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Podcast

The Power of Consistency: Jeanelle Teves-CCO of Bugaboo

Jeanelle Teaves CCO of Bugaboo

NEW MODERN MOM

11/08/24

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Written by:

Barbara Mighdoll

Jeanelle Teves, Chief Commercial Officer of Bugaboo, sits down with me to share her tools and frameworks for integrating corporate leadership with motherhood, and how she applies her professional skills to her personal life. Our chat includes her daily routine, tips on quarterly planning for family life, effective time management strategies, and the importance of building a supportive community. Jeanelle also provides clear, tangible advice on communication, storytelling, and consistently achieving small gains both in her career and as a mother. Tune in for actionable insights on balancing the demands of work and family.

🌅 Self-Care Mornings

Discover how Jeanelle starts her day at 5 AM, filling her cup with gratitude, reading, and a personalized workout routine before her kids wake up. She emphasizes the importance of starting the day with self-care to maintain balance and productivity. This routine allows her to have quiet, focused time for herself before the demands of the day begin.

“I am definitely part of the early riser club. I love just waking up and having that slice of day for me. And we all know the phrase you cannot pour from an empty cup. And for me, that looks like filling my cup the first two hours of the day before my kids get up.”

📅 Quarterly Planning

Learn how Jeanelle applies business strategies like annual goal setting, quarterly check-ins, and weekly reviews to manage her household and achieve personal and family goals. She and her husband have a New Year’s Day tradition where they set goals and regularly check in to ensure they are on track. This structured approach helps them stay organized and proactive in managing their busy lives.

“It's really a tool that I borrowed from business and that I applied into my household because I realized that in order to have a well-run household, you could take a lot of pages from the business playbook. So setting annual goals, doing quarterly deep dives, and then having weekly progress check-ins.”

🎯 Decision-Making Framework

Jeanelle discusses her approach to prioritizing tasks and making decisions that ensure she remains fully present during family time. By balancing small daily details with long-term goals, she ensures that she is always moving forward both professionally and personally. This framework allows her to focus on what truly matters and allocate her time effectively.

“I always do a scan and I try and make sure that I'm having the right balance of the small details, which is one-on-ones with my direct reports, the weekly business reviews, and the bigger picture, the 12 plus month out meetings.”

🚀 Efficiency Hacks

From stacking her tasks to including her mom on work trips, Jeanelle shares practical tips for maximizing time with loved ones while managing professional responsibilities. She makes ordinary tasks special and integrates family time with her professional duties. These efficiency hacks allow her to stay connected with her family while maintaining a high level of productivity.

“One thing that I do is when I come home from a business trip, I take the kids on my own and I intentionally tell my husband to go take a couple of hours for himself. This way, I get to fill my cup again with my kids, and my husband gets his much-deserved breather.”

🧹 Division of Labor

Get an inside look at how Jeanelle and her husband, a stay-at-home-dad, share household duties and the importance of acknowledging each other's strengths to maintain balance. They divide responsibilities based on their strengths, ensuring that each task is handled efficiently. This division of labor helps them maintain a harmonious household and manage their busy schedules.

“The short answer is, who is stronger at what takes that responsibility. He manages the finances and anything related to our house, while I handle the meal planning and our kids' wardrobe.”

🤝 Building a Support System

Jeanelle emphasizes the importance of finding your tribe and creating a supportive community of friends who share similar parenting stages and challenges. She shares how having a network of friends has been crucial in providing support and camaraderie. This community aspect helps alleviate some of the pressures of motherhood and provides a social outlet.

“I don't have a huge social life, but I do have a couple of friends whose kids are the same age as mine. We get together at the playground or for dinners, and this has become a structural part of our rhythm.”

🌟 Being Seen as a Leader

Jeanelle offers advice on how to be seen as a thought leader at work by focusing on high-visibility projects that align with the company's strategic priorities. She emphasizes the importance of taking on projects that matter and delivering clear, impactful results. This approach has been a key factor in her professional growth and success.

“Find what is the strategic priority for the company and go kill it in a project related to that area. You're going to burn the same amount of energy, so focus on the key projects that are important to the company.”

