IAM791- Entrepreneur Empowers Black Women Travelers

Wanda is a superfan of Black women travelers. To that end, she's created a Facebook group, a podcast, a conference, and a creative services agency that all center and empower Black women travelers. Wanda tried and failed to leave the States in 2010 to work and travel online as a digital nomad, and for the past five years have been doing that and much more.

• CEO Hack: Being able to tune in to me and focus on the entrepreneur I want to be
• CEO Nugget: Don't be afraid to let go, you are the magic and you can do it
• CEO Defined: Commanding your today and your life

Website: http://ashalbh.com

Black Women Travel Podcast
Twitter: Twitter.com/bwtpod
Instagram: Instagram.com/bwtpod
Facebook: Facebook.com/bwtpod
LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/39fNkhR

International Black Women Travel Jubilee
Twitter: Twitter.com/ibwtj
Instagram: Instagram.com/ibwtj
Facebook: Facebook.com/ibwtj
LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/3etDD0e

Black Women Digital Nomad Entrepreneurs FB group- http://bit.ly/2oM8g8K

Asha Live Breathe Heal, A Creative Services Agency specializing in social media management, virtual assistants, and holistic coaching-bit.ly/ashalbh

Full Interview:

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Transcription

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[00:00:02.20] – Intro

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you’ve come to the right place, Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you’re in search of. This is the I am CEO podcast.

[00:00:29.80] – Gresham Harkless

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I Am CEO podcast, and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Wanda Duncan of ashalbh.com. Wanda, it's awesome to have you on the show.

[00:00:40.10] – Wanda Duncan

Hi. Thanks for having me.

[00:00:42.39] – Gresham Harkless

No problem. Super excited to have you on and hear about all the awesome things that you're doing. And before we jump in, I want to read a little bit more about Wanda so you hear about all those awesome things I was referred referenced to before. And Wanda is a is a super fan of black women travelers. To that end, she's created a Facebook group, a podcast, a conference, and a creative service agency that all center around empowering black women travelers. Wanda tried and failed to lead the states in twenty-ten to work and travel online as a digital nomad, and for the past five years has been doing that much and many things more. Wanda, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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[00:01:16.59] – Wanda Duncan

Let me talk to them.

[00:01:18.09] – Gresham Harkless

Let's do it. Alright. So to kick everything off, I wanted to kinda rewind the clock a little bit here, a little bit more on how you got started. Could you take me through what I call your CEO story? We'll let you get started with all the awesome things you're working on.

[00:01:29.00] – Wanda Duncan

Okay. So is this, like, before twenty-ten?

[00:01:32.90] – Gresham Harkless

Yeah. We can go back. If you had seeds planted before then, we wanna hear it all.

[00:01:37.00] – Wanda Duncan

I grew up a little black girl in Southern Illinois. That's pretty funny.

[00:01:42.20] – Gresham Harkless

A little bit. So we ask for it a little bit.

[00:01:43.29] – Wanda Duncan

So what happened was I was working at CNN in Atlanta at the headquarters, and things were not gelling. I was getting cut on that glass ceiling, so to speak. And so I left. I said this is not for me. There's something else that I could do, and I went to go do some nonprofit work in El Salvador. I stayed there for six months. This was in twenty ten. And then, I was like, I'm kinda making things work here. If I can make things work anywhere, I wanna go to my first love, Jamaica. Jamaica was the first country I've gone to, abroad, so to speak. A lot of black people, like, start with the Caribbean because this was, like

[00:02:26.69] – Gresham Harkless

The cruise.

[00:02:27.59] – Wanda Duncan

Attainable. Right. So I did that, and I was in Jamaica for about three months. And then I got to that moment and the truth-telling moment where it was like I had enough money to extend my visa or enough money to change my flight fee. The flight change flight fee. Yeah. So I buckled, and I was like, I guess I'll go back to Atlanta. And then I spent some years there trying to keep myself entertained essentially, working on some other stuff. Stuff I was happy to work on, but, like, it just wasn't fulfilling because Atlanta wasn't for me, Gresh.

