The Top 5 Things Successful Women Do Differently

If you’ve ever looked at another woman and wondered, “What does she know that I don’t?” …this episode is for you.

After years of sitting in rooms with founders, investors, creators, and powerhouse entrepreneurs, I started noticing something:

The most successful women weren’t always the smartest, richest, or most experienced.

But they DID share patterns.

In this episode, I’m breaking down the five things successful women consistently do.

We’ll also talk about friendships, motherhood, professional circles, and why some of the biggest opportunities come from investing in people with potential—not just people with power.

Oh, and yes… there’s a quiz involved.

So grab a notebook, give yourself a score, and let’s see what kind of woman you’re becoming.

Click play to hear all of this and:

[00:00] Why Successful Women Create More Opportunities Than Everyone Else

[02:04] How Making Your Own Decisions Changes Everything

[04:03] Why Asking For Permission Is Holding You Back

[06:20] Why Plans, Schedules, and Timelines Matter More Than Motivation

[09:17] Why Successful Women Talk Strategy More Than Socializing

[14:08] The Networking Shift That Creates Massive Opportunities

[17:18] Your Success Quiz Results: Which Stage Are You In?

Listen to Related Episodes:

• Creating Brand Loyalty, Social Media Virality, and User-Generated Content with Michelle Cordeiro Grant
• A Playbook for First-Time Founders with Nancy Twine
• What Investors Are Really Looking For with Kim Perell
• Build It Like You’ll Sell It: A Wake-Up Call for Founders with Shay Bacani

📧 Join my Newsletter for a weekly cocktail of insider business strategy, personal reflections, and the journey of being a thought leader: https://jasminestar.com/newsletter 📧

For full show notes, visit jasminestar.com/podcast/episode640

Transcript

Jasmine Star 00:00:00  The most successful women know that the more connections they can make. Even if they don't have a vested interest, the more success they foster in the future. There is a business hack I cannot wait to share, and this show is going to break down a decade of studying, watching, and dissecting the most powerful insights I've seen. So before I share this, I need a warning. After listening and taking action, you might be facing a windfall of results and optimized outcomes. You might get an overwhelming abundance of opportunities and growth potential. So don't say I did not warn you. Welcome to the Jasmine Star Show where I talk about life, business. And today we're going to be focusing on the top five things successful women do. Now, before the haters come out and you ask me to cite my resources or ensure that I didn't get this from a script from ChatGPT. Rest assured, this is all an entirely based on years and years of watching and studying women at the top of their field, from really far off, in a distance to very up close.

Jasmine Star 00:01:01  Because what I can tell you here and now is that I have gotten access to some of the most powerful and incredible and successful women behind closed doors. I share as much as I can publicly, but there are so many times when I'm invited into a small room with industry titans and women who are written about and studied for their acumen and for their prowess. Why am I invited into these rooms? If I'm being honest, I am not really sure. But if I had to guess, it's because one. I respect their privacy, and two, I've demonstrated I create media to help other women in business. And number three, I have a platform which they view as a megaphone for their businesses, charities and causes. I've also interviewed incredibly successful women on my podcast, so I have gotten to experience them up close, like on camera and off. I've carefully mapped patterns of their success and I realize that many of them, if not all of them, share these exact characteristics. And I can't wait to share them with you today.

Jasmine Star 00:02:04  And I want to have a little bit of fun with this particular show. I want you to keep track where you align with each of these characteristics. So for each of these top five things, please rate yourself on a scale of 1 to 10. One, you don't possess that trait, or ten you absolutely possess it. And one more rule. It can't be the number five. You can't give yourself a number five. On a scale of 1 to 10, it could be a four or it could be a six, but it cannot be middle of the road five. Okay. So are you ready to play? We're going to get started with the top five things successful women do with number one. Successful women make their own decisions. This one, hands down, is the most powerful characteristic every successful woman possesses. This one right there. They make their own decisions. Successful women don't wait and ask somebody else. They don't abdicate the decision to somebody who knows more. Who has more experience. They get quiet.

Jasmine Star 00:03:06  They trust themselves. And only then, after deciding for themselves, will they seek insights from other people. They pressure test their decision. They get feedback, but it's not for other people to decide. It's to help make the decision she's already made stronger. They know what's best for their business and they make a decision. Period. And then others come around her to ensure, hey, have you considered all sides now? She can change her decision. Sure, but it's still her making a decision. So now let's get into this little bit of quiz. It's like a Cosmo quiz gone, right? So tell me, on a scale of 1 to 10, how often are you making your own decisions? So I want you to keep track because at the end, we're going to have a breakdown. Yes. Like I just mentioned those Cosmo quizzes that we did in high school. Now it's for business, and we're making money. Okay. Now let's get into number two of the top five things successful women do.