🗣️ Effective Communication

Jeanelle shares tips on honing your storytelling skills for impactful presentations, emphasizing the importance of clear and confident communication. She believes that strong communication can significantly enhance one's professional presence and effectiveness. By becoming a compelling storyteller, you can better convey your ideas and achievements.

“Learning to be a strong storyteller, where you say, ‘This is the thing that I worked on. Here's what I did about it, and here were the results,' and doing that in a really crisp, emotive way, will serve you well.”

🔄 Consistency as a Superpower

Hear how Jeanelle's dedication to small, consistent efforts leads to significant achievements both at work and in her role as a mom. She believes that consistent, incremental progress is the key to achieving greatness. This principle applies to both her professional endeavors and her personal life, helping her manage the chaos of motherhood.

“My professional superpower is consistency. All the seemingly small things, when added up, become greatness. This principle of the 1 percent gain applies to both my professional life and motherhood.”

Listen to the Episode

Want bonus tools and takeaways?

Connect with Jeanelle on Instagram here or Linkedin here.

Rather read the full interview than listen?

[00:00:42] Hello, everyone. I am beyond excited for today's guest Jenelle. Tevez her tools, frameworks, and advice on corporate leadership and integrating motherhood time for herself and her career have become quite viral on Instagram. For good reason.

[00:00:56] Her brain works so similar to mine in terms of [00:01:00] process and organization.

[00:01:01] And I honestly just needed to take advantage of the opportunity to have her on this podcast, to have an honest, real conversation with her live, to ask some of those questions on topic. She hasn't gone that deep in publicly.

[00:01:14] I'm telling you now so that you don't need to come back and relisten to this episode. Take out your notebook or open up your notes app on your phone. There is so much tangible advice in this episode. I can't wait to hear what you think.

[00:01:27] Welcome Janelle. It is so good to have you here. Thank you so much for having me, Barbara. I'm so happy to be here. So for our listeners, I started following Janelle on Instagram last year. And then I was chatting with a friend recently about this podcast and she was like, you need to meet my friend Janelle.

[00:01:44] And I was like, this Janelle pulling up my Instagram I immediately Was like, please introduce us and fast forward to today. We are meeting for the first time. So Janelle, I'm so excited to chat with you about navigating what we have to do in order to effectively cut through the chaos of [00:02:00] balancing motherhood and career.

[00:02:02] I wanna know how you've taken your professional superpowers and apply them to your personal life. So let's get into it to start. Can you please share a bit about yourself? Give us your elevator pitch, both personally and professionally. Sure. So I am the chief commercial officer at Bugaboo. My background has been and growing and transforming what I'll call female love brands.

[00:02:24] So prior to Bugaboo, I spent nearly a decade at Nike where I worked on new products, launches like Nike yoga. Nike dance, the maternity line. And I quite frankly love the fitness wellness sports space. I thought that I was going to spend the rest of my career there. And when the bugaboo opportunity came along, I like to describe it as really the perfect intersection of.

[00:02:50] My professional hard skill sets and my life's passion, because I was actually just home from the hospital when I [00:03:00] had my son in 2020, when the bugaboo opportunity came about, and I thought, well, what better industry to move into than the motherhood space. I was a new mom myself. I was completely immersed and just.

[00:03:12] feelings of uncertainty and this shift into a new identity. And I felt just such a deep connection into the brand and then also just into the consumer because I was her and that was three years ago. And it's been an incredible fit ever since. Can you set the stage for what life looks like at the present moment?

[00:03:31] Give us like the good, the bad, the ugly. Yeah, that's, you describe it just in totality. It's, it's great. It's extremely thrilling. It's also very full. So what I call my day job is definitely my role at Bugaboo. What I call my life's job, is being a mom to my two kids. So I'm raising a three and 6-year-old in Manhattan, and a typical day starts for me at five o'clock in the morning.

[00:03:58] I am definitely part of the early [00:04:00] Riser club. I love just waking up and having that slice of day for me. And we all know the phrase you cannot pour from an empty cup. And for me, that looks like filling my cup the first two hours of the day before my kids get up. So I talk a lot about it doesn't need to be difficult.

[00:04:16] It just needs to be done. And the first thing that I do when I open my eyes is I try and start my first few moments with gratitude. And they can be small things like. The comfort of my bed or the way that the, the, the light looks to big things like the health of my children and of my parents. I'm really fortunate they're still here.

