planning and mental wellness.


Angela shares the story behind her "Fear to Faith" framework and how surviving frontline disasters shaped her mission to serve rural business owners. From the importance of reading the fine print in insurance policies to building a "toolbox of happiness" for mental health, this conversation is a masterclass in staying grounded when the world shifts.


This episode is for small business owners and leaders who are feeling the weight of uncertainty and desire a proactive roadmap to navigate both natural and manmade disruptions with confidence.


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WHAT YOU'LL LEARN

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→ The three essential pillars of disaster recovery: Plan, Insurance, and Community.

→ Why mental wellness is the first thing to check in a business "pulse check."

→ How to conduct a SWOT analysis that actually addresses external threats.

→ The difference between "going with the flow" and having a disruption plan.

→ Why community and relationships are your business's ultimate insurance policy.

→ How to transition from making ego-driven decisions to heart-centered leadership.

00:00 Introduction

01:06 The birth of Emerge Agency and disaster recovery 03:20 Top 3 lessons from the 2013 floods

07:31 How to build a DIY disaster recovery plan

09:56 The Business Pulse Check: Prioritizing mental health 

13:17 Leaving a legacy of mental wellness

17:36 Using YouTube and music to recenter during a slip 

21:15 Overcoming people-pleasing and finding self-love

28:00 The shift toward shopping local and community strength

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ABOUT ANGELA GROENEVELD

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Angela Groeneveld is the CEO of Emerge Agency and a powerhouse in rural economic development. With a background in coaching, and disaster recovery, she helps communities and businesses emerge forward through crises with strength and strategy.

Website: www.emergeagency.ca Instagram: @e.m.e.r.g.e_agency


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IF THIS HELPED YOU

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If this conversation helped you move from a place of fear to a place of faith in your leadership, make sure to like, comment, and subscribe. Share this episode with a fellow entrepreneur who needs to hear this today.


#disasterrecovery #businessresilience #mentalwellness #entrepreneurship #ruralbusiness #leadershipgrowth #feartofaith #businesscontinuity #smallbusinessadvice #okotoksbusiness #albertastrong


"How to Build a Disaster Proof Business Plan with Angela Groeneveld"

Work with Karas Wright — Business & Leadership Coach (Wright Step Coaching) Website: www.wrightstepcoaching.com

Instagram: @wrightstepcoaching

SPEAKER_00

My mantra is when you have the fear in your head, which is the ego, and it edges God out. All the noise starts to talk to you, whether it's in your personal relationship, your business, or your ideas, or your own confidence, talking to yourself. If you let that noise come in, it will form an ego and it'll edge God out. Do not make decisions from the brain. The brain is there, is your biggest machine. It's the engine in your body. It's like the engine in the car. So let it do its work, but make your decisions from your heart. Make your decisions from a stable place of love. And when you do, you will do no wrong in life. You will fly.

SPEAKER_01

One who has not just started and run an effective business, but also has dominated economic development in the rural Alberta market. Angela Grenneveld, I'm so excited to have you join us. And I'm gonna have you tell us about those many different hats that you've worn. Well, thank you. Thanks for having me. And my dog, Molly.

SPEAKER_00

I don't know if someone can see it. Oh my goodness. She's not a service dog. I'm just a country girl, cowgirl that loves bringing her dog everywhere. But um dominate. I love how you uh dominate. I love that, how you introduced me because that really is my energy. And I uh I think when I enter a room, I dominate a room.

unknown

I really do.

SPEAKER_00

And for my EDOs that are watching out, they're my colleagues that I dominate the industry, they'll probably laugh and say, well, she dominates the room, definitely, but I don't know about the industry as I respect them all. They they are all so great at what they do. Uh, a lot of them become mentors. But yes, I'm very passionate about everything I do. And uh so a little bit about myself. Um, I'm the CEO of a merge agency. Uh eMERGE Agency was formed from uh it started when the floods of High River came about. Uh I got thrown into learning really fast how to do uh business disaster recovery, community disaster recovery, economic development disaster recovery. So um I also did some training for myself. I suffered some PTSD from that that I didn't realize, serving uh on the front line in disasters for a while. Um, had a very special person uh invest in me and uh said you need to go get some training to be able to serve entrepreneurs better because I was carrying their pains. So I went and got my my coaching at that time. And so the company is emerge, emerging yourself forward, emerging your community forward, and emerging your business forward. And then when if a disaster happens for those contracts, it moves into one word on my branding as a merge agency. Um and it was a local uh branding lady, marketing lady here that um uh created that for me. And I love it. I love that I can be diversified. You can see the key there. I'm coaching already, that I can be diversified a little bit with the contracts coming in on that. But uh, so yeah, that's my side gig. Um, it was my full-time gig for a while. And uh, but I have a very big passion for rural business owners, for entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship. I eat, breathe, sleep, love it. And rural communities. I'm a country girl. Um, I love rural communities, so I serve uh in government for economic development. Um, and that's my day job. So yeah, that's a little bit about me.

