TY - BOOK AU - Reuter, Claudia TI - Yes, you can do this!: how women start up, scale up, and build the life they want SN - 9781119625605 U1 - 658.11082 PY - 2020/// CY - New Jersey PB - John Wiley & Sons, Inc. KW - New business enterprises KW - Success in business KW - Businesswomen KW - Small business--Finance KW - Self-employed women N1 - TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction: Create the Life You Want by Starting Up 1 How Did We Get Here? 3 Why Not Lean In by Starting Up and Move Past the Binary Setup? 4 The Privilege of Being in Charge 7 So Let’s Get in Charge and Lean-in to Entrepreneurship 8 Win or Lose, How Do I Know You Can Do This? 10 Why This Book is for You 11 How to Read This Book 12 Section I: Get Ready to Start Up 15 Chapter 1: So You Want More: Get Off the Fence, Start a Business, and Create the Life You Want 17 The Monthly Mentor Gathering 17 Real-World Experiences and Opportunities 20 Entrepreneurship as the Path Forward 20 What’s Holding You Back? 22 My Journey to Becoming a Startup Entrepreneur 24 What Starting Up as a Stay-at-Home Parent Looked Like 25 A Manifesto for Women to Become Entrepreneurs, and a Playbook to Help 28 Chapter 2: Reasons to Lead: All the Cool Things You Can Do When You’re in Charge 31 A Little More About Sophie… 31 Why a Business Can Give You the Life You Want 33 You Can Change the Rules 33 The History of Gender Equity is Still Recent 36 Legislation Can’t Be the Only Path Forward 36 Chapter 3: Stop Believing Your Own Unconscious Bias: Develop the Mindset and Self-Confidence to Be the One in Charge with Gratitude 43 Hannah at Work 43 Making the Ask 46 A Few Things About This Conversation 46 How We Think and Act is Conditioned 47 How to Consider Unconscious Bias and Self-Advocacy as You Start Up 48 I Didn’t Always Have This Figured Out 51 Why Affirmations Matter (Yes, You Can is a Good Example!) 53 Chapter 4: Your Perceived Weaknesses are Your Hidden Strengths: How to Leverage Your Weaknesses to Start Up 59 When It All Goes Wrong 59 Let’s Role-Play! 62 You Really are Perceived and Treated Differently 63 Goal Setting as a Framework for Success versus Perfectionism 64 Section II: Building for Scale and Avoiding the Traps: Debunking the Myth That Women Don’t Think Big Enough 69 Chapter 5: You Might Have the Next Big Thing: Your Experiences Might Lead to Something Revolutionary 71 We’re All Potential Innovators 71 Seeing What’s Possible 74 Identifying Types of Innovations 74 Why Diversity of Viewpoints in Innovation Leads to More Innovation 77 The Creator of Liquid Paper (White-Out) 78 An Incremental Innovative Sales Strategy That Created a Different Way to Sell: Tupperware 79 An Incremental Product Innovation That Created a Billionaire: SPANX 80 A Disruptive Business Model Innovation: Rent the Runway 81 Turning Reviews into a Viable Business Model 82 A Makeup Artist Takes on an Entire Industry 82 My Own Experience 83 Chapter 6: Write Down Your Future: How to Develop and Use a Business Plan as Your Personal Playbook (and to Combat Imposter Syndrome) 87 Getting Back to Sophie… 87 Standing Up for Your Business and Fighting Imposter Syndrome 90 Making Your Vision Concrete 91 Developing a Business Plan 93 How My Business Plan Helped Me 97 Chapter 7: Tell a Bigger Story: Don’t Apologize for Thinking Bold 101 Is Your Story Big Enough for Investors? 101 Putting the Press Release Strategy to Work 104 A Brief Example 105 Own Your Ideas with Confidence 106 Chapter 8: It Really is Okay to Make Mistakes: How to Plan for Them So You Can Quickly Recover 109 The Others Arrive 109 How to Get Started on the Financial Plan 115 Chapter 9: You Don’t Have to Wait for Revenue to Ask for Funding: Create a Compelling Pitch Deck That Gets Others on Board 119 Six Months Later… 119 When Bootstrapping… 122 Seeking Investors 125 Section III: Lead and Operationalize 133 Chapter 10: Empathy is One of Your Biggest Assets: Use It to Understand Your Customers and Make Your Teams Stronger 135 As Starboard Grew 135 Creating an Environment Where People Want to Work Starts with Knowing People 139 Understanding Your Employees’ Working Styles 140 Little Things Lead to Bigger Success 140 Working Together to Improve Outcomes and Customer Satisfaction 141 Chapter 11: Instill a Growth Mindset in Your Teams: Constant Change and Transitions are Never Easy 145 When You Move Beyond the Startup and People Start to Silo into Positions 145 Building for Organizational Success through Your Company’s Mission 147 Chapter 12: The Same Skills That Make You a Great Mom Make You a Great Manager: Bust Out Your Multitasking Skills as Your Team Grows 151 Sophie’s Day 151 Managing the Small Corporation of Your Family 153 Being a Mom is Being a Manager 155 Dismissing the Guilt of Being a Stay-at-Home Parent 156 How Your Two-Year-Old Honed Your Management Skills Like No Other 157 Chapter 13: You are More Than Your Product or Company: Protecting Egos When Things Change 161 Letting Go to Move Forward 161 Diffusing Fear and Creating Psychological Safety 162 Chapter 14: Balance Life at High Speeds: Make Time for Yourself 165 Running on Fumes 165 My Story (and Cautionary Tale) 167 What Balance Really Means 168 Conclusion: You Really Can Start Up and Scale a Business: You Might Just Change the Rules in the Process 171 Sophie and Jake 171 Hannah and Stan 172 Maria and Jill 172 How Will You Start Up? 173 Overcoming the Scarcity Mindset: There’s Enough for All of Us 174 Valuing Women as Entrepreneurs 175 Find, and Later Become, a Mentor 176 Bibliography 179 Acknowledgments 189 About the Author 191 Index 193 N2 - DESCRIPTION How women can "lean in" to entrepreneurship to create the life they want! Claudia Reuter left a promising corporate career to raise her two young children but realized, when re-entering the workforce, that the gap in her resume looked like a gap in ambition—not a purposeful plan. Instead of leaning into a corporate career and fighting the structures and systems designed by and for men decades ago, or leaning out and giving up income, Claudia took a different path. That decision ultimately led to success in the corporate world and at home. In Yes, You Can Do This!, Claudia shares her own reasons for starting a business and makes a call to action for women to consider entrepreneurship so that they can create businesses with the rules they want and change the playing field for others, making a significant impact in the world. More than a "how-to book" on building a business, Yes, You Can Do This! provides clear examples and practical resources to help others create the life they want through entrepreneurship. In Yes, You Can Do This!, you'll learn: How to develop and share your vision How to deal with stereotypes and unconscious bias How to leverage perceived weaknesses and turn them into strengths How to balance life at high speeds and avoid burnout How to cultivate the confidence to move from idea to creating a company with the culture and rules you want Claudia provides women with an electrifying third career option: it’s not just "lean in" or "lean out," but startup and change the playing field for others in the process ER -