[00:04:36] So I spent the first few moments grounding myself in gratitude. You can think those things. I like to write them down. It makes them feel very real. And then another thing that I started doing was not sleeping with my phone in the room and I reach over on my nightstand and I have a whole stack of books and I read a little bit of a nonfiction book and that just fills my mind with [00:05:00] inspiring Stories from people, a few steps on the journey ahead of me.

[00:05:04] And then after that, I, I turned to movement. So I do a 25 minute workout in my living room. I don't follow a specific app. I don't have a program. Everyone always asks me like, what, what workout am I following on YouTube? I make it up and I make it up based on. Years and years of going to studios, but I just am not in that season currently of using that time to be out of the house.

[00:05:28] I prefer to be there when my kids get up. It's my personal thing in this chapter while they're still so little. I like to be there when they get up. So I do a little workout and then that's when I turn to emails, starting to communicate with my Europe headquarters. I usually am at this point, I'm making my second cup of coffee and I'm starting.

[00:05:46] To make breakfast for my kids. And then when my kids get up, it's like the circus has started. And you know, this it's like, just get them dressed, get them fed, get the backpacks next to the door, get them out of the door on time. My husband [00:06:00] really takes over from there. He's a stay at home dad and. Really the first block of time is I'm on and then he takes over and then he handles the logistics for the rest of the day when they leave the house.

[00:06:10] Then I can usually do my very quick getting ready routine. I then leave for the office that is not too far of a commute. I think that that's key. I'm, I'm lucky. I know that a lot of things can get eaten up by commute, but my office is not that far from my apartment. And then I'm just back to back to back.

[00:06:28] I, I am. Fool on because if I maximize that time between eight and four thirty, then ten out of ten times I'm home for dinner. And if I'm not home for dinner, it's because I've chosen to go to a networking event or have a dinner with a peer or colleague or a girlfriend. But those times I tried to make them very selective because sitting at home, having dinner with my kids, full dinner table, it won't always be like that.

[00:06:54] Someday they're going to be doing sports and activities and our schedules in the evening are going to look a little different. So I'm [00:07:00] really embracing this chapter right now where we're all home. And then again, between five and eight, it is all about. Family, dinner, bedtime, bath time, and then I'm usually hopping on after they go to bed and I'm, I'm finishing up anything that I've left outstanding at 4 30 when I left the office.

[00:07:19] So I'm usually at that point, pretty tired and feeling like I'm running on fumes and I don't do much productively at that hour. And I'm, I'm really honest about that. I'm, that's why the morning prime time is so important for me. Definitely a very full day and you truly are the productivity queen and I know your, your audience really leans on you for advice in the realm of productivity.

[00:07:42] So I'd love to, to break down some of like the key tools and processes within that. Can you talk to me about how you apply the concept of quarterly planning to your personal life? And I'd also love to know how that process impacts your, your professional quarterly plan as well. Yeah, it's really a tool that [00:08:00] I borrowed from business and that I applied into my household because I realized that in order to have a well run household, you could take a lot of pages from the business playbook.

[00:08:12] So setting annual goals, doing quarterly deep dives, and then having weekly progress checkings, a lot of business managers, entrepreneurs, leaders will have that kind of rhythm in business. And. My husband and I didn't always have this. It wasn't until we had children and we started wanting to do things like buy a home and take certain vacations or have a certain type of lifestyle and that was really like the practicality side of it.

[00:08:41] So we. Have a New Year's Day walk. It's one of my favorite rituals that he and I do, and we'll go get a coffee, and we'll go to a bench in Central Park, and our kids will play, and we'll take turns reading to each other the goals that we've written down for ourselves, personally, and for our [00:09:00] family. And we started doing this when our daughter was one, and it is actually one of the things that we start talking about.

[00:09:07] Even weeks before New Year's day, because we're just really excited to talk to each other about what we want for ourselves and for our family. And so we set our annual goals and then quarterly we do these deeper check ins. It's, it's definitely not perfect. We're not militant about it, but. It's just like, how are we doing taking a look at your accounts and your finances and taking a look ahead at the calendar?

