The event is designed to give women practical advice and counsel in career, estate planning, finance, health and wellness and more. One thing that was covered that really stood out to me was how negation, in any field or context, is something women just don’t learn enough about. If we are going to have equality in the workplace and beyond, negotiation skills are extremely important.

Know Who You Are Dealing With

Whether it is a Fortune 500 executive or the car dealership down the block, knowing who you are dealing with is the first step toward negotiation success. Understanding their background and familiarizing yourself with the logistics of their rank and career can help you maneuver a negotiation. Doing your research on who you are negotiating with can make or break a deal, as I have seen time and again with my own clients and experiences.

Speak Up

As women, many of us are hard on ourselves and are afraid to negotiate firmly. My friend Bryn Freedman, one of the leading speaker coaches at TED, shared with me recently, “Being authentic and standing up for ourselves starts by quieting our inner critic. This critic is in all of us but it’s not your true self no matter how much it feels that way. Your true inner voice is kind, it advocates for you and, without being strident, knows that you deserve to reach your goals. The more you speak to yourself with love, the louder and clearer your authentic voice becomes.”

Be Fair

Before demanding an unrealistic or perhaps undeserved ask in a negotiation, be sure to do your research. Look into what others with your level of expertise are asking for or making. Also, “Never pull the gender card when discussing qualifications, or really in any environment,” stated Beverly Hills Chief of Police Sandra Spagnoli at the conference. Seeking equality is the heart of feminism, and using gender as a reason for a raise doesn’t aid anyone in both a negotiation situation and the greater movement for equality.

Leave Emotion At The Door

As with purchasing a car or home, don’t show even a glimmer of anger, annoyance, excitement or anything other than calm professionalism. Your emotions and microexpressions are likely being analyzed and assessed during every moment of the negotiation.

Practice

Hire a coach, talk in the mirror, or get a friend or colleague to run through scenarios and sample questions that could come up in your negotiation — any sort of preparation is beneficial for a successful negotiation. As my friend and successful entrepreneur, Ashley Sumner shared in my interview with her, “Don’t let the first time you ask for what you want, be said to the person you need it from the most. It’s important to think it through and practice saying it, out loud, to a trusted friend.”

Make A List

It’s a mistake going into negotiations without writing down exactly what your goals are ahead of time and knowing exactly what you will accept and not accept.

Don’t wait for a boss to say, “Here are your benefits.” Ask for what you want instead. You are making yourself more powerful by writing down a proposal of your requirements and never being too afraid to bring it to the table.

Get Everything In Writing

In any negotiation, you can be promised the moon but unless you get it in writing you are not guaranteed a thing! This is something I learned the hard way over the years. It’s worth it to push for paperwork to back up everything that is said.

Use Silence

Put your offer on the table and then stay silent. Human nature will tempt you into filling the quiet, but don’t! Spagnoli insisted to “use your silence as a benefit.” 

Act For What You Want

Talk, think and dress for what you want — not what you have. You don’t need to spend an enormous amount on designer clothes. It is possible to look the part – whatever that might be for your profession and come across very polished on a reasonable budget.

Be Willing To Walk Away

Know it is okay to walk away; if they truly want you, they will always come back. Despite what it may feel like at the time, there is always another opportunity, and if the offer was not ideal, it is all right to leave the situation empty-handed. Don’t allow this setback to destroy your confidence, productivity or happiness.

As a business founder and mother, I’ve found myself in this position many times, trying to balance my entrepreneurial ventures with my efforts to create a warm and loving environment for my son. I won’t lie, I’ve struggled to find harmony between these two roles and more than once has one part of my life been momentarily overshadowed by the demands of the other.

With practice, however, I’ve learned some lessons that make it easier to create symmetry in my life between these two roles. Whether you are thinking of starting your own company (or becoming a mother!) or you’re already deep in the trenches, these seven tips to balance entrepreneurship and motherhood can help you make the most of both roles — and maintain your own sanity in the process.

