Kind Of A Big Book Deal

Episode 24 - Why Authors Can Stop Competing with Ruchika Malhotra

• Meghan Stevenson

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What if success wasn’t about competition but collaboration? In this episode of Kind of a Big Book Deal, host Meghan Stevenson sits down with bestselling author Ruchika Tulshyan, whose new book Uncompete flips the script on what it means to win. Ruchika shares how the myth of “doing it all yourself” keeps entrepreneurs and authors burnt out and isolated and how equity, generosity, and radical collaboration can build true, sustainable success.

Listeners will learn why letting go of scarcity thinking opens doors to creativity, opportunity, and community. Ruchika and Meghan talk candidly about navigating publishing gatekeepers, building authentic professional relationships, and finding courage to redefine success on your own terms. Whether you’re dreaming of your first book deal or just want to stop competing with everyone, including yourself, this conversation will change how you think about success.

This week’s guest is Ruchika Tulshyan. Ruchika T. Malhotra is the author of Uncompete: Rejecting Competition to Unlock Success. She is also the founder of Candour, a global inclusion strategy firm. A former business journalist, her writing appears regularly in publications such as Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, Forbes, Bloomberg, The Seattle Times, and more. She has previously held adjunct faculty positions at Seattle University and the University of Washington, where she now advises the Communication Leadership graduate program.

Ruchika is the author of Inclusion on Purpose: An Intersectional Approach to Creating a Culture of Belonging at Work, MIT Press’s top-selling book of 2022.

Find Ruchika on social 

Uncompete: Rejecting Competition to Unlock Success, will be released on Nov. 4. Preorder the book here: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/753092/uncompete-by-ruchika-t-malhotra/

Find upcoming events with Ruchika at https://www.ruchika.co/speaking.

Episode Highlights:
(0:00) Intro
(2:32) Meghan introduces author and inclusion strategist Ruchika Tulshyan
(3:17) The harmful myth of competition and burnout
(5:47) Why doing it alone doesn’t work
(10:46) How patriarchy and scarcity shape women’s success
(17:28) Gatekeeping and breaking barriers in publishing
(25:07) Building audiences through generosity and collaboration
(28:27) The power of amplifying others online


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  • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meghanstevenson/
  • TikTok: @meghan.stevenson.books
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Have a great idea for a book but don't know where to start?MeghanStevenson.com/quiz


Traditional publishing expert Meghan Stevenson blasts open the gates of the “Big 5” – Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, Hachette, and Macmillan – to share what every entrepreneur and expert needs to know about landing a book deal.

In episodes released every other Monday, Meghan shares wisdom and stories from 20+ years in publishing as well as interviews with authors, literary agents, and editors. She also answers questions from listeners like you.

Whether you are an experienced entrepreneur with an empire, or are just starting out – this podcast will help you understand what you need to do in order to turn your dream of being a bestselling author into real life.

Speaker 2:

If your gut instinct tells you like this person isn't operating with the mindset of generosity, like you gotta figure out like where are you? Are you in a place where you can engage and you'll be okay, like you have the support you need, or is it okay to say, like, actually no?

Speaker:

Welcome to the kind of a big book deal podcast where entrepreneurs come to learn about traditional publishing. I'm your host, Meghan Stevenson. After working as an editor for two of the biggest traditional publishers, I started my own business helping entrepreneurs become authors. To date, my clients have earned over five million dollars from publishers like Penguin Random House, Simon Schuster, and Harper Collins. In these podcast episodes, I blast open the well-kept gates to traditional publishing. I'll explain what every entrepreneur needs to know about landing a book deal without losing your mind. I'm going to share stories, answer your questions, interview the successful authors I've worked with, and probably save platform more than a tech pro. So if you dream of landing on a bestseller list but have no idea how, this is the podcast for you, and I am so, so glad you're here. So, y'all, I am so excited today to have my client and friend, Ruchika Malhotra, today on the pod. So Ruchika is actually the author of two books on Compete, which is coming out literally the week that this podcast goes live, and a previous book, Inclusion on Purpose, which was published by MIT Press in 2022. To give you a little background on who Rouchika is and why you should listen to her, she is the founder of Cander, a global inclusion strategy firm. She's a former business journalist and girl, your credits are amazing. Harvard Business Review, New York Times, Forbes, Bloomberg, our hometown, our shared hometown of Seattle Times, which is one of my favorite magazines, and more, or not favorite magazines, favorite newspapers. Come on.

Speaker 2:

But I have written for their magazine as well, which is really one of my favorite things.

Speaker:

I've had you know they had a magazine. So now I know. Um and in addition to all her credits and writing two books and being a mom and an entrepreneur, Rochica also was previously faculty at Seattle University and the University of Washington, Go Udubs, where she now advises the communication leadership graduate program. So I also was a communications major, which a lot of people don't realize. Um everybody assumes I was an English major, but I was not. I was a communications major, and that shit has served me so well. Like so well, so well. Okay. Anyway, let's jump in and talk about Uncompete, because that is what we're here to do. So I'm really excited to chat today. So Uncompete, I have to say, Richika, I've been in this business collaborating for 13 years, and you are the first book. Uncompete was the first book to be named a top 10 book by Publishers Weekly. So congratulations on that. I'm I'm so thrilled for you on that. And I think it's because in this book, you really take down one of society's like biggest cultural beliefs, right? And that is the belief that we have to compete with each other. We have to like sort of it's a zero-sum game. It's as scarce, like only one person can win, like winner take all mentality. And what you say in the book, which is the main argument of the book, is that this mindset actually causes us a lot of harm. It causes us to feel exhausted, burnt out, resentful, and actually less successful than if we've just fucking collaborated already, which I think is so funny. So you propose in the book, which I'm not gonna give away all the book, we're just gonna cover talk about a few core concepts today. But you propose that we uncompete. And how you define that just at high level is by using equity, uh, spirit of abundance, collaboration, and radical generosity to get there. So that's a lot of me talking about it, but I want to dive into all of that from the perspective of our listeners who are entrepreneurs and experts, like you, like me, who want to get a book deal. So, can you talk about or reflect? I think it's more of a reflection question. But like there's a lot of people that believe one community's gains comes at another community's losses. Can you explain or reflect how that's come up for you as an author?