[00:09:30] Okay, what are the types of vacations we want to go on? What kind of birthday party do we want to plan for our children this year? What are the projects for our homes that we can do? And so that has been part of the quarterly tracking. And then on a weekly basis, I talk about this often, we do just a 15 minute check in on Sundays.

[00:09:51] And it's just like a scan of the week. Okay, where are you? Are you traveling? Here's what the kids have. And it helps us do one of two things. One, it [00:10:00] helps us give each other visibility into what each other has on their plate. And that brings in a level of empathy for each other. He really understands. He might not be, In the pitch with me, he might not be in the meeting with me, but he understands, okay, you have a huge meeting on Thursday.

[00:10:18] I got it like Wednesday night. Don't worry. Like I, I will take the kids and I'll handle it. And he gives me that little extra space opposed to me getting to Wednesday, feeling stressed out, maybe being a little bit more snippy. And then this kind of like unnecessary combustion happening, which is. That has happened, but it has prevented this from happening more often.

[00:10:39] That's and that's the first thing then the second thing is it allows us to ask for help from each other So if his cup is empty or me if i'm feeling really tired We can use that moment to just say hey, I need to lean on you a little bit more I'm feeling really burnt out and I want to just preface this is something that has been helpful, but every partnership [00:11:00] and every family dynamic, it just ebbs and flows.

[00:11:04] And this is very much with the stage of our children and where we both are as individuals, this helps us co parent. Yeah, absolutely. We, we also do a Sunday sync and since we started doing it, I feel like it's made the weeks and the days of the week so much less stressful and really do feel like you're working as a team to manage the household.

[00:11:24] So I love that you guys do that. And I want to start implementing this annual New Year's Day tradition. I love that. I feel like we have those conversations, but it's not so structured and it kind of happens over the course of several weeks. So I feel like having like one dedicated day. Would be so effective for us.

[00:11:40] So I'm going to, I'm going to use that. I love it. Yeah, no, it's our new year's day walk. It is, it's one of my favorite times of the year. So, and, and going back to. What you said earlier around, you know, your day, your work days are 8 a. m. to 4 30 p. m. And you really have to maximize the time during those days.

[00:11:59] I'd love to get a [00:12:00] sense of how you actually manage your very full work days. You know, how do you build your plan to stay focused? Just like you have this morning routine, this five to 7 a. m. Like, how do you do that when you're at work? When you have a large team that you're responding to and supporting, you have your own deliverables.

[00:12:15] What are your days? Look like, how do you structure them? I think any strong business leader, and this is something that I learned from my mentors. I think it's the ability to look big picture and have a vision for the, okay, what is the big, like kind of end goal that we're working towards? And then being able to execute the day to day and be in the, in the details.

[00:12:38] And some of the best leaders and CEOs have that ability to oscillate between it. Chasing the five, three year, one year goal, and then not micromanaging, but knowing enough to keep things moving, to make sure that we're hitting the goalposts, and so my week, I always do a scan and I try and make sure that I'm [00:13:00] having the right balance of the small details, which is.

[00:13:03] one on ones with my direct reports, the weekly business reviews that are just tracking, okay, how are we doing to our quarterly, our monthly, quarterly and annual goals? And then also like the bigger picture, the 12 plus month out meetings, am I having, Probably not the 50, 50 equal distribution, but like 80, 20.

[00:13:26] I think that that's a pretty good mix of like 80 percent you're keeping your finger on the pulse of the current year business, but then making sure that you're dedicating 20 percent of your weeks and your time to planting seeds that you can, you can benefit from next year, that three years out, I think that that.

[00:13:46] That ability to make sure that you're balancing both will help you get to where you want to go as a brand, as a business, as an entrepreneur, as a parent, I really take pages from my business [00:14:00] playbook and I apply them to my family. And you do something that I really love for efficiency, which is like this concept of stacking.

[00:14:07] You recently brought your mom on a work trip. So I'd love if you can share some other ways that you've really like optimized your time. Yeah, I didn't even, you, you crystallize that for me, actually this like stacking. I like that I've heard of habit stacking, but I think that that bringing my mom on a work trip was definitely me trying to fit in two really important aspects of my life, which is spending time with loved ones and those people that I.