Enlist Deputies at Work and at Home

One of the first notions that you have to rid yourself of as an entrepreneur and a mother is the idea that you have to do everything yourself. The belief that you have to have a hand in everything is often seen as embedded in the concept of being an entrepreneur, but attempting to tackle everything on the job and at home guarantees that things will fall through the cracks. I fell victim to this misguided theory when I first launched my business. However, I quickly found that relying on my talented team at work and extended support network at home produced better results across the board.

Create a Routine for Yourself (But Allow for Flexibility)

Between my company and my son, every second of my day is filled. Without an established routine, it’s too easy to lose track of what I’m doing in the middle of doing it, wasting time and leaving me feeling unnecessarily stressed. Even worse, without a plan, one role can easily overwhelm the other. Establishing a weekly routine with time set aside solely for my business and my family alike helps me stay on top of things and be more effective. That said, flexibility is key. Otherwise, that unexpected doctor’s appointment can throw a wrench in your whole week.

Set Goals on a Daily Basis

I’ve found that outlining my life’s big aspirations is easy. I have a clear vision for my company’s long-term growth and I know the important principles and values that I want to instill in my son. The smaller, day-to-day goals that will lead me toward fulfilling these ambitions, however, can be harder to set. Putting aside time each morning for a quick daily goal-setting session has helped me enormously. First, it allows me to see more clearly if I’m forgetting something important. Second, the action of checking off a completed daily goal — no matter how small — gives me a sense of satisfaction that helps nurture my own mental well-being.

Be Able to Roll With Life’s Punches

The key caveat to the practice of daily goal-setting, of course, is that you have to be OK with failing to meet those goals from time to time. Start by making sure that your goals are realistic. I personally found that my intention to go to the gym every day was too ambitious. Even the best-laid plans are going to fall apart every now and then. Every entrepreneurial mother will face baby spit-up on their dry-cleaned suit at some point. Accept that this is going to happen, recalibrate and move on. Dwelling on these setbacks will only mess up your routine even more.

Be Mindful

Multitasking seems like it was designed for those of us balancing a company and a child, but trying to do both roles at once can easily result in doing neither role well. Before I figured this out, I definitely had times when I short-changed my son by attempting to answer a work email while playing with him. And I didn’t do my colleagues any favors, either, by missing an important question while trying to soothe my son. Whether you’re doing something for work or something for your family, dedicate all of your attention to that task. Being mindful can actually end up saving you time.

Make Family Meals a Priority

Carving out time dedicated solely to your family can be tough, and it’s easy to let the lovely idea of a family meal at the dinner table together fall to the side in favor of eating a sandwich in the kitchen while typing on your phone one-handed. If you’re able to fit just one daily activity into your life that revolves around your role as mother, however, family dinner is the way to go. Researchers have found that dinner-time conversations improve literacy and behavior.

Don’t Forget Self-Care

In balancing motherhood and entrepreneurship, forgetting to take care of yourself is easy. But you’re the glue that holds everything together! I learned the hard way that neglecting my own health, physical and mental, can lead to worse performance as a boss and as a caregiver. Between sleep, exercise and unplugging mentally, finding time to fulfill my own needs and recharge makes me more effective in everything I do. Sometimes this requires a little creativity; maybe gym time has to be slotted in at 5:00 a.m. But remember, building harmony between your role as entrepreneur and your role as mother starts by finding balance in yourself.

Healthcare is hard — but many startups are now successfully navigating the healthcare space with us. In this article, I explore how to approach the beast that is the healthcare industry.

Know Thy Stakeholder(s)

Most healthcare organizations are deeply layered and extremely complex. When entering a working relationship in the healthcare industry, it’s imperative to understand the different layers of stakeholders in order to have a successful engagement. To build a mutually beneficial relationship, you must understand who each stakeholder is, where their priorities lie, where they see risk and what success looks like to them. You’ll find, as with all large organizations, that stakeholder priorities are not always aligned, meaning that you need to be willing to take the lead and help them align with one another.