SPEAKER_01

That's amazing. I want to touch on um the the experience that you had in the 2013 floods. I actually lived in Okotokes and served uh in the community at that time, and I remember it vividly because my ex-husband and my kid's dad was working in High River, and that was a terrifying moment for so many of us. What have you learned about disaster recovery from a business standpoint through that experience?

SPEAKER_00

We would be here a long time ago. Top three things you've learned. Top three things um have a plan. It's not if it happens, it's when it happens. That um it's there's some way uh you're gonna have a disruption in your business. And so we are trained uh as disaster recovery specialists, that we are trained that there's a natural disaster or a man-made disaster. So COVID is a man-made disaster. Uh when the tariffs, man-made disaster. So when our economy is uh by man has changed, and we wake up one day and we're told that we can't open up our business or we're told we can't sell this or it's gonna cost this today. Yeah, those are shifts. So if you don't have a plan in place for that, uh, that's my number one lesson that I learned is everybody needs to have a plan. Number two is um if how can I explain this? If you're not really good at something, please hire the expert. Insurance. I I don't speak very highly of insurance because of my experience, but I speak highly of insurance because everybody needs it. My experience was we I've been an entrepreneur my whole life. And I you there's things we do for check marks to get them done, but we don't read the fine print. The pain for me that I still carry to this day, and I've served on just a lot of disasters in Canada, some in the national, is that's the day that they pull out their insurance policy and they take a look at it and and they realize they don't have coverage. It's the same as if your house gets uh um, if your house gets hailed or or my truck got stolen the other day, broken into, and I was being cheap, and it's just an old farm truck, and uh I didn't have theft insurance on it, didn't read the fine line on it. So that's number two. And number three lesson is one that I practice every single day, and community recovers community. Tribes working together, connections. That is what is going to save your business. So you, as an entrepreneur and a business owner, make sure that you have relationships with your customers. I don't believe in competition because I've watched uh I've watched it over the years serving in disaster recovery. They're all there together. We're all trying to put food on the table and make money. And um it takes uh takes a community to do that. It you'll bring in resources from Red Cross and government and donations, but it's really the community and it's the customers that will support you in the end. So those are my top three.

SPEAKER_01

So plan, insurance, community.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Let's step back into the plan piece because this is uh something that's near and dear to my heart as a former financial planner. And as a matter of fact, just earlier today, my husband and I sat down with our financial planner and uh was going through our estate plan. Oh, I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_00

No, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_01

That's a terrible feeling. No, but I think it's it's because I run away from that kind of work. Right. And I run towards that for the exact I think for the exact same reason. Yeah. Is because of fail to plan, plan to fail. Yeah. And so when we look at this from a business standpoint, and this is where the business continuity comes in, because of both of our businesses being as coaches and my uh an arm I'm gonna be adding in in the next two years is counseling. I have to think about what does the actual estate planning look like from a patient perspective. So the business perspective, but also the patient perspective. And the same thing for my my coaching clients and you would as well. Like what happens if something happens to me? My husband doesn't want to deal with that. Yeah. There's no way. So let's walk back through what is a recovery plan, a disaster recovery plan, whether that's man-made or God-made.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

How what do you need to have involved with that?

SPEAKER_00

So uh government has to have, so your municipality, your province, um, your country, they all have to have uh disaster recovery plans. Departments have to have disaster recovery plans. So I'm gonna just speak to it from uh your you as an entrepreneur, you as a business owner, is basically everybody knows what a SWOT analysis is. You know, your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. I'm gonna make this as easy as it can be. So you can hire me. You can hire lots of people. And with AI right now, you could go on and put your business in there and it'll it'll whip you out a disaster recovery plan. But for those of you that are 50 plus, I'm still learning AI. Right there. Yeah, that's not a lot of money and want to do it yourself, just just write out what I just said. Do a SWOT analysis on it. And when you get to the threats, make sure that you have if I go to my business was closed tomorrow. What would I do? If my a flood, a fire, so go through the natural disasters that happen. We've been taught that the government can absolutely fluctuate your business. So if restrictions come in, what creed them? What restrictions? Um, if so water use. That was another one that was uh the emergency operations center. We stabilized last year when the water line breakdowns went. Uh uh, I serve Strathmore right now, and they were on the water line. So we had to put a opera, you know, I had to call business owners and say, okay, your water restrictions have just gone down. No plan. So how does a car wash? How do you know the most interesting one was a uh Ford dealership, I think it was, that they said we detail every single vehicle when it comes out and wash it. And well, we're gonna have to find another way here because you you can't in-house wash it anymore.