Speaker 2:

So actually, this is really relevant, I think, to your audience and to my, you know, your audience being someone like me who is an entrepreneur who has, you know, wanted to have my ideas out in the world for a long time. And I think believed that you need to do everything by yourself, right? Like you build, build, build, you do it yourself. You don't have, you don't rely on others, you know, success means like you built it, you built the whole damn thing by yourself. Um, and I and I think what something like this book, what uncompete really tells us to do, what the idea tells us to do, is actually that's impossible, right? It's it's in the same way you, if you know, and I I use this example because it is top of mind. It happened more recently than I would like. But if your if your toilet is blocked and you're not able to like do a simple fix, you're gonna call a plumber. But I think but I think what happens in a lot of this sort of competitive hierarchy, like, you know, especially in entrepreneurship, especially if you're from a community that has long been underestimated, you're a female entrepreneur, you're an entrepreneur of color, et cetera, et cetera. We know there are known and well-documented barriers to our progress. Um, we believe that like even investing a little bit in the help that we need to get to the next level means we're somehow taking away from future success, right? And so much of this is about rewiring your mindset to say, here's something that I really want to do, here's something, here's a place I really want to get to. Who are the people who can help me get there? What are the investments I need to make to get there? And so something like what you do is really meaningful. And I will say, as someone who is a professional writer who went to school for journalism, I have a master's in journalism, who was a practical and and has actually written three books. My first book is as good as self-published. It was published by Forbes, and then they closed down their platform so for ebooks. So um, you know, I've written three books. So when I wrote the first two, I was like, oh, absolutely don't need anyone. Like, I'm all good, don't need any help. And then even to get to having the support I needed with the third book and reaching out to you and getting that support, there was so much of hesitation because there's this idea that, like, if I am successful, I've done it myself. If I have to like share that credit, which is so ironic because I was writing a book about, you know, uncompeting. I was writing a book about sharing the credit and getting collaboration and getting the help you need, and you know, making sure that like you have all the support that is necessary for your success. Even at that point, my worry was like, does this then take away from my um identity as a writer, as someone who has always thought of myself as like a writer first, even more than things like podcasts and videos and all these other things you have to do as an author. I know we'll talk about that later. So, all of this to say like the basic like tenet of uncompete is you can't do it alone. It makes you less successful. Um, it has a longer-term impact on the world, you know, being the way that we want it to look like, which is equitable and just and fair. And I think that there's a lot that we can do to get there.

Speaker:

I mean, I agree. And I'm glad you brought that up because we worked in a different capacity for your book than I think we've done. We've talked about previously in the pod, which is that Richika had written a manuscript. She had submitted it to her editor, and her editor said, Hey, this isn't quite what we agreed on, right? Um, and you took it into your book, it still has a lot of narrative and memoiristic aspects. A lot of you is in there, right? I learned things about you. I thought I knew you pretty well, but I learned a lot of things about you reading the book. And so it's and that's a great self-help non-fiction. Honestly, every one of my clients puts something of themselves on the page, but sometimes you do need somebody who's from the outside to tell you what's up. I almost think of it similar to the role of a therapist where one of my friends was like, I don't know what's wrong with me. I'm just seeing the negative and everything. And she was like, I think I need to go back to therapy. And I was like, Yeah, sometimes you just need you know, she's not clinical, she doesn't need a diagnosis, she doesn't need like another SSRI or anything, but she just needs somebody to see it from an outside perspective and give her that outside's perspective. And so that's what my colleague Claudia did on your book, and I think very successfully. Um, and that's just really helpful. And a lot of people do hear ghostwriter or collaborator and think, oh, but I want to write my own book. That's like a very like real reaction we get a lot. And I'm like, it's still your book. I can't create shit without your content, right? I can't do any like and my friends are like, when are you gonna write your book? And I was like, I don't want to write my own book. I've read in everybody else's books. I'm good, you know? Um surprises me.

Speaker 2:

Are you sure you don't have a book in you? Because I feel like you're yeah, I mean, there has to be something there. I actually think something like, How do you write a best-selling book or how do you write a book that makes an impact would be, you know, it's it's this, it's this thought that I have that I I I personally, and I assume you agree, everyone has a book in them in some way, shape, or form, right?

Speaker:

I think everyone has content in them. Uh not necessarily a book. I like it. So like it'd be like the the difference between I just thought of this analogy, but it's pretty, pretty um accurate. Me writing a book would be like Jennifer Aniston going to do comedy. Like it's not at comedy. What do you think? But it like or a very serious like Shakespearean actor going to do that. Like it's a it's just a different skill set. All right. So let's get it. I'll table that discussion for right now. Okay, let's keep on. I will table that for right now. Um okay, awesome. So let's talk a little bit about more about this mindset that we talk about. So how does this hyper competitive mindset affect women and people of color more specifically? Because I'd love to hear maybe a little bit more about how that, your identities that you hold, have affected your career as an author and entrepreneur.