[00:14:36] I care about deeply. And one of my things is I don't want to just wake up and realize I've missed it. I don't want to realize that I've just worked so hard that my kids are grown up or that my parents are much older. And so I, I try and always force myself to as best I can make the things that are important to me work.

[00:14:55] And I don't make everything work disclaimer. I, the things that I [00:15:00] can within reason. I think another thing that I do is I. I talk often about how when I come home from a business trip, I We'll take the kids on my own and I will very intentionally tell my husband to go take a couple hours and he goes and does a workout or he'll have a coffee or he'll go to a museum.

[00:15:23] And the question that I tend to often get is, isn't that hard for you? Aren't you tired? A hundred percent. I am so tired. And it is really hard for me to take two kids on my own after coming home from a business trip. Okay. So let's just talk about the things that I don't do. I don't do my laundry. My, my suitcase is just marinating in my bedroom waiting to be unpacked for days on end.

[00:15:48] I don't feel that great. I am just off an airplane. I haven't been eating the food that I normally eat at home. So my health is definitely on the back burner. But my kids, I'm so, I miss them. I [00:16:00] physically haven't been with them. I haven't been home in New York. So usually I'll just take my kids and I will go run an errand, but I will make it really special.

[00:16:08] I'll say, okay, we are going to go get groceries and then we're going to go get a treat. And then we're going to go to a playground, all those things I have to do, but I make it into an adventure. And I'm lucky that my children are still enamored by this because of their age. I think I'll still do some version of that with older kids.

[00:16:26] Those are all things I have to get done, but I make it magical. I am excited about it. I think it's fun. I let my daughter pick her outfit. I let my son choose what kind of bakery we're going to. Like I let them have a little involvement and autonomy and what that day looks like. And so I'm kind of killing two birds with one stone.

[00:16:45] I'm getting special one on one time with my kids. I'm making it fun. And I'm getting a couple errands out of the way. Again, not groundbreaking, but my husband gets his much deserved kind of moment and breather. [00:17:00] Any at home parent can say that it's just so tough being always on. I get, I get to fill my cup again with my kids.

[00:17:07] We get some outside time, get some sunshine. Maybe we'll see a friend. And everyone is happy after that. And so speaking of your husband, you've shared that he is like the primary caregiver. I want to get a little bit granular here and would love to understand the setup. I imagine that, you know, you have a bunch of household responsibilities that you guys have to split during like non work hours.

[00:17:30] You know, you just mentioned the laundry. How have you decided what will be split and What that setup looks like between the two of you. Yeah. So there are some aspects of my life where I'm really prescriptive, like the goal planning and the time management. And then there are some areas that I am just flying by the seat of my pants and it's like trial and error.

[00:17:53] The household rules and responsibilities is certainly one where the short answer is [00:18:00] who is stronger at what takes that responsibility. So I jokingly call him our CEO slash our CFO. He manages the finances and the bank accounts and the deposits and the tuition and all of that realm is all him. And anything usually related to our house.

[00:18:20] So any repairs or work that needs to get done or just the maintenance of our home is very much him. I love cooking and I just feel great feeding my family with food that I have prepared. So I handle sort of the inventory of what we're going to be eating and the meal planning. I also really love clothes.

[00:18:45] I talk about that a lot. I think style and clothes are a reflection of who you are. So I handle our kids wardrobe, the sort of changing of the seasons. And then he also does the cleaning, but I think that that's something at one point, [00:19:00] if you can do it, I think that that is an example of a task of outsourcing that it's a really low joy task.

[00:19:06] And if you can afford to bring in support and help in that manner, that's, that's one thing that I would advocate for. And then in terms of childcare, we really do it on our own. We don't have any family. My, my brother just moved to New York city, but Prior to this, we didn't have any family. So we have paid help in the form of a babysitter for when we do date nights.

[00:19:28] But then other than that, like he's really our primary childcare setup. And then that Sunday meeting actually helps us a lot, just kind of divide and conquer any of like the minutiae, RSVPs and all of that kind of stuff we delegate. Or I ask him, can you take this? Or I say, I've got this, but That is loosely how we divide and conquer.