Jasmine Star 00:04:03  Successful women give themselves permission. Now, here's a crazy thing. Permission is a crazy thing to even talk about in the 21st century. And it's most likely because for hundreds and hundreds of years, women had to ask for permission for everything. Y'all. It wasn't until 1974 that a woman could buy her own house on her own. So let's make this simple. Your mother likely couldn't buy a house on her own. We are one generation removed from not being able to buy property. And here's a piece of historical relevance. There's been less than 50 years of real financial access to women. So what runs really deep in our blood? Generation after generation after generation of women who couldn't buy a car on her own, who couldn't finance a refrigerator on her own, who could not get a business loan on her own. We are the first generation who dared greatly. But what I have seen and experienced is that successful women have taken this legal right in 1974 and then sprinted towards their freedom. The successful women that I am looking at, they're no longer looking to anybody but themselves to choose what's best for them their goals, their families, their businesses.

Jasmine Star 00:05:24  Now, I want to be very clear because I think people are going to come sideways for me. I'm going to be very clear. I am not saying successful women only think about themselves. I am saying successful women don't ask for permission for what to think, how to think, what they're allowed to do. I can tell you that I model what I've seen other successful women do when they are in a union or a partnership with a significant other. I asked my husband if we could talk about this and he says, if you believe it will help other people have a better understanding of what they want and what they need. As leaders and as women and as equal contributors to their family. He said, go right ahead. So here's what I'm going to be honest with you. I am not asking for my husband's permission. I'm asking him for his support. I present my husband and business partner with facts and hopes and a clear explanation around my plans, and I tell him I believe that this is the best decision for the business as the business CEO.

Jasmine Star 00:06:20  Now he can and he does. He asks questions. He pushes back. He asks me to consider other perspectives, but he knows that he does not grant me permission. He gives me his support. So you tell me, on a scale of 1 to 10, how often are you giving yourself permission? One would mean that you're asking permission for everything to do all the time in ten would mean that you never ask for permission. Now let's get into number three. The third most popular thing that I see the most successful women do. Successful women create a plan and schedules. So do you want to know a crazy fact? Every time I have attended an event, I was invited into a room or I was given access to a think tank. The most successful woman in the room was the person running the show. Okay, like the most successful woman was the one who was handling it. She was the one texting or emailing details. She arranged reservations. She asked for flight arrival times. Now I am not saying she herself was handling the details.

Jasmine Star 00:07:23  Successful women all have help. More on that in a second. But successful women know a good plan and they know that a good plan gets results. I have yet to attend an event with successful women, where there has not been a timeline shared in advance, like, yeah, okay, so I debated sharing this, but I got permission from Emma. Well, I was at her house, so Emma agreed is a powerhouse. Not only is she the co-founder of Skims and Good American, as well as a few other companies, she is a bestselling author. She's a speaker, she's a podcast. Now, I'm a member of a female professional podcast group, and we had wanted to get together for a really long time, for almost a year. Everyone's going to get together and then nothing really came of it. So then Emma joined the group and in less than two months, so she joined a little bit of everybody else. In less than two months, she planned the first event she hosted at her house.

Jasmine Star 00:08:13  She sent a timeline for dinner and also included the ending time. So I asked if I could take photos and videos of the event and share my experience. And she replied with share, share away. That was my English accent. I think that was pretty terrible. I wanna try it again, but I'm just gonna roll with it. So what I thought I experienced at the time was me creating content to put people like you in the room, but what I realized it was something more. It was another successful woman confirming a pattern I saw again and again plans and schedules are key. The most successful women make plans and schedules to ensure that every detail is considered and time is maximized. So now let's go back and answer this for our quiz. On a scale of 1 to 10, how often are you creating a plan for your goals and scheduling what needs to get done to accomplish them? So let's pause here. How often are you creating a plan, and then how often are you creating that timeline? Right? Like, we can have a plan, but without putting time to it, we might not hold ourselves to it.