Speaker 2:

I love this. And I'm actually going to tell you a little story. It's it's related to the first ever book I wrote called The Diversity Advantage. So at that time, I was, you know, I was literally transitioning out of journalism. I had done a stint and content strategy at a tech firm. I do not recommend technology. The advantage. I also did that.

unknown:

You did it.

Speaker 2:

We also did that. I'm married to someone who has been in technology for 20 plus years. We're so different that I can see like how that was such a bad fit for me and such a good fit for him. Anyway that I digress. Um, so I, you know, I transitioned out. I was like, look, I and in fact, I think that experience did make me see how much of the advice around women's leadership that was like the heyday of the lean-in movement. And so much of the advice was like, oh, women are failing because, you know, we're not trying hard enough. We need to lean in instead of looking at the very many structural barriers to our success in the workplace. Um, so at that time, you know, I write this book. I wanted to look at the research. The, you know, the journalist in me was like, okay, let's let's look at what's really up. Because if we're just saying women aren't leaning in, that's not my experience. That's not the experience of so many incredible women I know around me that I've observed in the workplace, that I've covered as a journalist. Gotta, I wanna see what's up. So I kind of collated the research, looked at case studies of organizations that were doing well in terms of you know propelling women into senior leadership positions and all of that. So I write this book. Um, super excited. It's like 2015. It's coming out, in fact, it to this year, this month, this month, and this year marks 10 years since that book came out, The Diversity Advantage, which published in September. Um, I know this is releasing in November, but in September 2025 is 10 years since the Diversity Advantage came out. So backtrack, um, you know, I got invited to speak at a women's conference, you know, very famous people there. It's like this huge conference. I go up to a well-known woman who everyone would recognize in women's leadership, and I'm like, hey, I'm writing this book. I'm really excited, first-time author, writing a book about um women in the workplace and and you know, how to advance gender equality in the workplace. Some of this sounds dated because you know, now it's 2025, but back in the day it was still a big deal. People were still very much looking at it as like women's problems to solve. And I go up to this woman, she's like really well known. I don't want to say her name, and she says, Well, I hope you write about how women don't support each other. And I was like, sorry, what? And she was like, Yeah, women are each, we're each other's worst enemies. We're the ones who are really the biggest blockers to our progress. And if you don't have a chapter on how women hold back each other's progress, I kind of feel like you're not getting to the heart of the problem. So obviously by then I'm like, ah, as you know by this point, like the book has been put to bed. It's like ready to publish. I was like, oh jeez. Um and but that comment stayed with me. I address it a little bit in inclusion on purpose, which is about especially about how women of color can progress in the workplace. Um, but I would say this is the book where it took me 10 years to really wrap my head around this concept. And the the short answer is, you know, patriarchy, of course, harms men and women and people of all genders. It really impacts women's success because what we're told is like what we're shown is like, you know, and you look at any company today, any Fortune 500 company, you look at the board, you look at the C-suite, it's like white man, white man, white man, white man, one white woman, maybe one woman of color, you know, or white woman, kind of interchangeable white man, white man, white man. And so what we're taught is there's only that one spot. And because patriarchy is so hard to dismantle, why don't we kind of make that fostion bargain where we actually elbow out the other women to get to that one top spot? And I and I see this happen again and again. And I don't think, and I've been asked, like, is there something inherently, you know, two women, like 10? I remember like a college boyfriend or something saying to me, a hundred men could live together, two women couldn't never live together because they constantly fight. And this idea of like women's cattiness and bringing each other down and whatever it is, is really about this idea of like when you're shown there's such limited spots for success and that you have to compete for them, you learn to elbow each other out of the way rather than collaborate and shine with each other. So this is a very long-winded, I'm sorry, as you can see, I really love like stories and getting to detail. But I really think that for us to make progress on these big issues, like more equality in terms of gender, more equality in terms of racial equality and other types of like really creating um a world that again, we want to see, it does require us to dismantle this idea that there's only one spot, even if we're only shown that there's only one spot. What we realize is a lot of people get to those senior positions and then they kind of pull the ladder up behind them because there's so much fear and scarcity. So I really want to like turn those ideas on their head.

Speaker:

And to turn that to publishing, I see that all the time in book deals. Like it's not for the people that actually have the deals because I think then they realize that they're just sort of a cog in a bigger machine, that their book is only it's only the most important thing to them, right? Yes, is it important to someone like me? Of course. Is it important to their literary agent? Yes. Is it important to their editor? Sure. But within the greater scheme of Penguin Random House or Herper Collins, it is literally just a product among all the other products, right? But when you're looking for a book deal, which is the majority of people listening to this podcast, it is a crabs in the barrel mentality. And when you have that crabs in the barrel mentality, if you're not familiar with it, I just wrote about it for a book by my client, LA Diop, um, who's writing about uh brand new entrepreneurship for black women specifically. Like there is this crabs in the barrel mentality, and nobody gets out of the barrel because the minute you get ahead of something, somebody else is pulling you down. And so there's this idea of that within communities, especially within author communities. Like if you go on Reddit, you will see that it is there, and it is just sort of crazy. So it seems like you sort of experience the opposite in terms of your book, in terms of like, you know, you cite all sorts of people in your book, you give all sorts of flowers out. Um, you actually talk about giving people flowers. Like, can you tell me a little bit more about like how maybe your thinking about this changed as an author since you have written these three books?