When it comes to financial stakeholders, the key objective will (obviously) always be focused on cost to the company and ROI. However, it is important to remember that each finance department, for each healthcare entity, has a different structure. Therefore, it’s necessary to understand which KPI’s are important to them before engaging. IT stakeholders, on the other hand, may be motivated by implementation requirements or security vulnerabilities. Often times, technical architecture is specific to an organization. And as most health organizations tend to be more complicated, a successful partnership relies heavily on open lines of communication and a full understanding of their existing systems. Satisfying those driving the business case along with those who will actually use the product can also have conflicting goals. Stakeholders can also be silent or non-obvious. Even if a CIO makes the final call on decisions, she may heavily defer to her IT team, whom she trusts. If all of these factors align, the relationship stands a strong chance of being successful.

Map the Ripple Effect

Let’s be honest. The word “investment” does not strike many of us as an interesting topic. We think of investments and hear stocks, bonds, real estate and other ways to increase our net worth. I mean, the definition of the term ROI is “the measure of gain or loss generated on an investment relative to the amount of money.”

But a return on investment really should be defined as the benefit to an investor resulting from an investment of some resource.

Why Should It Have a Broad Definition?

A resource could be looked at as simply money but there are other resources used from an investment perspective that can benefit an investor. There are two other forms of resources that are not included in the original definition that are important to entrepreneurs and business owners: time and energy. Without ROI, we have no clue on whether our efforts are even worth our time – or if our energy could be better utilized elsewhere.

Time

They say time is money, right? Calculating what your time is worth can be debatable, but everyone would agree that their time is worth something. Doing an ROI analysis on time-based subjects such as chores, tasks and other to-do items will dramatically change your life for the better.

I sat down to figure out what my time is worth and came up with a value of $100/hour. That means that whatever I am doing better be worth $100/hour. If it’s not your strength and you don’t enjoy doing it, then you have to find a way to hire/outsource that task or to-do item to someone else.

Not too long ago, I was mowing the lawn and fed up with the work. It was taking up a ton of my time – and at what cost? Hunched over, drenched in sweat and out of pure frustration I pulled out my phone and started to search for lawn care companies. Why was I wasting hours when I could be doing other things?

I was seeing prices from $30-$50 a month to take care of my lawn. The ROI analysis was a no-brainer. I could spend $30-$50 a month on lawn care and save 4-5 hours a month in time at a value of $100/hr. That’s a significant amount!

My lawn needs mowing twice a month and it takes an average of two hours each time. My ROI analysis was pretty simple. I could waste four hours a month or pay a lawn company $60 a month to take care of my lawn. I personally value my time at $100 an hour and so lawn care would cost me $400 per month. By paying $60, I save four hours to work on my business or to spend time with family.

Your return on investment in regards to your time can also be calculated. As entrepreneurs, business owners, employees, students, etc. we all have some type of value for our time. But it’s not just time. Energy can be another factor for determining ROI.

Energy

When eating, for example, there is a big correlation between the food that you choose to eat and the type of ROI it will return when measured as energy. If you choose to eat a large lunch at McDonald’s, you will most likely return a negative ROI on your energy level. You will feel lethargic, slow and not focused to accomplish the rest of the day. Typically large greasy meals that have more carbohydrates will return a negative ROI on your energy. If you choose to eat a kale salad, though, you will actually notice that your body is producing more energy. Let me give you some examples of real-life ROI scenarios that I use:

• Choosing What to Eat for Breakfast
• Choosing What to Wear in the Morning: I calculated that I could spend 15 minutes every morning picking out what to wear to work that day or I could lay out my options the night before.
• What Time to Leave for Work Every Day Based on the Commute: How long will I have to spend in traffic?

