IAM1021- Founder Helps Build Scalable Businesses

Monique Blokzyl is the founder of HeartPowered Business, helping speakers and expert entrepreneurs worldwide to build scalable businesses, so they stop just selling their time, earn a 6+ figure income, and make a much bigger impact. Monique herself is an awarded international speaker, business mentor, podcaster, and published author. Bringing her passion for business together with her love for speaking, she helps you turn your message into your golden key to success. Her business mantra: Speak up. Scale-up. Impact the World!

• CEO Hack: Book- The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz
• CEO Nugget: Don't be shy, boost your visibility
• CEO Defined: Caring about what you do, the people you work with, and making a big impact

Website: https://www.moniqueblokzyl.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/moniqueblokzyl/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/HeartPoweredGlobalNation

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Transcription

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00:13 – Intro

Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, You've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

00:41 – Gresham Harkless

Hello, Hello, Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast. I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Monique Bloxell of Heart Powered Business. Monique, it's awesome having you on the show.

00:50 – Monique Blokzyl

It's amazing to be here with you, Gret.

00:52 – Gresham Harkless

Definitely. The pleasure is all ours and super excited about jumping in into the interview. But before we do, I want to read a little bit more about Monique so you can hear about all the awesome things that she's doing. Monique is the founder of Heart Powered Business, helping speakers and expert entrepreneurs worldwide to build scalable businesses so they can stop selling their time, earn a 6-plus figure income, and make a much bigger impact. Monique herself is an Awarded International Speaker, Business Mentor, Podcaster, and Published Author, and bringing her passion for business together with her love for speaking, she helps you turn your message into your golden key to success. Her business mantra, speak up, scale up, and pack the world. Monique, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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01:33 – Monique Blokzyl

Absolutely. All ready to rock and roll.

01:35 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Well, let's do it then. So I've definitely been honored to be a guest on your show. So I truly appreciate all the awesomeness that you're doing. But I wanted to hear a little bit more about how you got started, what I like to call your CEO story. We'll let you start all the awesome work you're doing.

01:48 – Monique Blokzyl

Right, okay. So, you know what not a lot of people know about me is I grew up actually in Eastern Germany. And I don't know how much you know about history in Germany, but Eastern Germany was the communist part of the country. So, you know, I was actually on the streets, demonstrating to make the quarter walls come down, which happened in 89. But when I grew up really, it was a communist country, meaning that we didn't have a lot of entrepreneurs. Not a lot of people were running their own business, meaning that most people really stayed employed, resources were state-owned, right? So I, you know, again, I grew up with a mantra and you know, even if you haven't grown up in a communist country.

I think a lot of us have grown up with a mantra, girl or boy, be good at school, get a good job, and live a good life. Yes. Okay. Can I see a thumb-up? All right. Okay. Yeah. I think a lot of people have grown up this way. So the thing is, despite the fact that I didn't have inspiring entrepreneurs around me, even as a child, Even as a kid, I was already, I feel like I already had this entrepreneurial gene inside of me. So, you know, at the age of 10, 14, and 18, you know, I was picking out what people wanted and needed, you know, put a little bit of entrepreneurial sparkle on and made money. When I was 18, I already had people making money for me. But I never saw myself as an entrepreneur.

So, you know, again, I followed the advice to go be good at school, get a good job, live a good life. So I studied economics. For about 15 years, I worked in the corporate world, which is good if you know, in so many ways because I picked up a lot of insights this way too. However, and that's a little bit of a, you know, dark side of my story. I was living a comfortable life but there was so much missing in my life And I think I probably tell the story of a lot of CEOs that run their own business today. You know, there's something in your life that was missing that either you felt that there was like this kind of sailing off, you know, what you could really achieve, what impact you could make, what a purpose was, you being employed.

A little bit of a dark side was that while I was still employed, within a short period of time, I lost 2 people who were pretty close to me. So first my friend Michael died unexpectedly, age 46, leaving a five-year-old child behind. And shortly after him, my boss died at the age of 46, leaving a five-year-old child behind. Both of them out of the blue. Okay. And I know that we always ask the question, you know, what, and you know, and we never really take the question seriously until we do. So at that moment, I asked myself this serious question. I was in my late 30s and I asked like, what if I have to go at the age of 46? What do I want to die out of? And it was not out of a corporate job.

So you know, I really asked myself and I looked into my life like we all start digging and say, who am I? What do I care about? What difference do I want to make? And I knew that I wanted to become an entrepreneur. Okay. I looked back into my chart. I don't know what, what, you know, sparked, sparked it for me and I said, okay, good. So I was naive. I thought like, hey, you know what? I've managed a big part of a big business and starting a small business from scratch should be easy, right? I thought I had contacts all over the world, but in the end, they were all employed. They couldn't show me how to do it. So when I stepped out and built my first business, I felt miserable, right?