Speaker 2:

Yeah. I mean, Meghan, I will say that because it felt so hard to get my first book, like proper book deal, which would have been inclusion on purpose. Um, so depending on how you look at like traditional publishing, you know, this is my second book, you know, kind of if you count almost self-publishing, this is my third book. But with inclusion on purpose, when I saw how difficult it was, and it was really difficult, you know, I remember reaching out to, and back to this like collaboration mindset. Like I remember reaching out to authors, like friends who I had known for years and whom I thought I had, you know, we had a spirit of like reciprocity and generosity with each other. But the level of like doors shut in my face that I saw the lack of people saying, like, hey, let me introduce you to your to my agent. Let me tell you, my poor agent Miley Beal is like tired of me sending people her way. And I always say I'm I'm honest. And and you know, and and I'll be honest also that like like if I send her 10 people, she may sign two, but I will always offer, right? And she always says to me, and again, like it again, this is there's so much to this, right? Um, it's not like I don't want anyone to listen to this and be like, oh my gosh, like I'm just gonna send you and hopefully you'll send it on to my leader. It's not that obviously there's some level of like, I need to protect my professional relationship with her as well. I don't want her to like kick me out for sending thousands of people her way. But um, I I don't want to be the gatekeeper. Like I have experienced gatekeeping, I have experienced what it is like to be, you know, to be told no before like I really needed to be told no. And I just don't want to do that to other people. So whether it's it's understanding that, especially folks within my community, at least let a professional look at it. If the professional looks at it and is like, no, this isn't the right person, this is, you know, no harm, no foul. But I hate the fact that like so many of us believe we need to gatekeep it because there's some level of like scarcity of resources. Um, you know, there's that. I think the other thing that I like to be really open about is again, if if you're within my community and we're close, I and again, because of privacy, you know, privacy things, but I have definitely sent around my book proposal widely, you know, especially the one for inclusion on purpose. I've sent that around widely to people who I trust and love. Because the last thing I want to do is be like, I want to hoard all of these resources for myself. And I think that a lot of people, and again, especially if you come from a community that has historically been left out. I have seen men do this for each other. They do it on the golf course, they do it when they go for their dinners, they do it over poker. There is a level of sharing of resources that again, because as women, we've been taught there's such scarcity, we're shown that there's scarcity that we often, you know, believe that there's limited seats rather than how do we build a wider table. Now, I'll say as an author, there's like a specific good thing that happens if you are able to widen the table to include more voices that are basically saying what you're saying, right? In different ways. What happens is you have to you get a chance to hopefully stop needing to constantly prove that there is an audience in a market for a book like yours. And this is something that like requires some rewiring, right? Of course, like there's a only a limited amount of like financial resources and a number of books, a limited number of books that like a penguin or like a harper or whatever will have, you know, will bid on for books, right? Like I get that. Like I get that we're shown that there's scarcity. But what was different with even uncompete versus inclusion on purpose is with inclusion on purpose, I got so many passes because so many editors were a bit like, hey, we only we have that one woman of color writing the book, right? Or we already have a book that's kind of related somehow to diversity and inclusion. So we don't really need another one. Like we don't think it's marketable. And I think when it came to uncompete, I was able to show that not only did my book do well with inclusion on purpose, but also that there were a plethora more of voices by the time I sold a book in 2023 that were saying what I was trying to say, right? That there is a better world that we can advocate and agitate for.

Speaker:

That, and I think your your book is adjacent to other books, right? Like this is a continuation of a conversation that Eve Brodsky started with fair play. This is, you know, I think there's a lot of like you're going against the Cheryl, like this is the wave of change from the Cheryl Sandbergs on the lean in aesthetic or the nice girls get the corner office aesthetic. Um and so I think that makes a lot of sense. I mean, I have seen overwhelmingly because I tend to present at conferences with authors of color. I came up under a black editor. I work on, I don't believe in like black books. I don't think that's the thing. I think books are written by black people that are read very widely. But like it's it's very interesting to see that when I do talk to communities of color, a lot of them assume that self-publishing is the only option. Where for a long time, and it's less so now, but I would say from 2020 through 2024 or 2025, it was actually kind of an advantage um to have a diverse author because publishers were, I mean, they're pretty left leftist. So they were very like, oh shit, we fucked up. Um that doesn't mean that my authors don't face bias, they do. That's not to say that there isn't this idea of black books, meaning that authors that are black or identify as people of color only serve those audiences, which is total bullshit, but it does exist. But I just definitely see people counting themselves out. Um, and I definitely have seen the professional competitiveness happening, not only between women, but between this idea of like scarcity and publishing is real. It is so real. Like it's real around the money, it's real around the book deals, it's real around the capacity. But like when you back up and you realize that Penguin Random House is a billion-dollar company, it things get a whole lot less scarce. Like they're crying poor seems sus as hell. It is when you get into that, right? Like it just does. Like certain companies, you know, your inclusion on purpose was published by MIT Press. Some of the polar smaller houses do sort of have that argument to be made, but some of the behemoths, they're behemoths for a reason, you know. And so I think that's important. Also, I completely agree with you on sharing resources. Like, I always welcome my clients, yourself included, to send me referrals. And then what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna put them through the same test I would put anybody through in terms of our 3P framework, where listeners will be very familiar with this, and then I'm gonna try to help because I'm gonna be like, hey, you need a bigger audience or you need to develop this this way, and then let them go do that. If they want to do the work, then we can get them deal. That's basically how I think about it. Um, okay, awesome. So a lot of people bringing back to audience, so a lot of people listening to this podcast need to grow their audience. We have a quiz, and out of the people that are writing kind of the books we work on, so prescriptive, nonfiction, self-help, issue books with uh advice like your own, those people want to develop a book, but they also need to develop their audience and their IPs, they need to develop their author platform. Given those goals, how would you recommend applying what you're talking about in it on compete?