Think about it. Investment is a great topic – especially if there is everything to gain in your everyday life.

What is your ROI?

The first order of the day was to examine the numbers. After reviewing the financial statements, I discovered that the CFO was paying himself dividends as the company was running at a loss. When confronted on this item, he declined our request to defer dividend payments until the company was in stronger financial health. It became clear to me that I had to fire the CFO.

Next, I had to shop around for a financing deal that would consolidate all of the company’s debts — instead of the high-interest line of credit the company was paying too much for. But getting a bank to take a chance on the business was no easy task. At the time, I was working full-time in procurement for IBM where I was responsible for negotiating vendor agreements to save the company money. That experience came in handy. I had to knock on many, many doors. And eventually, I found an institution that was willing to give my small business a shot.

After finances, I had to put in place new processes after discovering that the three main divisions of the company (sales, manufacturing and accounting) worked in silos. I eventually got involved in the business full-time and took over as CEO until the company was in stable financial standing. I later hired a general manager to run company operations. Turning the business around was a huge learning experience. Here are some of the lessons learned, which I hope help you manage your own business.

Know Your Company Finances

No matter how big or small your company is, make sure you understand your balance sheets. I recently graduated with an Executive MBA, but you don’t need to have an MBA to learn how to read financial statements. You can always take a course online to help you get a grasp on your numbers. Always get a second opinion on your financial situation — whether things are going well or not. After firing the CFO, I hired a small accounting firm that specializes in small business accounting. For a small monthly fee, they ended up doing a much better job than the CFO who was costing the company 300,000 a year.

Don’t Be Discouraged by Rejection

When I was looking for a financing deal, I received one rejection letter after another. I met up with several bank representatives. Most were very helpful and gave me good advice but were not able to take on the risk and finance a small business. But I persisted. I kept reaching out, making appointments and showing up, until finally, a major bank agreed to give my business a chance. Without that financing deal, the company would not be in business today.

Surround Yourself With the Right Team

It was during those difficult times that I learned the valuable lesson of surrounding myself with a team that I can rely on. When I took over the company, I realized that the previous management had isolated its vendors, clients and employees. It’s amazing what can happen when you treat everyone as part of the same team, working towards the same goal. When the company was in financial trouble, I reached out to our vendors and asked for extended deadlines to make payments. To my surprise, many agreed to it. It was around that time that I developed my “Let’s Grow Together” philosophy. I’m a true believer in the strength and absolute necessity of teamwork as the foundation of success.

A version of this post originally appeared on Medium. 

This being said, over the years, I have found several takeaways that could dramatically accelerate a new entrepreneur’s learning curve and success. Below are six suggestions that took me years to figure out the hard way. I hope this will act as a shortcut for new, budding entrepreneurs.

Hire a Good Bookkeeper and CPA Early

When my business partner and I were first starting out, all our focus was getting the business off the ground. The next thing we knew, a couple years went by and we were getting buried by taxes. I thought owning a business had tax advantages!

There are advantages, but unless you’re a CPA yourself, odds of you knowing what adjustments to make are slim to none. Being an entrepreneur means you need to learn a little bit about a wide breadth of items. You also have to learn where to focus your energy and where to bring in experts.

I know how tight a bootstrapped budget can be, but you’re costing yourself a great deal more by not hiring a professional bookkeeper and CPA. The fees these professionals charge is beyond worth it. In the long run, they will save you thousands. The ROI for their services can be through the roof. Not to mention all the time, energy and money saved from leveraging their knowledge and experience versus trying to tackle all of it alone.

Find a Great Mentor

You don’t know what you don’t know. Find someone who has already started and grown a successful business or businesses. A good mentor can share valuable wisdom learned from years in the trenches. They will be there to provide insight into some of the most important and impactful business strategies. They’re also there to hear your struggle and challenges and provide guidance towards solutions.