[00:19:52] It definitely takes a village. And, you know, I've, I've chatted with a lot of women who are living in these cities where they don't have any family around. And so they [00:20:00] have had to kind of build this village around you outside of outside of your brother, who, who just moved there and some of the childcare, are there any like tools or services that you guys lean on a lot to kind of get you through the week?

[00:20:12] I mean, I will say that sort of informal thing that I use during the week and that I would really encourage any mom listening to is find your tribe. And I don't have like a huge social life, but I do have a couple of friends. That have hit like this perfect trifecta of their kids or my kids ages. I love them deeply just as women and individuals and we have fun together.

[00:20:38] And so one thing that really does work is that we kind of get together at the playground We'll say hey, do you want to come over? And I didn't have that with my first I didn't have a community around me. I was in the netherlands when I When I became a mom and I just didn't have as much of a circle and I think culturally just kind of this chitchat at the playground and making friends is [00:21:00] very American.

[00:21:01] So I didn't have that. I had that more so with my second and I would really encourage that. So that, that's a sort of, Non paid but very structural part of our rhythm on weekends or at least monthly where we'll get together with our friends. We'll have an incredibly like fun dinner and our kids will just have their own little friendships in the next room, they'll be playing.

[00:21:26] And so that's one thing that I actually really depend on. And when my friends are traveling or they're working, it's, it's like, Oh, I really feel that I miss you. Like, when am I, when can we meet up again? Yeah, it's definitely important to have those adult interactions and just like, somebody that is so in the thick of it with you that can relate to anything, whether they're like validating a feeling or entertaining your child with their child.

[00:21:50] Absolutely. And I'm the biggest advocate for meeting people at the playground. That's how I've met a lot of my friends. And it's good to know that, you know, That's happening in New York too. And I'm [00:22:00] sure every other city you can find friends there as well. So we just talked about the Janelle at home, but I want to spend a little bit of time talking about the Janelle at work because you are clearly a force.

[00:22:11] So, so many of our listeners are actively trying to grow in their careers. And I think, you know, as we get more advanced in our careers, we talked about this, it's, it's more and more important that you are seen as a thought leader. So I want to get into how you created your professional persona.

[00:22:27] Specifically, I want to talk about how you've orchestrated the perception in your career that allows you to really showcase what you're capable of to the board or other executives that have earned you those promotions or given you those thought leadership opportunities. So the best advice that I can give is find what is the strategic priority for the company and go kill it in a project related in that area.

[00:22:52] You are going to burn the same amount of energy working on a project that isn't going to get as many eyeballs as [00:23:00] one that is going to be part of The bigger visibility. So there is usually some sort of annual town hall, or if you work at a smaller brand, maybe this is the founder or the CEO addressing the group and the group can be 75, 000 people, or it could be 75 people, or it could be seven people in those meetings.

[00:23:23] Listen closely and they'll either lay out, these are the three strategic priorities for the company, A, B, and C, and raise your hand for those. And that can look like having a direct one to one with your manager and saying, Hey, I'd really like to work on something related to membership, or I'd really like to influencer marketing.

[00:23:45] I think that. That it has been one of the bigger propellers of my career is zeroing in on the key projects that you're going to spend your time, [00:24:00] energy, company dollar on. And Making sure that you deliver really clear results. So that's one, just make sure that you are a high performer and a key project that is really important to the company.

[00:24:13] And then the second is learn to become a really good communicator, storyteller. And I am shocked by the amounts of times that I've seen People have the opportunity to stand and present something that they've worked on and they come across as not confident, unprepared, mumbling, rambling. And I certainly am always working on my communication skills, whether it's, you know, Recording myself or literally taking a video of myself and then watching it back again, or working with a coach or working with a mentor.

[00:24:52] I'm always trying to sharpen this skill, but learning to be a strong storyteller, where you say, this is the thing that I worked [00:25:00] on. Here's what I did about it. And here were the results and doing that in a really crisp. Emotive way with a little anecdote woven through is going to serve you well When you get those moments to stand on the metaphorical stage And share your work and you can become a strong communicator in the right areas of the business Then that will be an additional accelerator to Being a solid performer in the corporate world.

[00:25:26] I mean, I think being able to advocate and present what you've done is so, so, so critical. And I agree. So many people are not strong in that area because that's not how they necessarily have had to get ahead in their career yet until they hit a certain point. So, you know, what, what would you say are some key takeaways if you're trying to coach somebody to develop a clear point of view during a presentation or an executive meeting.