Speaker 2:

This is so hard because I will say I feel like I built my audience at a time where the platforms didn't feel like the hellscape that they are, right? So I yeah. I signed up for Twitter when I was in grad school. Um, and it was like brand new. And you know, our whatever, our dean was like, you need to, everyone needs to have a Twitter, like we used to call it a Twitter. Everyone needs to have a Twitter. And I really built a platform there, and it was very sad to see what happened. And I finally left it about two years ago. Um, slowly built on LinkedIn, slowly built on Instagram. I have a I have a decent following on LinkedIn. My Instagram is very, it's just a hard nut to crack, and I don't want to go down a lot of the paths that I think exist to like buy followers or do other things. Um, I'm not a video person. I don't, you know, I don't want to make videos of me like pointing this way. I no shade to anyone who does. I appreciate y'all so much. It's just not me. Um, but I do think that uh social platforms can be very helpful for you to test ideas. And I have to say that the ideas of uncompete have been tested for years before they became a book, right? So one of my favorite things that I do, I do it every year. I do see a huge following. I see a huge engagement, not following rise, but definitely an engagement rise with this campaign I run every July called Amplify July, where I amplify, I have folks in my community apply to um, you know, and kind of related to this, this, this concept of giving people their flowers, I have them apply to share something that they're working on. It could be a book that they have coming up, could be a podcast, could be a piece of art. We've had people share nonprofits, we've had people share coaching businesses, like all sorts of things. So every July, every weekday in July, uh for the last three years, we've been sharing, you know, people who are doing amazing things in my community, many whom I don't know personally, um, who get to share on my social platforms, which is now combined, you know, over 50,000 people. And so what starts to happen is you create this sort of community of goodwill, right? You start to create like, this is, you know, I believe in sharing other people's work. It's not just about me. My social media has never just been about me. I've tried to like highlight new pieces of research related to the things I care about, tried to highlight awesome people. I know we wanted to talk about like Taylor Swift and Beyonce. 100%. So, you know, people, people who really like I just think that this idea again related to uncompete, like this scarcity mindset of like every single day, I just need to bombard my community with everything that I'm doing and every piece of thought I've ever had. Um, that's gone away. I think what often gets, especially for me, even now at these times where every platform has their own sort of algorithm and hard to crack, the the pieces of content that still give me the highest engagement are largely when I'm sharing other people's work and when I'm sharing other people's like new research or new ideas or things that they've done. And I think again, that creates a community of goodwill around you, where I often find that reciprocity to me as well.

Speaker:

Oh no, I I completely agree. So that leads me to actually my next question was Beyonce and Taylor Swift. So in the book, you hold them up as women who are at the top of their game, yeah, who support each other and they actually uncompete with each other and they uncompete with their peers and they bring people up, right? Yeah, they support other women. So how do you see? I mean, we talked a little bit about this, but like how do you see like let's say I'm an entrepreneur who wants to grow my audience and in you know, the dreams of writing a book someday, how would you like embody uncompete on the daily in your business?

Speaker 2:

Ooh, uh I mean in different ways. One is of course, as I mentioned, social channels. Like I'm all about, I'm all about elevating other authors. And I know people think that, oh, well, an author is different than, you know, if my business is, you know, like taxes, and I if I if I post about another accounting firm, then like my accounting firm will have less business. I actually disagree with that, right? And again, I think that there is a fit for everyone. I think there's in the same way, in some way, you as you said correctly, maybe not a book, but there's content for everyone. And so for me, um, I really think that like when you refer out businesses or when you kind of shine, you know, shine a light on other, even quote unquote rivals or competitors, as our society would tell you, these are your competitors, these are your rivals. I actually think what you do is you create a lot more trust. Again, it has to be genuine. It can't be someone you like is absolutely a mortal, sworn enemy for some purpose, but like you're you know, faking it and being like, I love this person. But When you come in from a spot of like generosity and like genuineness, I really think it shines when again, and every author that I've ever spotlighted on my platform is someone whose book or someone whose work. I genuinely believe it. Like I want people to read this. So I think as business owners, again, it doesn't have to be, it doesn't have to be the person doing the exact same thing you're doing. Again, I do think I know this as an entrepreneur. There is only limited bandwidth I have, right? And there's a sweet spot of the type of client that I would like to work with. And if they're not the right, if someone comes to me and they're not the right fit for me, the last thing I want to do is say, oh no, go out into the world and like figure it out on your own. Maybe someday they will be the right fit for me. And I have seen that. I have referred out businesses to other people who do inclusion strategy, culture, advisory work. I've referred out business because they weren't the right fit at that time. Either they were too small or their needs were too niche or they did something I didn't cover, or I just was too busy. And then they've come back years later and been a fantastic client because they were like, I'm so glad you've you referred me out to your colleague, blah, blah, blah. Now I'm ready to work with you. Let's work together. And it's been a fantastic relationship. So I think being able to really create a referral network of maybe people doing exactly what you're doing or adjacent work that you can refer at, I think it creates that level of goodwill. It creates a trust where the client knows like this person isn't just like sending me out into the ether to go out and do my own research, but you know, it has my best interests at a heart. I think it creates that nurture cycle even over a long time. What um Anka Pete tells us is things are not about short-term thinking, it's about long-term thinking. And to really be successful, sometimes you're nurturing a client for years on end or a prospect for years on end before they became your best customer, for example. Um, so I think there's ways to do it on social media. I think there are ways to do it in real life when you're actually referring out business. I think it's also about like trying to create amazing communities. One in the Seattle area that I love is the F-Bomb Breakfast Club. They are an incredible community of women and women identifying entrepreneurs who gather monthly, throw a lot of F-bombs, which you can hear I don't, I don't, I don't do in general in my general conversation. Um, but you know, they're they're an amazing community. They're actually hosting a book event for me, which I feel so lucky for. And I think, and I think this is, you know, building like building as you rise, as you climb, is really like the number one thing that I want people to take away from this conversation.