Network With Other Entrepreneurs

One thing I’ve learned is it doesn’t matter what business you’re in, the challenges business owners face are nearly identical. Find a group of other business owners in various stages who you can connect with on a regular basis. Think of it as an entrepreneur roundtable or mastermind group. You’ll learn as much from your colleagues as you will from anywhere else. You’ll also find personal growth by helping others and sharing knowledge from your lessons learned as well.

Discussion topics include leadership, systems, vendors, marketing strategies and more. Make it a point to seek and share knowledge among your group on a regular basis.

Focus on Systems and Processes Early

The first two years flew by for me. I was doing everything. I knew what needed to be done and how to do it. The problem came when I needed to hire other people to step in and take over some of my responsibilities. Without documented systems and processes, training a new teammate and setting them up for success can be difficult. As you’re doing specific business tasks, begin documenting the steps and processes. This is how business systems are created. A successful business is heavily reliant on systems. Create them early and perfect them over time.

Define KPIs

How do you know if you’re succeeding? Define a small handful of metrics to track and measure. These will be your businesses’ main KPIs (key performance indicators). KPIs will vary by business vertical, but some ideas include leads, margins, sales pipeline and conversion rates.

To determine what KPIs are right for your business, think about what items move the needle the most in your business. Which of these can be tracked, measured, analyzed and optimized to increase business efficiency and growth?

Read Books Like Your Life Depends on It

I saved this for last because it’s probably one of the most important in my opinion. Go inside any millionnaire’s or billionaire’s home and I guarantee you’ll find bookshelves full of books. How do you think they acquired the knowledge to become so successful?

Reading business books on an ongoing basis will speed up your learning curve and provide powerful ideas needed to take your business and personal development to the next level. Find popular books on leadership, business, managing stress, marketing, finance and industry-specific trends and topics. Start reading early and never stop. By doing this you’ll get the equivalent of a master’s or doctorate degree. You’ll be surprised how addicting it can be to feed your thirst for knowledge and how much you’ll grow.

How do you know what to read? Find out what books other successful entrepreneurs are reading. Join Mentorbox, listen to books on tape while commuting, visit the library regularly, buy a Kindle; whatever works best for you. Set goals regarding the number of business books you read each month, quarter and year. Make seeking knowledge and constantly learning a lifelong habit.

Entrepreneurship is a journey like no other. You’ll be challenged, beat down and rewarded beyond your wildest dreams. It’s hard work, but it’s extremely fulfilling. Take the advice in this article as a shortcut and accelerate your success as an entrepreneur. Looking back, I wish I would have tackled these items earlier. I hope these tips provide value and ease your journey.

At 18, she used to tell me I handled clients better than most of the adults she had worked with over her 40+ year career. But not only did I work full time with my grandmother, I also kept a second job in a restaurant 5-7 nights a week to help pay my bills, since I was living out on my own.

And then, when I was 21, I made what everyone told me at the time was the stupidest decision of my life. I walked away from my grandmother’s business and started working full time at the restaurant. It caused a gut-wrenching wave of emotions through my family. My grandmother didn’t talk to me for years. Understandably so, she was hurt. I had no solid direction regarding what I wanted to do — just a bunch of ideas and dreams.

I wanted to go back to school but I didn’t know what for or how I was going to pay for it. I just wanted time to figure it out — my own space and time to think.

I messed up a lot. I couldn’t get out of my own way and I lost direction for a few years. But I never let go of my ideas and dreams. I wrote notes to myself all the time in order to document my thoughts and get them out of my head. I knew I’d figure it out somehow because a failed life was never an option. It’s in my nature to solve problems and strategize solutions. And figuring out my life’s direction was a problem that needed solving.

So, at some point during my 20s, I stopped believing that I had made the stupidest mistake of my life and started putting the pieces together. In the coming years, I moved across the country alone (more space and time to figure it out), finished college on my own dime, got married to one of the most amazing guys I’ve ever met and started a successful consulting business with him. We run our own podcast together and now we’re currently traveling Europe for three months (more space and time to figure things out).