Jasmine Star 00:09:17  So now let's rate ourselves on 1 to 10. One means you don't ever have a plan, and ten means that your plans have plans. Now remember, you cannot rate yourself a five. Okay, we're going to get to the end. We're gonna break it down. Like, where are we following this? Let's get into number four. Successful women talk strategy more than social. Okay. Oh, this is a newish concept for me, but when I interviewed Shay Bikini on my podcast. She said something that I can't ever unsee. It actually lives rent free in my brain.

Shay Bacani 00:09:49  Men go to golf to talk business and talk deals. When women, we go to the restaurant, we're talking about the kids we're kind of releasing. We're taking a load off. We're just very communal. We want to talk about the family. We want to talk about the kids, which is fine. But we have to know when to say, okay, we've caught up. What are you working on? What are you doing in five years? What is your thoughts on how the market is going to be? What are your insights on the future of social media? People talk about Elon Musk and PayPal Mafia, which is like some conspiracy that everyone that came from PayPal are like wildly successful.

Shay Bacani 00:10:14  And there's some mafia that they have going on, and I don't think it's as deep as, hey, we all have knowledge, let's get together and talk about this knowledge and get to this next level. Women don't do that. We get together and we try to release from business, and we try to decompress when we get together. We aren't having the right conversation.

Jasmine Star 00:10:29  Let me start off with my truth. When I get together with industry peers, male or female, I actually do care about their families. I care about their work life balance. I care about personal aspects of their lives. It's just that in my experience, men address it, but they don't dwell in it. Now, they might have a different space for them to do that, but when we're gathered together in a professional capacity, men keep it mostly focused on business. I've gone to events where women talk more about their preference of Macha, their spiritual archetypes, their cycle syncing, their yoga practice, and all of those things are totally amazing.

Jasmine Star 00:11:06  Fine, I love it, but I don't like it more than I like talking about business. At a business event, the most successful women I have been around are fully present and supportive of the personal aspect of each other's lives. And I mean this like deeply. But they make no mistake, they are there and we are there by business, for business and because of business. So we can handle business. Now here's where I want to be truthful. When my daughter Luna was old enough to enroll in swim classes and gymnastics and story time at the library. I met a lot of other mothers who were so good and so kind, and they were so much fun. They invited me to cocktail parties, mahjong nights, mahjong. I'm saying it wrong. Okay, if you're a fancy and you play mahjong, mahjong, mahjong, whatever. Mahjong. They would invite me to their mahjong nights. They would invite me to Newport Beach home tours. I was lucky, I really did feel welcome. And I felt invited.

Jasmine Star 00:12:06  And then I realized that it wasn't a fit for me. That's hard to say. I'm a little bit embarrassed, but it's true because they are incredible women and they are incredible mothers and they make the world better. And all I felt was guilty that I didn't want to hang out with them. And I can't believe I'm actually saying this, but I was worried that I was going to be cutting Luna out of like, the neighborhood playdates. I was worried that they think that I was like, I thought I was going to be too good to hang out with them. I was worried that I would look like a workaholic, and then I simply decided to stop. I decided to tell myself a different story. Like, literally in the snap of a finger, I dropped the negative narrative. I took control of my truth. And this is my truth. I'm a great mother. I love the business I'm building and the people I get to build with. I am simply choosing to spend my time around people who help shape me as an entrepreneur, and less shape me socially.

Jasmine Star 00:13:04  Now I want to be clear nothing is wrong with either option. I simply know what I want. And so I chose that. And I choose it still to this day. And it's simply my truth and it works for me. It might not work for you, and that's all okay, but I invite you to ask yourself, what do you prefer? If you find yourself in professional rooms with women who talk more socially than strategically and you love it? Rock on. Amazing. If you find yourself in professional rooms with successful women, you'll listen to how they give support and how they give care, but they are there to keep the main thing, the main thing handling business so you know what time it is. It's quiz time. On a scale of 1 to 10. When you gather professionally with women, are you one spending way more time talking socially or ten? All strategy, all the time. Now let's get into our final lucky number five. Successful women make time for people of potential, not just people of power.

Jasmine Star 00:14:08  Sometimes I think of successful women like builders or chrome contractors. They lay the foundation, they build big businesses. But like any great builder will tell you, that foundation is built on many parts. For example, laying large pieces of marble on a floor requires grout to keep them connected. A great builder, like a successful woman, understands that her network of marble pieces Her industry peers connections experiences are held together by much smaller connections. So let me break this down. Back in 2024, I was introduced to Kim Perel, a powerful investor and entrepreneur. I loved her, I loved her, I still love her. She's inspiring, she's magnetic, and she's a force of pure magic. I flew to Miami to host a podcast for her, and I was ecstatic because I got face to face time with her. And then I did something I never thought I'd do. I asked her for help. Now I am the first born daughter of five children in an immigrant family. Asking for help is something first born daughters from immigrant families never do.