I think in the first one-half years of my entrepreneurial kindergarten time, I think I lost about 60, 000 euros. And, you know, yeah, one half years of my life. But I learned the 10, 000 ways of how not to do it. Okay, how not to start a business. The good news is the more you learn what doesn't work, the more insight you get on, or the more idea you get on what does work. So eventually, I was lucky enough, I find a mentor and she really got me into the entrepreneurial world and helped me to take a shortcut. So I really understood what it means to think like an entrepreneur, feel like a business owner, holding the whole responsibility of our business in our own hands.

You know what I meant to network, to act, you know, and really to build a business and start making money. So you know like that's when you know things started to take off and the last 8 years pretty much that's what I've been doing. You know, I really have entrepreneurs to really use the power of their voice, to get more visible, to step up, and to grow their business and make a bigger impact in the world. So that's a little bit about my story. This is how I got to where I am today.

06:32 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, I appreciate you so much and sharing that. Obviously sorry to hear about your friends, but I'm a big believer in sometimes things happen in life and kind of redirect us towards that. As you were talking about, you know, you as your youth and not, I almost think that I'm a big believer in binary. So sometimes when you don't have something, as you talked about not seeing a lot of entrepreneurs, sometimes that when you get that taste of who you are and what kind of makes you who you are, it kind of fuels you in the work that you do, it sounds like.

So I appreciate you for sharing that and even more, for all the work and impact that you're having in so many different lives. And so I know you touched a little bit more on, you know, what it is and how you exactly serve the clients that you work with. Could you drill down a little bit more into that and what you feel is kind of like what I like to call your secret sauce and what you feel kind of sets you apart?

07:16 – Monique Blokzyl

Absolutely. So, okay. So the mantra of our business, our business called hard-powered business. Okay. The mantra of our business really speak up, scale up, and impact the world. Okay. So, you know, what we do is we really work a lot with expert entrepreneurs, you know, like coaches, speakers, trainers, consultants, and we really have them to speak up. You have them to sharpen their message, okay, to step out more, get more heard and seen. Like what are you doing here right now, Christian, right?

There are a lot of people who say, oh my God, I could never speak on a podcast, right? Or that's such a powerful way of really getting heard and seen and sharing your wisdom with others, right? So we help them to really feel more confident. We help them to get into more stages. We help them to, you know, to really also sharpen their message so that, you know, it's not only that they show up, but people really resonate with their messages at a deeper level.

08:09 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely appreciate that. And 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 app, a book, or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

08:20 – Monique Blokzyl

The first 1 that comes to mind once you're asking me this question is a very simple one that has nothing to do with business and has everything to do with business. Okay. It's from a race, the book called the 4 Agreements. Do you know that book?

08:33 – Gresham Harkless

I've heard of it.

08:34 – Monique Blokzyl

Okay. So the 4 Agreements is really about, you know, like principles like, okay, always do your best. Okay. If you do your best, you don't need to beat yourself up. If you succeed or you learn, right, we either succeed or we learn, right? Okay. Again, you don't need to give yourself a hard time. You're always proud of yourself because you're always giving your best.

08:54 – Gresham Harkless

It's absolutely huge. So I want to ask you now for what I call a CEO nugget. So that could be more of a word of wisdom or a piece of advice. It might be something you would tell a client or if you have to do a time machine, you might tell your younger business self.

09:05 – Monique Blokzyl

It's always like, don't hold back. Boost your visibility. Show up, take a stand, trust that what you know and do is valuable, okay? And share it with the world. Don't play small, okay? You will always create the ripple effects in the most amazing ways. So use the power of your voice to grow your business, okay? And trust that you are creating an impact. Just an example yesterday, right? I saw on LinkedIn, There was a woman, you know, that was part of a workshop where I gave, part of a conference where I gave a workshop yesterday as well. And she posted on LinkedIn and she tagged me and it was saying something like, oh, and thank you, Monique.

Monique was one of the first, you know, edit and first speakers at a Toastmasters conference to really show me how big we as women can go. That must have been many years ago. I don't even know what conference she refers to anymore. Why do we touch someone's life every time we speak up? So don't walk back, don't be shy, don't hide behind a computer. Okay, go out there, and be interviewed by Crash and other amazing podcasters and other speakers, right?