A couple things I’ve taken with me in all the years that have passed since working with my grandmother: Always, always keep records, take notes and have full insurance coverage. I write down notes on everything: dreams, ideas, phone calls, meetings, events, people, the good and the bad. It’s all documented. Whether it gets shared or not, I always have a reference to go back to. I contribute my success, as many twists and turns as it’s taken, to my meticulous note-taking. If you don’t write down your ideas, thoughts, dreams and hopes, how can you ever materialize success?

If there is anything I want readers to take from my story, it’s this: Your ideas aren’t stupid and your dreams matter. But if you want to materialize success you have to hold onto your dreams as tight as you can, set short-term and long-term goals, work backward from those goals and put in the time it takes. It’s not enough to just dream. You have to sweat out the fears and let your voice be heard as you continue to cross milestones toward your goals. Keep telling yourself and other people what you want and manifest your own opportunities. You will find yourself in uncomfortable situations. But if you don’t go through those uncomfortable times, you’ll never grow and be who you’re meant to be. Let what you feel inside shine by putting in the work and giving yourself the opportunity to be successful, whatever that means to you.

Failure Is Necessary

As an entrepreneur, you will inevitably experience failure. What you must understand, however, is that failure is good because it saves you time. When you fail, you know what not to do. The key is to identify failure, and stop chasing it. If something is not working within the first month, change course. I lost years chasing ideas that the market told me very early on were wrong. The market will tell you the truth very quickly; it’s us entrepreneurs who fail to admit it. Don’t be afraid of failing. It’s the best way to take corrective actions.

It’ll Be Harder Than You Think

I was always taught that starting a business will take twice as long as you planned, and cost twice as much. After failing miserably with seven consecutive businesses, I proved this theory wrong. It will take four times as long, and cost you four times as much.

Don’t Be a Perfectionist

Time is more valuable than excellence. Early on in your business, you won’t know whether your ideas are really the right ones. There is no better way of knowing if what you have to offer has a place in the market than by putting it out there.

I spent years perfecting a product that ultimately nobody ever bought. I would have saved tons of time and money by launching it when it was less than perfect. This goes for your website and logo too: I used to spend countless hours and dollars getting my logo just right — from the color to the font. But a logo doesn’t make the company. See if your business succeeds first, then spend time on your branding.

Keep Trying

It took me 12 years and eight different companies to finally find the right idea. If I had given up after the first, second or third idea, I wouldn’t have made it to where I am now. Make sure you’re in a position in life where it’s OK for you to fail — a lot.

Don’t Get Emotional

When running a business, feelings don’t let you see with clarity; they get in the way of the truth. Emotions can cloud your vision when making important decisions, and you won’t want to hear anyone say anything negative about your business. This immediately skews your perspective and causes you to not think objectively. It makes you deaf to key information, which will drain you of time and money. Trust your gut, not your feelings.

Don’t Ask Friends for Advice

Listen to people who have entrepreneurial experience. Don’t consult with your mom or your friend if they have never run a business. They’ll tell you what you want to hear because they care about you, and what you want to hear is never good advice when starting a business. You need to hear the cold truth about your idea and your strategy.

Sell to Those Who Can Afford to Buy

One of my mentors used to use the analogy, “Why do robbers rob banks?” Well, that’s where the money is. When selecting your customer, go after the ones with money. Don’t sell to consumers who will nickel-and-dime you. Business is hard enough, so remove as many barriers as possible and sell to customers who can afford to buy. It will increase your chances of success.

Break the Rules

Don’t be afraid to break the rules. When you’re small, you may think you’re the center of attention and that everyone is watching you, but the fact is that nobody is, and nobody cares. Sometimes, bending the rules is necessary to save time to prove your concept or quickly get ahead. Once you do, millions of people will start taking notice.