[00:25:52] What are, where, where should somebody start thinking about? So I like to present in the same sort of formula, [00:26:00] which is at the beginning, coming in with a lot of energy at the start. I also talk about that within the first 10 seconds, people are going to make an immediate decision. First impressions really matter.

[00:26:10] Am I going to lean in and tune in, or am I going to just back up and. Zone out. So obsess your introduction and within your introduction already start to indicate, I am going to tell you one, two, three, or I, the objective of this meeting is to get your input on one, two, three, so indicate to the audience what their role is and.

[00:26:30] They will have an understanding of how they are to participate. And then the middle section is the presentation of the story and of the findings or of the data. I think it's always useful because humans love stories and we're, we're listeners. We're emotive. People and creatures, if you can humanize any data or KPIs with not a long story, but with a little anecdote and kind of bring it to life with a little story, that's what people are going to [00:27:00] remember.

[00:27:00] And and then closing out with in summary, we've talked about one, two and three, just close strong. I like to think of this as this is what people write down in their notebooks when they're getting ready to leave the meeting. This is the headline. If you're speaking to media, these are the sound bites that make it into the article.

[00:27:18] So I think being really crisp and closing strong, like think about the book end of it, open, strong, close, strong, and then tell a couple of stories in between has been a formula that has worked for me. That's such a strong playbook. I love that and I'm going to definitely incorporate that into future projects of mine.

[00:27:35] I think, you know, to wrap up the conversation today, can you share with us what you consider your professional superpower and share how you've seen it show up in your personal life to manage the chaos of motherhood? My professional superpower is consistency. And I think of all of the seemingly small things that seem to not matter.

[00:27:58] They're just like the little [00:28:00] details, but when you add all of those things up, they become greatness. They become great opportunities. They become great presentations. They become great pitches, great meetings. And so I am a really big believer in the 1 percent gain. The corporate word for that is consistency.

[00:28:17] And that's really how I approach motherhood. I, I talk a lot about how I am not there physically. the same number of hours a day as some of the other moms on the playground, but I really try and make them special. I make them high quality. I make them joyful and dedicated. And that's actually what childhood is.

[00:28:39] I do this exercise with my kids at the end of every day. We always ask them, what was your favorite moment of the day? And I can have a incredible adventure. One day I took my daughter to the Statue of Liberty and I really took her from uptown to downtown. We saw the Statue of Liberty and it was like, wow, here's a historical monument.

[00:28:57] And we had to take a boat there. And it was this huge [00:29:00] day, 12 hour day. And at the end of the day, I asked her, what was your favorite moment of the day? And it wasn't Statue of Liberty, actually. It was when she fell on her scooter on the way home and I put a bandaid on her knee. And for me, that really told me that That's actually what childhood is.

[00:29:15] It isn't these like grand gestures, but it's actually like the small moments that you create safety and comfort and love. And that is the principle of the 1 percent gain to me that you just make those little moments matter. And that's what, whether it's your, your children or your family or your team, that's really what people feel and take away.

[00:29:34] I think those little small moments are so achievable too, right? As a busy, busy mom and working mom and making sure that you're focusing on what we would consider those mundane tasks. Like they really do make a difference. So that's such a good reminder. Janelle, how can our listeners connect with you after this episode?

[00:29:53] You can find me on Instagram at JanelleTavis, also on LinkedIn. So you can connect with me there. Thank you so [00:30:00] much for being here. I loved our chat today. Thank you too, Barbara.

[00:30:03] Thanks for listening to this episode of the new modern mom podcast. I hope you can use the story shared today to simplify the chaos of career and motherhood. If you like what you heard, don't forget to subscribe to this podcast. Give us a five star rating and leave a review. Please connect with me on LinkedIn and follow new modern mom on Instagram.

[00:30:23] I know you're busy and I so appreciate your support for my mission to help more moms find work life fulfillment. And I have good news. The playbook doesn't end here. To get bonus strategies, tools, and takeaways from this guest, sign up for my newsletter at NewModernMom. com backslash subscribe. I promise you'll be filing this under a must read.

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