SPEAKER_01

Well, and this is a real thing in Calgary right now, right? Because they are on water restrictions.

SPEAKER_00

And I bet you every one of those businesses that were along that street did not have a disaster recovery plan if they were told that you're gonna lose your sidewalk, your access, your advertising, you know, everything to have them come in. I advocate all the time that there should be disaster disruption insurance. Government should be putting money aside for it, whether it's a business um incentive uh tax or something, something has to be there. If we really want to retain businesses, when we shut their doors down, we need to support them in some way. So whether we don't, they don't have to pay property taxes, but I won't go down that road. But these are prime examples that happen. So have that plan in place and have that plan in place with your financial institution. And if they're saying that, and this is where I have one, um, I worked with Business Link and I had one uh webinar that I did called the business pulse check. And we always do our own pulse check and to make sure we're healthy. But do you do a business pulse check? And the first thing I always check it on that is your mental health, because that's the very first thing in that plan. Because can you do it? If you're here on like this is I kind of use my when I get into my fear to faith model, so I kind of hear when I'm here, I don't have room for anything else. Of so if I'm already working with personal issues in my life, my home foundation, uh financially, um, you know, whether you're looking after your parents or whether you've got some your children are a lot of work at the time or something, and then you've got drama or stress or nervousness at work, and then your side hustle business is on there, and then boom, a flood comes in, a fire comes in. Do you have capacity mentally of what it's gonna take? And it's gonna take a lot. So the mental check has to be on there as it, and there's no money. So there what they do is they give you loans right away. And loans are the second disaster, in my opinion, because uh they don't we don't properly make a business plan in place of how we're gonna pay that back. The 0% interest is uh is a carrot dangler, but I can go down that road too. But so the mental well-being of it, and then uh ask yourself that while you're in a stable mind, while everything is good, you ask yourself these questions. And then write a journal or write to yourself, what what would be your tipping point mentally if you couldn't do it? Uh, all the businesses I ran, I don't ever remember having six months worth of savings in my account that if the business shut down for a while, and here I am as a coach to say, have money set aside that uh will find out or a line of credit or something in place that will carry you through.

SPEAKER_01

So the financial well-being. And while you were talking, what was coming up with me, especially around that mental well-being, was when you're in those moments, especially as business is getting crazy or something happens, you are in de-stress. Yep. You were in fight or flight. Yeah. And so that opportunity to sit back and do the SWOT analysis, right? I'm a huge fan of a SWOT analysis to be able to understand that. And we spend more time on those strengths and opportunities than we do those threats. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Have the hard conversations in your relationship, in your home, in your business, when you're the most healthy, when your mind is the most healthy. Because that's when you're stable. That's when all the endorphins are working, that's when all the hormones are working. And uh make your plans there. Or make if you have a decision, if you're wanting to sell your house, expand, or if you're engaged and you want to get married, or any do it from a healthy state, not when you're in the disaster. That is the biggest lesson the last 20 years serving has taught me. And mental health, if you were to AI my name right now, you'll see that that is my legacy. I'm a huge, huge fan of um I've experienced some terrible things personally, myself, experienced in mental health and in family and in friends, and then in my career as well, how many business owners I've lost due to mental health.

SPEAKER_01

And um yeah, it's let's touch on that for a minute because that's something that's near and dear to my heart. And one of the reasons that I made a pivot, went back and got my coaching uh certifications, and the reason why I'm in the middle of doing what I'm doing with the with the um psychology education. What is it that you really with that legacy? What are you wanting to bring to the world?

SPEAKER_00

That you can live a great life with uh if you're having make mental wellness a priority. I don't the mental health part, I think, is old the word. I think there's a stigma to it. And um, I am an award-winning, very energetic, very happy person, and I have a toolbox that I have to make a priority every single day, or I will slip. Yes. And the depressions will come, the suicide thoughts will come. And uh there is some very successful people out there. I'm one of them. Brett Wilson, he's a huge fan. I'm a huge fan for him, and he raises a lot of money for it, and he speaks very openly about it. And the last garden party that he raised half a million dollars for mental health at, he said that he battles depression, you know, and he shared it. And I think as an alpha male, that is something really important for him to speak up in the oil and gas industry, you know, to say that. That's, you know, I think a lot of the alpha males are up there of that generation. I I was so proud of him. So the legacy I leave is don't let it absorb you. You can beat it. You can, but you have to make it a priority.