[00:03:10.69] – Gresham Harkless

Yeah.

[00:03:11.59] – Wanda Duncan

So I took off and, well, I focused. I focused on myself and said, I'm leaving. I'm going to do it way better than I did it the first time. The first time, like, I just took too much luggage. Like, I had my condo. I hadn't rented out. I had a storage unit. It was just, like, disastrous.

[00:03:30.50] – Gresham Harkless

Right.

[00:03:31.19] – Wanda Duncan

So I learned from that, and I've been traveling for it's coming up on five years now. It's been about four and a half years that I've been exploring my world, exploring myself, exploring my talents, pushing myself. It's been amazing.

[00:03:47.40] – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, I absolutely love that and I appreciate your kind of expounding upon that and speeding up from the boring little black girl and going into, all the awesome things that you're doing. But I think so many times, I appreciate you for obviously, so many times we have those, I guess, moments in our life where we have that kinda lasting impression or lasting experience. And so many times, we have to go back to whether it be Atlanta or go back to DC or whatever that might be.

But so many times, we don't really ever kinda go back to what that experience was. We automatically think that that's not possible. That's a fairy tale, and we sell so many of those things. But I love the fact that you turned back around and said, okay. Not only am I gonna do it again, I'm gonna do it on an even bigger and better level, and I'm gonna help so many other people out as far as, like, doing that as well. So, I wanted to hear a little bit more about what we can find on your site and all of the awesome things you're doing, the podcast and the conference, and all those things on how you're empowering these black women travelers.

[00:04:45.30] – Wanda Duncan

So what happened was, I'm out and it's glorious being out. Like, I feel lighter in my spirit, and I'm traveling through Europe mostly doing a little bit of house-sitting. And then I say, I want to meet with other digital nomads, and that's people who primarily work online and their location independent. So they travel how they wanna travel, where they wanna travel when they wanna travel. Travel. So I went to Vietnam, and I saw some black folks a little bit. I go to Chiang Mai, Thailand. I see a few more. A lot of black people love Chiang Mai. That's another, like, gateway to travel in Asia. And so I say, I don't see that there's anything specifically for us, and I would like to have that.

I would like to have a group specifically for black women digital nomads, and then I tacked on entrepreneurs because, like, there are a lot of teachers. Teaching is also, like, the low-hanging fruit, so to speak, when it comes to being able to be location-independent, a way to earn money and travel how you want. A lot of the kids, like, our other companies are in China. A lot of the children are Chinese. So I created the group, and I wasn't selling anything. You know, on Facebook groups, usually, it's like a leader, and they have their products and they're coaching or consulting or whatever it is. And so I just kinda sat there for a while. Mhmm. Well, what ended up happening was I said I wanted to get deeper in these conversations.

The intro posts were the occasional question here and there is not enough. So I started the podcast, and it started with a lot of the members of that group. And then I moved on from the group to Twitter, and I found all these really dope black women travelers from everywhere. The group, my group is, like, primarily Americans. So I was finding folks from the UK all over the continent, Africa. And the thing I loved about them was that if there was an opportunity that popped up on Twitter, they would've just been like, hey. I do this. They'd be like, hey. I do this, but then they're, like, 10:10 of my other homegirls who also do this. And I was like, y'all are my people.

[00:06:52.00] – Gresham Harkless

There you go. My tribe.

[00:06:54.00] – Wanda Duncan

Exactly. As entrepreneurs, like, it's really difficult a lot of times to get that word-of-mouth out. Everybody knows, like, generally speaking, your friends and family aren't going to support you. That's just, like, for whatever reason, not what they do. We have all the same friends and family apparently because, like, just like notorious.

[00:07:11.89] – Gresham Harkless

Right.

[00:07:12.30] – Wanda Duncan

They're not going to support you. And then I moved on to Instagram. Me and Instagram, we're working things out because, you know, a lot of the travelers on Instagram that get most of the attention are vacationers.

