Thanks for sharing your story with us Kristin. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I require a certain amount of complexity in my work to stay engaged, aka I get bored easily. Out of college, I excelled in sales and sales management roles in Southern California. When I moved to Dallas, I had to learn the culture of the new city plus the culture of sales. I overcame those challenges to become successful in a new city with a wildly different culture and after asking for a promotion to a job that didn’t exist and getting it, I was on top of the world at 26, until I got bored again.
At the time, I was working for a company that sold auto and home insurance and I was just looking for a way to have a bigger impact on people. I’d learned how to educate clients around the importance of risk management but it just wasn’t enough. I went to a career fair searching for a next step and, super long story short, I ended up working with a financial services company in Dallas. After years of small changes, in an effort to give clients a more holistic experience I changed my whole model of risk management-based financial planning to a Fee Based model for financial advice & planning. Now, I work with a Dallas based firm, and Fee-Based Financial Planning is what I do all day long.
In my practice, I typically work with women who are primary income earners. In most cases, they’re in a role with fluctuating income or are a business owner. These are women who make a great income via bonus or distributions and are often great savers. They want to make the most of their money but don’t feel confident about making decisions around investments or long term goals because there’s just so much research out there and it’s tough to know who to trust. They turn to me for expert advice & ongoing support. Think of it as Project Management for your finances.
While working with these women, successful, powerful, women, I realized a few things to be true: they worked hard to get to the top but when they got there, they were alone and didn’t have the relationships or the life they wanted. In addition, my clients often didn’t know who to turn to for help diagnosing problems in their business and were challenged to find great partners in the industries they needed to support them (think banker, lawyer, accountant).
I started Ashton Charles to support women in ways that don’t include financial planning. We focus specifically on helping women build community & networks, as well as specialty online courses around setting specific goals & creating strategic sales plans.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc. – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
The ride has been rough, what’s made it worth it is the impact I’ve been able to make on others. What makes it bearable is the community of women I have around me that support and encourage me. They believe in me when I don’t believe in myself. My Tribe is insanely supportive and I love them for it.
Specific struggles? I’ve been self-employed for six years and cash flow has been a challenge at times. I’m saying that in a public forum because every single women, or man for that matter, I work with has the same set of problems in their business. We all have to overcome the same things. We all struggle with knowing when to hire or when to fire or how to have tough conversations, when to increase our fees, how to fire a client or be fired by a client. As business owners, we struggle with the same set of problems and we’re so ashamed to tell anyone else we keep ourselves isolated. Oh yeah, then there’s isolation. Before I learned to be vulnerable with a few of my close friends, I was stressed out and carrying the weight of the world–all the time. It’s hard to show up and do your best work for clients when you’re that stressed–no matter what your business is.
My advice is to find a few people who also own businesses and make them your friend. Yes, there’s a way to intentionally create a network. I’ll be launching an online course and publishing a book about this later this year!
Be in business for yourself, but not BY yourself. Collaborate with other women with complementary businesses, offer support to people who are where you want to be so you can be mentored by them. Make yourself invaluable to others. If you give it, you’ll get it back.
Do you think there are structural or other barriers impeding the emergence of more female leaders?
In the coaching space, there are so many women I don’t think this is a huge issue.
In financial planning-land, however, there’s a huge gap. I have so much to say about this, we could publish a whole separate article, but I’ll try to keep this brief.
The biggest issue with the financial planning industry is that the people who are running it aren’t present to the actual problem. They’ve identified there are no women in the industry, but when they develop the plans to recruit more, they leave women out of the conversation. This often leaves a room full of white men to decide how to recruit women, white, black, Asian, or otherwise. I find that when I give my opinion or give feedback in an effort to help make a change it’s often overlooked or considered a “complaint.”
For women new to the industry, the challenge is that there are not a lot of people that look like them. Additionally, men and women build relationships and do business differently. You have to translate what men say and how they say it into a language that’s authentic to you—that’s tough to do.
I’m often asked what the answer is to this issue. I can’t claim to know it all, but I do know that you have to support women differently and sometimes more than their male counterparts. In estate planning, we have a saying, “fair isn’t always equitable” meaning that what seems fair on paper isn’t always what’s fair in real life. You have to realize that women and minorities have to climb up to the starting line. We’re not all starting the race from the same place.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.ashtoncharles.co
- Email: kristin@ashtoncharles.
co - Instagram: ashtoncharlesllc
- Facebook: https://www.
facebook.com/ ashtoncharlesconsulting - Podcast: https://podcasts.
apple.com/us/podcast/the- tribe-podcast-by-ashton- charles/id1457251279 - Other: https://www.linkedin.
com/in/kristinoneal/
Image Credit:
JCi Creatives
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