SPEAKER_01

Yes. And and it's really interesting because you you um alluded to the battle of depression, mines anxiety and debilitating anxiety to the point where I'm unfunctioning. So I've talked on the podcast before about crying in the bathroom, about having an anxiety attack in the bathroom before I had to go and lead a team meeting or whatnot. And so I think we really do need to speak more openly about that. How will you know that that legacy that you want to bring is truly fulfilled?

SPEAKER_00

That's a great question. That is a really, really great question. Because a lot of people, I get up every day to serve in some way. I I I'm God's child and I want to serve in some way. And I love to laugh and I love to God gave me this big smile and this big personality, and all of these experiences in life, uh, I never, I was a little mad at them for a while there, like that's enough. But I realize now it's to pay forward. And I'm not doing it for a legacy. The legacy natural comes from the way that you want to live. So the way that I want to live is I want to make people feel good when they're around me. And I want to share my story that if I can inspire one. So how do I know if my legacy is working? Is every time someone says to me, I love your smile, I know that they're smiling back when they say it. If someone says to me, I just love your energy, I know that I've made an impact in that person right there. When I go and I have keynote speaking and I'm watching people in the audience nodding like this, or I'm getting messages coming to me. So I don't rate it in any way except from the human interaction, and I know that I'm making a difference. So I can die tomorrow and I know that my legacy worked while I was on earth because I know the feedback I got.

SPEAKER_01

It's the small things that make the big difference. Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Even my dog, the joy she brings people, when I will, I bring her everywhere because I will watch people drop their shoulders or drop their egos and they pet the dog. And I know she's making a difference and she's lifting someone up, their spirit. And I watch it, and that's my legacy. That's Angela brought that dog everywhere, and the dog made her happy. And I'm like, enjoy your dog. You're you're sorry about the dog here, but she's just leaving love feathers behind for you for the day. Love feathers. Oh my god. I just have a lot of fun with it. Yeah. I love that. My whole my house is full of love feathers. Yes. And no bird queen.

SPEAKER_01

Well, we love having Molly here. 100%. That was like the biggest smile on my face when I saw her. Right.

SPEAKER_00

It's what happens. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Bring an animal in and yep. And that's all any of us can ask for. Now, when you're having one of those days where you're on the verge of slipping, what brings you back?

SPEAKER_00

YouTube.

SPEAKER_01

So that's not the answer I thought you were going to say.

SPEAKER_00

Yep. When I no, I'm serious. When I'm when I'm having real troubles and the noise. So for me, um, my mantra that I teach, Fear to Faith and On to Fly, the um the fear in the head, I actually have a visual of a dark and a black in my head. And um, so when the white light is in my coming through me through a spirit knot, then um I'm good. I'm but when that noise starts to come in, it starts to get black and dark. And um so I immediately go to YouTube wherever I am in the day and I get grounded and I'll put in whatever I need music, EDMR, or if I need a quick 10 minutes of a motivational thing, because there was a time that I didn't have any resources or anybody or could afford anything. So I always had a phone and I always had access to YouTube, and that's the biggest free tool that I use to start pulling me up. Music, just singing it, like finding my favorite. This little light of mine is one that I play all the time, Amazing Grace. You know, and then sometimes Deaf Leopard, sometimes, you know, can can rock. Depends on my mood. I think I have multiple personalities. Whatever it is.

SPEAKER_01

So it gets me going as an Eminem. Yeah. Right? So in Aretha Franklin and Binaural Beats and anything that allows to just recenter.

SPEAKER_00

Yes. Yes. So that is my immediate. And uh, if you want to play with it, uh, so my algorithms are picking up already on it. And um, that's just it's my uh dialogue counselor right there, right fast. Now, to prevent it, I have a toolbox of happiness, I call it. And everybody should customize their own toolbox. And I taught it to my daughter recently. I went down and uh she was struggling a little bit and mentally, a lot of pressures being a student athlete. Um, and uh, what are your favorite things? So we start to fill the endorphin. We start to the music to the what kind of clothing are we wearing, or do we need, you know, as a student athlete, not a lot of money. When you go shopping, you can go thrifting. You got $50 or $20. It's the experience. It's buying the favorite food. It's the, you know, if you can't afford the perfume, but you want to go spray it. So all of those little things, and for me, it's nature. I have to get, I gotta get my body moving. If I'm not moving, energy and motion. So if this body isn't moving, if it sits still too long and we're all, you know, desk uh jobs or the new smoking, they say. So I have to be moving to keep my endorphin going, to keep mentally strong, to keep the dark out in nature. And the reason is is to shut the noise out. Those are so I my recommendation to anyone listening is find your happiness, write it down, things that bring you joy in any way, and create that toolbox. Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

And put it somewhere that it's a reminder regularly.