[00:07:25.30] – Gresham Harkless

Right.

[00:07:25.50] – Wanda Duncan

And is it like you're not in a flowing dress every week? Right.

[00:07:31.00] – Gresham Harkless

The wind is blowing in the air.

[00:07:33.50] – Wanda Duncan

You can work on the beach. It's not always that comfortable, though, honestly speaking. Yeah. So it's just like a different demographic, a different kind of traveler, which is totally okay. Not really the focus of my show. So anyway, I love these ladies. I'm just like, you all are the team. I wanna be with you forever in life. Let's travel, which is something we love to do, but let's also upscale. Let's teach each other the things that we know and how we can get better at our crafts. I like to talk shop. So I was like conference time. So when I was in Atlanta, I did a little bit of event organizing. So I was like, we're going to Rwanda twenty-twenty. It's our year. So it's our year.

[00:08:15.10] – Gresham Harkless

Just in a different way.

[00:08:17.10] – Wanda Duncan

You know what they say? Make a plan, and I will work that out for you.

[00:08:19.89] – Gresham Harkless

Right.

[00:08:22.69] – Wanda Duncan

So that's exactly what happened. We're not traveling, but we're going online, which, you know, we're gonna make that do what it does. Right. Not what I want, but, hopefully, it will be amazing because I'm going to make it amazing. Another roadblock, I told you that, like, teaching English was a way that black women were finding ways to make money. I wanted to try and help with that angle too. So social media management was something that I had some expertise in, and some experience with, and then also branching off into virtual assistants. And then I knew quite a few coaches, from the group mostly.

And everybody's just kinda having a hard time, like, having the confidence, having the ability to price themselves. There's just so much research. You know, as an entrepreneur, you have to do about twenty-seven things if you can't afford to hire a team if you haven't gotten funded, or just trying to do, like, two or three things really well. So what I wanted to do was bring us together under an umbrella and be able to offer our services and share the work essentially. So that's where the creative services agency comes from. Live review.

[00:09:41.89] – Gresham Harkless

Nice. Well, I definitely, again, appreciate you for you know, obviously, one of my buddies from, college actually, he's in, Japan and I forgot what part of Japan. I went to visit him, but he's teaching English. That was his gateway to how he got to get there. And sometimes, as you said, we sometimes don't see the different opportunities that are presented, when we go with it. But, again, when you hear somebody that, oh, they're doing social media management, they're doing this, they're doing that, while they're being a digital moment no matter. It creates a whole entire, I think, different experience definition of what it means to do that, what it means to travel, what it means to kinda be that digital nomad. So I appreciate you for doing that and creating all the opportunities for that to happen.

[00:10:20.00] – Wanda Duncan

Thank you. I appreciate that.

[00:10:22.20] – Gresham Harkless

No problem at all. And so I wanted to ask you now for what I call your secret sauce, and this could be for you personally, other things, that you have, kind of in the fire, but what would you feel, would be the thing that you say things sets you apart and makes you unique?

[00:10:36.10] – Wanda Duncan

It is being able to tune into myself and be flexible with that because the Wanda I was an hour ago is not the one that I was yesterday. Like, I've gone through a whole transformation. Like, literally, I was just like, oh, I'm doing everything wrong. I gotta just focus. So being able to tune into myself and that focus and consistency for so for the podcast, I started it last year, in July. I put out an episode every single week for the last year, and we're I'm about to launch episode sixty coming up on month on Sunday. I didn't know the day of my thank you. But yeah. So but it's just like it's what gives me life. So being able to tune into myself and focus on the things that I want to do, the entrepreneur that I want to be, not necessarily playing all the games that are out there to play, you know, with the algorithms and the hashtags and, like, all of that being on every single platform having a presence. For me, it's not necessarily about that, but where I do show up, I'm trying to show up strong, and being able to focus on that and being consistent as well. So that's my sauce.