Speaker:

A hundred percent. And I think that reciprocity is a really big thing, right? I have competitors who, when I started to go public with my marketing, they would like set up meetings with me to try to like take my marketing strategy. And I was like, they weren't super subtle about it. So I was like, oh, dude, really, guys? And they were men. Um and then there were a few that were women, and I was like, you know, should I be like and then I thought, no, they're different, you know, they're different than me. They have a different aesthetic, they have a different vibe, they do things differently. We can exist in the same space and be okay, you know, and aren't we more powerful if we're communicating? Like, what do you charge? What do you, you know, what's your relationship? What was your experience with this literary agent or that editor? And that way we get more perspective. And it's like, it's not quite gossip. I would say it's intelligence, but it's also like if it is gossip, it's the good kind. And so I think it's the helpful kind. And so it does work, and it's very helpful to be like, I will literally shoot my uh closest book coach to me. I will like shoot her an Instagram message and be like, you'll never believe what this person asked me to do. And she's like, What the hell? Right. And it's helpful because it's like my husband doesn't even understand the nuances. Um I'm sure you have similar things where like they don't even understand, like my closest friends are like, How does this work again? So they don't get how like crazy the ask was, but my colleague does.

Speaker 2:

Totally. Right.

Speaker:

And so it makes it, it just is like a nice benefit to the relationship.

Speaker 2:

So let's talk about I'm gonna interrupt. I'm so sorry, but I have two important points that I want to make firstly. I want to make before we move on. Number one is I do think it's okay to though to trust your gut if someone is being extractive and not operating from the mindset of uncombe, which is something I write about in the book. I have been hurt, I still get hurt, I still get really, you know, and it's hard. It's hard when you see someone stealing your stuff without attribution, all of that. Like I get it. Like I know you have had experience with this, Meghan. 100%. Yeah. So I just want to say, like, if your gut instinct tells you like this person isn't operating with the mindset of generosity, like you got to figure out like, where are you? Are you in a place where you can engage and you'll be okay, like you have the support you need, or is it okay to say, like, actually no? And I know there are people who are like, oh, but you sent your book proposal to ABC, or I I know you did blah, blah, blah for that person. Why aren't you doing it for me? And it's hard, right? Sometimes it's hard to say it's because my gut tells me like this isn't gonna be like it's not gonna work in my favor, in terms of like, it's just gonna break my heart, to be honest, right? So I think it's okay to set those boundaries where you need. And I write about this in the book as well as someone who, you know, has definitely had my generosity, you know, taken for granted. A, but I think B, which I which I think is also really important about as you build sort of these communities of practice. I think all entrepreneurs really need a community of practice. I think it's very lonely to be a business owner, and it's also very fucking lonely. And there I drop my FOM, very fucking lonely to be an author. It is a very lonely journey. It is super hard to crack the different codes. It's very difficult when, you know, you have all these aspirations. You put your heart and soul into a book. It is different from writing a social media post. It is different from doing anything else. It's the hardest thing I've done, apart from giving birth, is what I say. Um and I and I think that this is where there's this like loneliness epidemic that competition and scarcity creates. And you're actually setting yourself up for success when you are surrounded by these incredible people in your community of practice who also get how lonely and how fucking hard it is and can support you through that.

Speaker:

100%. I mean, and that's the like hidden value of like what I do as well. Is like I'm like, oh, you're not crazy. This isn't okay, right? Like I come in with 20 experience, 20 years of experience. And so if something happens with my author, I'm like, oh, that's not okay. And then I can get the agent involved, or I can talk to the editor and back channel, or do whatever. And it's like that's actually an asset. And same thing with the community of entrepreneurs, right? You don't know what you don't know, and so having help like that is really awesome. So let's talk about your publishing journey more specifically. So a lot of people I meet, they roll up to me with like multiple book ideas, and what I say is like it's like rolling up to first date saying, I want to have five kids. Um when you started out with your very first book, did you have multiple book ideas and were just executing on one? Or does it did they kind of come up organically?

Speaker 2:

Good, good question. Also, because I had an arranged marriage, there's a part of me that does feel like it can be helpful to level set on day one, like, hey, listen, I want five kids. And if you're on a date with someone before you fall in love, they're like, I hate kids, then you, you know, then you got decisions to make. I've unfortunately met people who anyway, totally digressing, coming back to that. You can see, um, I will say that I uh with book ideas, I will I'll say this. With my first book idea, I played it safe, right? I with with the diversity advantage, if we're talking about that, I was like, I want to write a book about women in the workplace. I see that there are all these ideas. And I have to say, for me, I played it safe in terms of like I didn't reach out to agents. I didn't, I kind of just kind of went with whoever I knew in my network, which was at that time I was blogging for Forbes. And I think I played it really safe because I was one of those people, as you said, Meghan, who opt out. I was like, oh, there's no way I'll ever get an agent, I'll never get a book deal. Like, there's no point. I might as well go with what's safe. And I did play it safe. And so the book reads more like a manual. It was an idea I had. I'm sure there's a lot more of myself I would have wanted to put in my put in the book. And I was for me, I was just like, I just want to get this book at the door. With each subsequent book, uh, with especially with um uncompete, it was it was a very like I came off my last book, Inclusion on Purpose, and I was exhausted. I was like, I will not write a book again for years if I ever do again. Um and but the book, this idea of uncompete just became undeniable. I was just like, no, this is this is what I think the book, this is the book I think I was born to write. You know, and if I don't write another book again, I'll be really, really happy with this. And then being able to talk to and having the luxury of having an agent and a group of agents, which is what I really love about Miley Bielan. For anyone who's listening to this, please check out my incredible, the incredible team of agents at ARC Literary, ARC Literary, who actually set out to do it differently, right? Again, agents, especially folks in sales, you're taught to be, you know, undercut each other. Like if it's your book, if it's your author, the other person can't get involved, blah, blah, blah. When I had the idea for Uncompete, all the agents in ARC jumped onto a call on Zoom, heard it out, shared their opinions, and then we went ahead. I have never had that. Most, most other people I know represented by a literary agency will never have that because it's very much like you're my author, here's what I think. And therefore, you don't have that, again, collaborative sort of feel. And people had such great ideas on how I could bring this book, All the Agents, at Arc. Um, so I would say for me, I think I was pretty clear about what I wanted. At the same time, I think if there's any way you can test what resonates, I was able to test on social media, even the ideas of uncompete a little more, you know, generosity, the Amplified July campaign, things like that. Um, I really think that, you know, once you have that idea, like once you have that burning idea that only you can write, I think that's really important for us to kind of dial into that. I love that.