SPEAKER_00

Write it out.

SPEAKER_01

Put it somewhere, yeah. Sticky note it, whatever you need to do in order to bring that um forward. And I would add to that list gratefulness, right?

SPEAKER_00

The mental part. So there's the four, you know, mentally, spiritually, physically, yeah. So um the spiritual side for those people that have a strong faith system, you know, go to that. If you don't have one, find one. You really need to find one. And um, I respect them all. But uh find your tribe. And sometimes it's just praying and just talking, you know, whatever the faith system can be, just talking to the spirit. Just look up, just try something. And yeah, those are because if you don't have that tool in this happy box, the stuff will creep in. It'll start to creep in and you wanna keep you wanna keep all of those dark stuff out. So I'm very um my friend list is very short. And I had I discovered that I it was more important for me to make sure everybody liked me until I realized that that was a an actual mental health issue that I wanted to be liked.

SPEAKER_01

People pleasing.

SPEAKER_00

Yep.

SPEAKER_01

It will tear almost everybody down.

SPEAKER_00

It's because I didn't love myself.

SPEAKER_01

Yes.

SPEAKER_00

And everybody that didn't love me screamed it at me, but they didn't. But I felt like they were screaming at me. Any little comment of I can remember my 40th birthday party, I got all dressed up and I went to it. And uh someone came up to me at the party and said, You look like an Amazon. They screamed at me, you're ugly and fat. You know what they meant? It's because I had high heels and I was tall.

SPEAKER_01

And you're tall.

SPEAKER_00

And yes. I was devastated. I still was still talking about it. And I'm 54. So it these you have like, don't worry about it. And so if they scream, if you're strong with yourself and you're strong with your confidence, then you don't elaborate and blow up all the unhealthiness to come in. But be very, very protective of who you let in.

SPEAKER_01

There's an element of planning for that as well, right? Planning for the mental wellness, planting, planning for the how do your what is your intentional response going to be when somebody does say something. Yeah. And how are you going to navigate through? And a lot of that, I think, for me, it's comes back to um who you are, right? I work with a program, we call it Leader Brand. Um, and really it is, it's understanding what are your beliefs and your values are and keeping true to that. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

I love how soft you are and how you speak to it calmly. And that is, I watched one of your podcasts the other day, and you were saying that there's no competition. And you had this really neat conversation with your guest on it. And I just watched how your energy just went down there and how calming you were. And that is probably can you imagine uh someone working with you and they just feel good and love from you and calm and not judge? You come to me and you tell me that you have a victim story. I'm gonna have ACDC playing. No, I'm kidding. I'm gonna have you so pumped up. Right. I'm gonna have you so like my energy is like, you know what we're gonna do with them? We're gonna get a swear coloring book out and we're gonna color it and we're gonna swear at them the whole time. So that this is why there's no competition.

SPEAKER_01

Really interesting, because that is probably the number one thing that I hear from clients or just people is I naturally feel calm in your presence.

SPEAKER_00

I do.

SPEAKER_01

I mean, you were just talking, right? I just naturally calm down. And that, if you would have known me 30 years ago, would not have been my ammo. Right. I would have been like feisty. Yeah. Oh yeah. But that is that's how I show up, and that's how I've had to navigate through. You know, you talked about your trauma and some of the PTSD. That's how I've had. I've just got to be calm. I'm the calm presence navigating through that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And I can't go to you as a coach. No. I'm like this. Come on. Like I can, I need it and I want to be there. But for me to move in my businesses or for me to do all the things I'm doing, I want, I go on YouTube and I listen to David Goggins. Like you should see, oh, I'm dating now my partner. Like he's David Goggins live, though. But I love it. Right. I love energy and I love moving. I love, I literally am going to slip into my grave and not stop running. So it's just me. It's just who I am. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. And yet I have the same energy in terms of the energizer bunny. Go, go, go, go, go. I will be working 23 hours a day.

SPEAKER_00

You can just control it.

SPEAKER_01

I can just yeah. It takes a lot. I am the calmest redhead in the world. I swear. I am the anti-redhead redhead.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Um, because that's out of the fire that I navigated through, right? Forging through the fire.