[00:11:49.39] – Gresham Harkless

I wanted to, switch gears a little bit, and I want to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an Apple book or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

[00:12:00.70] – Wanda Duncan

I would say, again, like, the tuning into myself part. If I'm happy, if I'm joyful, if I'm loving the things that I'm doing every day, then I'm able to show up. And it sounds very simple, but I think sometimes it's very hard for people to be with themselves.

[00:12:20.50] – Gresham Harkless

So would you consider that to be, like, what I call your secret sauce? The thing might be a piece of advice or word of wisdom you would give your younger business self is really to have that permission within you to say, yes. You can do this or, yes. You can do that, permission to try, permission to fail, permission to succeed, all of those different things that, might kinda block us from where we could

[00:12:41.79] – Wanda Duncan

I don't think that black people are programmed for risk. Mhmm. And understandably so. So giving yourself permission to take a risk, giving yourself the bandwidth and the runway. Part of my runway was, like, financial because that's, like, huge for me. I don't have anybody I could call to ask for another night. So that was part of me taking care of myself, and it's just like, you're doing it. You know how to do this. You know how to manage. You know how to create. You just need to be consistent. You just need to continue to expand. Stop being satisfied with a certain level just because ten years ago, you would have been satisfied with that level. Mhmm. It's it's a whole new you, baby. You better keep reaching.

[00:13:27.89] – Gresham Harkless

Yeah.

[00:13:29.20] – Wanda Duncan

So I think that that's what I would say. There are times when I stay too long. I think we all had those relationships, right, where we stay a little too long. But I was like you were saying before, just attached to where I was at the moment or fearful of moving on to that next and reaching for that next. And so that's just very much part of the hack, part of what I would tell my younger business self. Just like, don't be afraid to let go. Continue to reach because you got you. Like, you are you are the magic.

[00:14:10.79] – Gresham Harkless

Yeah. I want to ask you now what I call, my absolute favorite question which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. And I know you touched on this a little bit. We're open to having different quote-unquote CEOs on this show, so Wanda what does being a CEO mean to you?

[00:14:22.50] – Wanda Duncan

Commanding your own life. Commanding your space. Commanding your vision. Being a leader of yourself.

[00:14:31.10] – Gresham Harkless

Yeah. Absolutely. I love that. And, I appreciate that. I appreciate your time even more. What I wanted to do is pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional. You can let our readers and listeners know, and, of course, how best they can get ahold of you, find out about the course, the podcast, and all the awesome things that you're working on.

[00:14:47.29] – Wanda Duncan

Alright. Y'all I got a pen and paper because, first of all, these titles are long. Alright. So, yes, you can normally reach me pretty much anywhere through the podcast channels. That's where I'm more active. I'm more active on Twitter and Travel Pod. I'm also on Facebook, of course, and Instagram for the podcast. The name of the conference is International Black Women Travel Jubilee.

It's happening on October fourth, eleventh, and eighteenth. They're all on Sundays. And the name of our online event specifically is Rally and Rejoice. So if you want to come and learn about what it means to be a digital nomad or travel content creator, then come do that with us because that's what we do, or aspiring if you're not already. And then also for the creative services agency that does social media management, virtual assistants, and, more enterprise coaching than personal coaching. But I'm happy to make them a referral if you're looking for somebody. You can reach us at ashalbh.com.

[00:16:00.10] – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. And to make it even easier, I should say, if you didn't get out that pen and pad, we will have the links and information in the show notes as well. So just check that out to get the links to everything. So, Asha, I truly I mean, Wanda, I truly appreciate all the awesome things that you're doing. I appreciate the reminder and the representation you have in your company as well. And, I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

[00:16:22.29] – Outro 

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at IAMCEO.CO. I am CEO is not just a phrase, it’s a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes, Google Play, and everywhere you listen to podcasts. Subscribe and leave us a five-star rating. Grab CEO gear a www.CEOgear.co This has been the I AM CEO podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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