Jasmine Star 00:15:11  In fact, asking for help. It makes me nervous and it made me nervous. Then when I texted Kim to ask, I was more nervous than a pregnant nun. I asked her if I if she could introduce me to a few specific women in her network. I was out there doing the sign of the cross. I wanted them on my podcast and guess what? Okay, my mom's listening. I did not do this on the cross. I don't mean to make a joke of it, okay? I was just going on, I got I got caught up in the spirit of the podcast. Okay. So I asked her for help, and then she made those introductions immediately. And I interviewed Michelle Grant, founder of Gorgie, and Nancy Twine, founder of Brazil, while I was in Miami. So I will link to Nancy's podcast, to Michelle's podcast, and to Kim's podcast in the show notes. But I did those podcasts when I was in Miami. Now I am not talking about how great it was that Kim made that happen all in less than a day, and it was great.

Jasmine Star 00:16:00  But what I want to do is I want to highlight that while I don't have the business size and I don't have the experience, nor have I sold a business for hundreds of millions of dollars. Yet like Kim, Nancy and Michelle, Kim saw me as pure potential. I wasn't as powerful as those other successful women, but I had the potential to create synergies, create media, create podcast and create exposure. She's a builder that saw that I had the grit to be the grout in her marble tile connections, and that is what successful women do. They make time to know people and understand how she can create connections between her networks. The most successful women know that the more connections they can make, even if they don't have a vested interest, the more success they foster in the future. They are aggregators of potential, and they use those aggregators of potential to create power, and it's incredible to witness. Okay, so now it's time for the last question of our five part quiz. Are you the type of person who makes connections between people, even if they're at different stages of life and business? One means you're not making connections, and ten means you're connections have connections and you love it.

Jasmine Star 00:17:18  Okay, so now let's recap the top five things successful women do. Number one, successful women make their own decisions. Number two successful women give themselves permission. Number three successful women create a plan and schedules. Number four successful women talk strategy more than social, and five successful women make time for people of potential, not just people of power. Okay, so now it's time for you to calculate your quiz results. Your results are going to range from the very low end, like five is the lowest you can get to the highest end 50. That's the highest you can get. So if you scored less than 25, you're in the seed stage. This means you have lots of ways to grow, and you can focus on every aspect of your network, connections and decision making to accelerate your expansion. Okay, so if you scored between 26 and 35, you're in the sapling stage. This means that you're going to want to focus on your lowest ranking categories and see how you can learn, flex and try getting uncomfortable, asking for help, offering to make connections and putting yourself out in new ways.

Jasmine Star 00:18:28  If you scored between 36 and 45. You're in the rooted stage. This is where you're going to double down on your highest ranking categories. This is where you're going to showcase your greatest assets in service of yourself and of others. You trust that you know things, you trust. You've done things and you've proven your own success on your own terms. Okay, lastly, if you scored between 45 and 50, you are in the Royal Oak stage, baby. Now it's time to create shade for others, not throw shade. Create shade. And you want to do this to expand in new ways, and you want to reach boldly for this guy. You now stand as a testament for others to follow and offer insights and help and value however you can. Now, one last thing. I specifically mentioned successful women. I didn't mention a single thing about money and well, yeah, money is often connected to success. It's not one in the same thing. You might have scored very high on this quiz, but you're believing you're not successful.

Jasmine Star 00:19:28  I challenge you. Your high score is a reflection of value of you. Just you. You are successful. And I want to make sure, please, that you understand that making decisions on your own, giving yourself your own permission, being in charge of your own plan, and making time for potential in others are the key tenets of success. And don't worry, I'll have another podcast on talking about how success will make more money. But for now, I am asking you to simply sit in the notion that success is in the eye of the beholder. So I genuinely hope that you allow yourself to see it for yourself. If you have found this episode helpful or enjoyable, please share it with a friend or you can post it and tag me on Instagram at Jasmine Star. I would love for that to happen because then we can stay connected and I can personally thank you here again. I appreciate you watching and listening to The Jasmine Star Show.