SPEAKER_00

Well, to be an entrepreneur, you gotta have energy. I don't care. I don't care what industry you're in. Yeah. You gotta be ready to grind. I love it. Yeah. I love it. Because when you're s when you're asleep and your competition isn't if we're gonna have competition, they're growing. 100%.

SPEAKER_01

So that's planning in like thoroughly all the way through. And then the insurance piece is really interesting to me. So the number two thing that you said. We could touch on it very briefly. It's that if you don't have it, get it.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. If you need it. If you need it. Yeah. Because some of the a lot of these different businesses now, it it's the premiums are huge. And for what you really look at your return on the money out on it. Because maybe you don't need it.

SPEAKER_01

And so what would you say a business owner does need versus what's a need to have versus a nice to have?

SPEAKER_00

Well, your inventory, if you make money off of inventory, you have to make sure that you have coverage for losing your inventory. So to have that replaced. Yes. So if you lose $10,000 worth of inventory out of a fire, how are you gonna, you're gonna have to take a loan back? You're behind it all. So if you're paying an insurance so that that's replaced, or your equipment, those are the top priority business operations. Those are the so a lot of people just they didn't have your displays, your shelves, your different things like that. Your staff is looked after through your EI. Well, hopefully a lot of these, this is that's actually a key because if you're being unpaid under the table, or if you're anything that's not on the books with CRA, if a disaster happens, you will not get compensated for any of it. And I've seen some very, very sad business owners that uh us as ranching, we we were affected by the floods. And uh you do a lot of cash jobs where you change a chain trade a calf for uh maybe some hay or something like that, and uh, or some different works or tractor usage or something. Well, that's not on the books. So if you if you lose that or if you get paid cash or that trade, you can't claim that as revenue or an expense or anything. So it's the same with uh your employees. Like be you have to be very aware of the consequences of not following the legal rules in entrepreneurship if a disaster happens.

SPEAKER_01

So be really discerning about what you need.

SPEAKER_00

Yep.

SPEAKER_01

Look at it, how it matches out both financially from cash flow, but the potential of the risk return.

SPEAKER_00

Yep. If you're an employee right now and you're listening to this, um, have that conversation with your boss. Say if you were to have a disaster happen in here, am I covered? And make them do the due diligence. They go, I don't know. Well, can you find out, please? Because I just took a mortgage or I'm planning on getting married. Or so the because the only one they're gonna find out is when they're in stress mode up to here in trying to you know look after their home and their business at the same time, and their employees calling them saying, I need a paycheck.

unknown

Right.

SPEAKER_00

Figure it out now. Figure it out all out now.

SPEAKER_01

Okay, perfect. And then I love community. I think community is one of the most important things. We have to have each other's backs.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

What are you seeing in community right now?

SPEAKER_00

Oh, it's stronger than ever. I uh like or not, Trump, he taught us all a big lesson. Shop local first. Shop local. Yeah. Because all of a sudden, all these tariffs come on. All of a sudden, our we we were almost spoiled by depending on our exports as our sales, because when the wall came up and that we couldn't sell it, we all went, oh, and then as an in-government, we couldn't, you can't sell BC wine in Saskatchewan or however it works or something. This is nuts. So everyone got a big wake-up call of how to become a community from a country. Everybody got a big wake-up call, how to become a community in our own province to get rid of some red tapes to support everybody and put some incentives there to help these entrepreneurs for their manufacturing so that they've been creating it. We don't have to buy it from China. And then in our own backyard, Trump also woke us up to shop local because what's made here? I want to support, I want to do it. So community is at all three levels: your country, your province, to your local community. But then it goes deeper. Community to me also is your industry. You that like I don't believe in competition. So all of you business coaches having a networking in in the region here, Southern Alberta event, and then buying cluster advertising and marketing and let your consumer make the decision on their own. They're doing it anyways. So why not be smart and buy one ad, put it all together, because the consumer's Googling them all, anyways, and just get them one place to land. And then uh it also goes further than that into location. So your community can be on your downtown um or in your own neighborhood. In the neighborhood, yeah. On the call-de-sac. Yep. Turn in there first before you go external for your customers.

SPEAKER_01

You're seeing some incredible things in the community that you're doing in Strathmore.

SPEAKER_00

Yes. I'm very proud of working in Strathmore.

SPEAKER_01

You're not just a little proud of Strathmore. You are a lot proud of Strathmoor. Yeah, good old country folks over there. Yeah. What are some of the things that you guys are doing?