Speaker:

I love that you mentioned playing it safe. Did you have an agent for inclusion on purpose?

Speaker 2:

I did. That was Miley. And I was very lucky because Miley reached out to me. I had been writing for Harvard Business Review. She was like, Have you ever thought of writing, you know, a book? And I was like, I kind of have, but I don't know. And then, you know, and I think again, having someone who believes in you can make all the difference. Because I don't think I fully believed in myself as an author until I met Miley.

Speaker:

That's also the secret benefit of writing a book, y'all, is like a lot of times people come to me and it's you'd be amazed, actually, because a lot of people know my clients, and some of the most brassy and bold were the ones that were like, Do you really think I could get a deal? Like multiple times in the process. They're like, Do you really think I can get a deal? And I was like, bitch, please. Do you not know who you are?

Speaker 2:

It's so vulnerable. It really is. I mean, again, like I think the stakes are so high because you it's just such a long process, and you just never know.

Speaker:

Oh, personal. It's just so personal. It's so, you know, it's so personal, it's so in-depth. Like a lot of times I'm like, you know, I talk about a joke, I don't have children, I have authors. But it's true because it's like I'm taking care of like emo your emotional and physical needs sometimes, and like it is like that. That's kind of what I'm doing, right? Um okay, awesome. So let's talk about again. I'm gonna I'm gonna tie your book to your publishing journey because I think it's really important.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker:

In Uncompete, you talk about redefining success, which I think is so great, and making success something you personally, like individually define. How do you see that evolving in your own career and the accomplishments you have done? And given that we were just talking about how maybe you didn't fully believe in yourself for your first two books. Where are you now, like 10 years later, in terms of like how you feel about success and how you define it for yourself?

Speaker 2:

Yeah. I'd be lying if I if I said that the major author milestones don't bother me. Like, I would love to out-earn my advance, which I did with inclusion on purpose. And this is actually the hard part of being in a situation where when in those moments where you work with a big publishing house and you get um, you know, a hefty advance, because then there's that pressure of like, can I out-earn it? Right, which I didn't with my with my last book. Um, I'd be lying if I didn't say I don't want to be on a bestseller list and that's like on my vision board and whatever it is. And I think that especially because of this type of work, and especially because so much Iran books are out of your control, is I have taken a lot from like an ancient Hindu philosophy, which is this idea of like you do your part, and the rest is really up to the universe. You kind of leave it out into the world and you hope for the best, and that's it. You've done your part, you cannot be tied to the outcomes. And so redefining success to me now does mean there's one side which of course is like would love those accolades that are like more traditional, you know, success metrics. But for me, a big part of this is like, have I the the real metric of success for me that I've looked at with Uncompete is did I get to write a book that like I felt that only I could write? That was my truth, that exemplified a lot of what I want to see in the world. And if this is like the last book that I'll ever write, am I proud of what I did? And in fact, in on all those measures, even before publication, I have hit them. So then I gotta just leave it out into the world and hope for the best. I'll do my part, right? I'll do like I'm knocking on people's doors and I'm like, please buy this book. And do you want to da-da-da? And do you want to host a book club and all of those good things? But there has to be a level of like serendipity because otherwise it can be so painful. And you see people burn out. You see people, I'm sure Meghan, you more than me, hear from authors all the time who are like absolutely burnt out. They've done this beautiful thing in the world, and they don't have a moment to enjoy it because they're so like caught up in, you know, with these one or two metrics, which are already impossible just to achieve, right?

Speaker:

So or out of your control. Like we have a whole episode about bestseller lists, right? But the major thing, yeah, the major thing is that USA Today is what I call a clean list, meaning they go off of numbers, and then the New York Times list is curated. I've had books on the New York Times that shouldn't have been a bestseller. They just wanted them to be, and vice versa. And so it's if you put all that, I mean, that's a classic therapy speak, right? If you put everything if you put your identity and your ego and you click that onto something that's outside of your control, you're kind of destined to have like a crisis versus like being exactly what you're saying is detaching from the outcome. And it's like, I think about all these things as like being classically simple but not easy. It's like detach from the outcome. Sounds easy, really, really fucking hard in the end. But I think that's true. I mean, I I kind of see the same thing, right? Like we do an audit every year on okay, how many proposals did we go out with? What happened, or how many pros proposals do we sign up with? How many proposals do we complete? Because sometimes we don't, right? Sometimes the author doesn't have enough ideas for even a proposal, right? That's not on us, that's on them. Third thing is um, you know, did we get an agent for those people? That's sort of my bar because if I can't get an agent, then I made the bad choice um because I didn't sign up somebody who reasonably could get a book deal, and then did they get a deal? And if they didn't get a deal, and 80% of our clients meet all those metrics, but for the two or three every year that don't, I say, okay, what was my part? Did I know? Did I guess wrong? Was I a little too optimistic? Did I just want the money for the project? Like, what's really happening there? And if I'm like, ooh, actually, you know, I kind of did something wrong there, then I'll take responsibility. And if I didn't, then I'm like, dude, the vibes were off. And sometimes authors will come to me and say, why didn't I hit a bestseller list? Or why did my book, you know, not sell? And I'll be like, I don't actually know, but the universe is gonna deliver something to you. That's right. And you're gonna figure that out, and it's gonna somehow be like a weird blessing that you got rejected by like 15 publishers or whatever it is. Um, totally.

Speaker 2:

Can I just say, can I just affirm like how when things, I mean, that it only you can only connect the dots backwards, you know, as Steve Jobs said.

Speaker:

But um, you'll re you know, and I'm like, yeah, Taylor Swift also says that invisible string, right?

Speaker 2:

Um okay. Um, but back to this, like I I think you can only connect the dots backwards, and it only makes sense in hindsight, but every opportunity that you got rejected from, especially professionally, it'll make sense why it didn't work out. And I'm talking as someone who came to this country as an immigrant who applied for like thousands of jobs, like literally, I think there were thousands at some point where I didn't get a job, where things didn't work out, where it was really hard. Um, and it makes, you know, it makes sense in hindsight. I mean, the fact that like I started my own company was because like I couldn't, for a while after I left my last job, like I looked around and I was like, yeah, I'm not hireable, right? Unless I do exactly what I do again, um, what I did at my last company. I was like, yeah, uh, that's not me. So that's why I started my own. Um, and at that time it felt like a bit like a failure, right? Everyone around me had these like six-figure jobs and health insurance and da da-da-da. And I was like, please hire me. I I care about DEI. And people are like, what the hell is that? So um, yeah, it makes sense in the in in sort of in hindsight.

Speaker:

In the long run. All right. So uh I'm gonna end with the last question. I always ask guests, or I always try to remember to ask guests, because I'm not gonna be perfect, y'all. Listeners know that. What is the number one thing or the most important lesson that you want the entrepreneurs and experts who are listening to this podcast to know about landing a book deal and writing a successful book? And that can be two answers, one answer, same thing. Okay.

Speaker 2:

I think landing a book deal, um, again, I think that it does require a lot more. And this is this is very specific and and and like logistical, but it is different. A book proposal is very, especially nonfiction. I didn't know this, and I learned through the process, is is essentially a sales document. And very few of us are engineered or wired or learn the tricks of the trade on how to create a good book proposal because it is not, it is not your book, right? And often we think like, oh, I'll put in my heart and soul into the book proposal, and then we go out to market, you know, without any sort of and you get hit with the crass commercialism that is traditional publishing. Exactly. You know, like they are literally like, can I make a lot of money off your book? It's not the PL gonna look like. Yeah, they don't even care about whether it's a good idea or not. They're like, does this person, and this is why, you know, again, we can see some problematic folks with bestseller books where you're a bit like, oh, this book doesn't say anything, but oh my god, it's a bestseller. So I think I think that was the number one thing for me about a book deal. Like a book deal often has, I mean, yes, you need a good idea overall, but you also need the tools to set out a great book proposal and a great sales document. And that shouldn't do with you, right? You need the right support to get there. So I think there's that. Um and then in terms of writing a successful book, um, I really think it's important to lean into like a very strong community for that. And I will say I don't, I didn't really have a great community of writers as I started. And even now, I wouldn't say it's like the way I would love it, the way I could like send someone something and be like, what do you think of this? There are a few people here and there who I can, and I think it has made all the difference in being able to do that with Uncompete much more than I did with any of the other books. So I would say a self, a successful like book writing journey really does require the type of support that maybe again, like, you know, because we've been taught like solarpreneur, like do it yourself, like everything is you know in your hands. It's not you need the community.

Speaker:

I think that's true. I mean, I'm biased, right? Because people pay me to support them in that. But I do see what I see in terms of writing is going to the right people for feedback, meaning that I have a client who's a sex coach. She went to some of her most trusted and long-standing clients for feedback. That was really helpful. They're their core ideal audience, right? She's not going to Joe Schmoe or like fellow sex coach who's jealous of her having a book deal with, you know what I mean? And so it's just really simple, or sending it to everybody. I had an author that sent it to like 30 people, and I was like, this is gonna wreck our lives. Yeah. Like, this is not gonna be helpful, you know? Um, because you don't have to take every single piece of feedback you get, obviously, on your book either. Um, well, that is awesome. Thank you so much for being here today. I know the listeners are gonna get a lot out of it. Y'all read Uncompete. There are so many golden moments, so many great pieces of wisdom for you all. The best hands-down description of karma I've ever heard, also. Um, so thank you for contributing that to my world. I really do appreciate it. All right, Ruchika, it was lovely to have you. Um, everyone, we will see you back in two weeks. Go ahead and buy Uncompete. The link will be in the show notes. Thank you again, and cheers to your success. The success of this book. Thanks for tuning in to the Kind of Big Book Deal podcast. Want to see where you're at on your book journey? Check out my free quiz at MeghanStevenson.com forward slash quiz. That's M-E-G-H-A-N-S-T-E-V-E-N-S-O-N dot com forward slash quiz. See you next time.