SPEAKER_00

Well, uh, I'm I I took a big break from government. I wasn't gonna go back into it. And uh when COVID happened, it was I was serving here in Okotooks and and I just gave my notice. And I I when COVID came, I was like, I can't do it. I've been back-to-back disasters. I knew too much. I knew that this was gonna land on the blame on government, and I knew the pain that was gonna happen to these entrepreneurs, and I just couldn't stomach it. Took a break and played in the disaster uh well, it's interesting because I played in the data industry for a couple of years there, and uh, it was like I went to uh data center school 101, and I my passion, I wasn't, I I couldn't even do it. And I'm a really smart person and I can do anything. And I could not sell as data center equipment or how to build a data center because I just, it just didn't make sense for me. And uh so I had a real calling back to serving entrepreneurs. And and uh so a colleague reached out, gave me the opportunity, and it just felt right. And I knew it was right when I their tagline was rural reimagined, because that's literally what's happening in every single community. There's we're rural communities that were started either from CP Rail or the um grain elevators, or usually a town is built around water, you know, there's some type of asset that it builds around in a rural community. So as your world evolves, it reimagines itself. So Strathmore had just brought on Rural Reimagined, and I knew I could have a lot of fun with that. Yeah. I knew I could. So uh it's a very uh small administration, and uh the CEO actually is from Fort McMurray. So he was involved in the disasters. Wow.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, he certainly talked about a dynamic team the flood and then the five.

SPEAKER_00

Are you kidding me? Yeah, when you align with that, and uh so he is very fiscally responsible and he knows to be very smart, he always has a plan, is my point. So he's always number one priority. So I like working for that. So recently I have to get Strathmore on the map. I gotta get people to, you know, when I was married and ranching out there uh along Bow the Bow River, you know, we often went to Strathmore. And um, I remember my son, I did a podcast here actually on it on the indigenous uh reconciliation because there was a son that was murdered, uh uh uh an indigenous man, and uh my son had played hockey with him. And so when that landed on my desk as well, there was a, you know, God was calling me in and we put on a reconciliation powow. I knew my purpose was to do that, to reconcile these communities together. Um, like I shared, community is very important. Well, we need to make sure we're getting along with our indigenous neighbors and that they feel welcome in the white man little town. And then the rural reimagined side of it was how do we get people to stop on Highway One, the Trans-Canada Highway, and turn into Strathmore. So I've had a lot of fun with some different initiatives. And one that um you heard me speaking about early is where the first uh rural community become to become certified and investment ready through the economic developers of Alberta. So I'll be doing a lot of marketing with that and working with Invest Canada uh on uh being now qualified to be on their dashboard. So that's a big win. That's a huge win and congratulations on that. And it's not me. I just am creating it's the town, it's the administration, it's the business owners, it's all of them there. I just tell their story and create ways to sell them.

SPEAKER_01

Service has come up a lot in this conversation. What does that mean to you?

SPEAKER_00

Oh, everything. I love your questions. Service is it's almost like I wake up every day waiting for my path to serve. Whatever hat I'm wearing, I I feel I'm supposed to do something in some way. So service is many things for me, opening the door for the person at the going into the grocery store. It's just and I uh in government, I think we forget that we're public servants. And I think we forget that we're here to serve. We're paid with tax dollars to take our expertise and our training and to serve them in that lane and listen to them first before you make your plan. Politicians, uh I highly respect every politician because I can't imagine being one these days, not only from the physical threats that are happening out there, the bullying and the online stuff, but uh beating up mentally. And there's no way they're paid enough. There's no way a politician but sometimes there's been politicians that forget that they're there to be elected to serve. They're not there to be elected to serve their own agenda. They're paid by taxpayers or elected by taxpayers. So it's uh that it means many, many things to me, but for me personally, I think every business owner should be serving their customers. Wow. I think that's how they should look at their business.

SPEAKER_01

Yes. That resonates with me. I grew up the daughter of three uh government employees. Uh two my mom, my stepmom, and my uh my stepdad. And service, I think, is at the heart of everything that I do, just watching through them. But I want to wrap up by asking you about your faith, because that is a part of how you coach. That's clearly how you get up in the morning and part of what lets you rise, and that's what fuels you.

unknown

Yep.

SPEAKER_00

Thank you for uh asking me that question because it's very important to me. And I believe my that is my story to share while I'm on earth. And um I was raised in the mountains. My mother was a teacher, my father was a a game warden, and um I r I lived the richest life. I had no idea we were financially maybe poor, people would call you, because we had such a beautiful life and a rich life of uh living in the mountains. You know, your mom, your mother always made sure he had the education and the culture and were exposed to things, and then your father was always showing you the lay of the land. So I was raised uh n that um God was when you went to nature and he gave gratitude. We were never relate raised with religion. We were raised with the spiritual side of it, and uh just to be full of gratitude and full he'd always thank the ducks for food and thank the fish for food and and and uh that's why he protected the animals and mom gr grateful for his books and to teach students, right? So you had that in you. Uh so I didn't know religion until I got married. And then um I was baptized up in the Northwest Territories. My uh I was not born in the Northwest Territories because a white woman can't have a baby out there, she was flown out, and then I was the only white baby raised within Uitz uh for two years, and I was baptized up there. And so, but I don't remember any of that. It didn't sit with me. And then when I got married, we went to church all the time, you know, a little, a little rural community church. And so I was just really interested in it, and I would ask a lot about it, and I would get confused on the behavior of people that would sit at church and then how they would act after. And I got very confused about it all. So I just let it go. You know, I knew it was a it felt good and it was about community, and it felt right raising your kids, and it's where all your neighbors and everybody went until a disaster hit me personally, and I heard a spirit speak to me and tell me I was it was four o'clock in the morning and I'm laying on the bathroom floor just in field position, just crying. We've all been there. We've all whatever we're gonna say, our breakdown is, and I heard fear to faith on to fly. And I didn't know what it meant. So I shared it with my husband at the time, and um he encouraged me to further on it to help me get through my, you know, I had a panic attack on the farm there. I was just, there was a lot of different energy that was, I was really, really struggling with a lot of different situations at the time. So I was mentally cracked. I didn't realize I had postpartum. Uh, you know, the kids were young. I owned two or three businesses, franchises at the time, and two young kids, and then business the farm was going through uh droughts and uh BSE. Like it was hard, hard times. And that's when I started to go down the road through Buddhism of understanding, just reading books, going on YouTube. The internet was just coming out there, Explorer Net was coming out in the country, and I was starting to learn to have something to believe in to guide me because I was completely lost and I was getting suicidal. I was getting very, very low. And uh my journey has always been the mantra, fear to faith on to fly. And then I found God. And I found for me the Christian belief, Jesus, uh it's what I believe in. I just know. And I, and but I also respect every other because if I'm a true believer of Jesus, it's everything's from a place of love. So when I say the word God, I mean love. I work from a place of love and I live from a pace place of love, and everything I do is from a pace of place of love. So my mantra is when you have the fear in your head, which is the ego, and it edges God out. All the noise starts to talk to you, whether it's in your personal relationship, your business, or your ideas, or your own confidence, talking to yourself. If you let that noise come in, it will form an ego and it'll edge God out. Do not make decisions from the brain. The brain is there, it's your biggest machine. It's the engine in your body. It's like the engine in the car. So let it do its work, but make your decisions from your heart. Make your decisions from a stable place of love. And when you do, you will do no wrong in life. You will fly. So for me, my heart, my love is God. So the more I'm still going down the journey, I've chosen a partner now in my life that um he what he was going to be a minister. And um he's gone like we're crazy, him and I. We're not perfect. We go up and down, and you'll see us on a Saturday night and think there's no way any God is in their life, right? But that's the beautiful thing, is that we make mistakes every day and we go back and we ask for forgiveness and we do better. And we listen because our we're learning all the time. So make sure you get back up into that brain. And when you feel something doesn't feel right, your intuition, your spidey sense, or whatever, or you've made a mistake, go to your place of love, go to your faith system, which is love in whatever religion you are in, and sit there with it and listen to yourself what the answer is. Let that spirit come in and then forgive yourself and move on. Get going.

SPEAKER_01

That's amazing. I really appreciate that thought. Fear to faith on the fly.

SPEAKER_00

Books coming soon.

SPEAKER_01

Books coming soon. Working on it for 10 years. That is amazing. So keep learning more chapters.

SPEAKER_00

Angela, where can we find you? Uh, mergeagency.ca, um, LinkedIn as well. Uh, a lot of my and all of the social media. All of the socials.

SPEAKER_01

Amazing. We appreciate this conversation. Hopefully, a part two. Absolutely. So much we can navigate onto. It has been an absolute pleasure.

SPEAKER_00

Thank you for having me. Any opportunity. If I've if I've changed one person's, if I've put a smile on one person's life or a little spark in them listening to that show, I served my legacy again.

SPEAKER_01

That is amazing. And I like to end periodically by saying lead with heart, and I know you do. So lead with heart, thank you so much for being here.

SPEAKER_00

You're a beautiful soul, thank you. Keep going,