And event organizers, get your word out there. So boost your visibility. And we are running actually visibility workshops, and visibility programs to really help people to go beyond being shy and holding back to get them to really shine and get seen and heard and noticed and visible so that they can really attract more clients, get paid more, and touch many more lives. So don't be shy, lose your visibility, and use the power of your voice to grow your business further.

10:39 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome, Awesome, Awesome. I truly appreciate that. I'm a big believer in us having gifts and those gifts being given for us to make an impact in the world. So I love that you mentioned that and that you do that, of course. And so I wanted to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. And we're hoping to have different quote-unquote CEOs on the show. So Monique, what does being a CEO mean to you?

10:59 – Monique Blokzyl

I mean, it means so much, right? So in the first place, as you know, our business is called hard hard-powered business, right? Okay. So being a CEO for me means coming from your heart, really caring, caring about what you do, your products, the people you work with, your clients, everyone, and everything involved. Okay, don't take it lightly. Okay, care about it. Come look at it and open your heart to it. Right at the same time. Don't you know, just connecting with your heart doesn't mean that you need to, you know, become weak or anything like that. On the contrary, your heart is actually one of the strongest organs in your body, right? So again, be powerful, okay? So again, care about it, love a better one, love around you at the same time, okay?

Use your power to create concrete results and make a big impact. And I believe as a CEO, it's an incredible opportunity to change the world. At the same time, it's a responsibility. So it's not like what happens within this department is my responsibility, but what happens somewhere else is not. Of course, as a CEO, you're responsible for your whole organization, but I also believe you're responsible for what impact you can make beyond your business. So I think we hold incredible responsibility to really think always beyond and outside of the box and step out of the box and allow others to step out of the box.

Right. So, you know, because I'm also, you know, friends of mine together with me and my support, you know, we created a normal boxes movement to help people to step out of the box, right? Also, one last thing I would like to say, which I think might be hard for leaders and even CEOs, there's always a spotlight on us everyone is looking at us and everyone is expecting to be guided by us. What I really learned is we do not pretend to always have the answer. We do not need to pretend that we always, you know, are in control of everything. Yes, we want to be the rock, okay, we want to keep things together, especially in turmoil times, But at the same time, I think we as CEOs have the responsibility to give people space to create, to contribute.

I think we really need to co-create, being the CEOs, we need to co-create where we are going with our business, what impact we are making, how we are making decisions, how we run our organization, our business. We need to not do that in isolation. There's, you know, I mean, again, I believe in collective wisdom and power. So again, you don't need to pretend that you're always on top of everything, just invite others, and give them space. And I've experienced that so many times. When we wrote a book about you know how do you start, you know, how do you grow your speaking business, we had about, you know, when I just had the intention I start to interview people within a short period of time we had about 150 people being involved.

So the whole process and the whole project became much bigger because we were open and we invited others to contribute. So again let me summarize, being a CEO is being hard-powered. Okay, so come from your heart, really deeply care and also care about results, and use your power and the power of your voice to grow your business. At the same time, make sure that you Take the opportunity to lead your organization into the future, but also to hold the responsibility and be aware of the impact you're making for your organization, everyone involved, your business, everyone involved, but also beyond that. On our society, on our neighborhoods, on our climate, and everything else. We hold that responsibility as CEOs. And last but not least, co-create it. Invite others to shape the direction and the impact you're making. And that will actually grow things beyond your imagination.

14:47 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome, Awesome, Awesome. Well, I truly appreciate that definition, Monique, and I appreciate your time even more. What I wanted to do is just pass you the mic just to see if there's anything additional you can let our readers and listeners know, and of course, how best they can get a hold of you and find out about all the awesome things you're working on.

15:00 – Monique Blokzyl

I would just, again, repeat what I said earlier, okay? Don't hold back. Your voice holds power. Okay. What you know holds wisdom. So again, use the power of your voice to make a bigger impact. Speak up, scale up, and impact the world in a greater way.

15:20 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome, Awesome, Awesome. And people that want to get a hold of you, what's the best way for them to do that?

15:24 – Monique Blokzyl

Okay, so they can either connect with me on LinkedIn, okay? Or they can also I mean, we have a global community of entrepreneurs and speakers that can also join us. It's called the Hard Power Globination and we can put the link actually in, we can add it so you can join us there. Connect with me directly on LinkedIn. Again, also we have a website called monikblockster.com. We are rebuilding our new website right now, which is going to be called hard-powered business.com, but that's still going to be a couple of weeks in the making. But you know, I think, yeah, I mean, again, you can always check it out. Awesome. That's how you can connect.

16:02 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. And to make it even easier, as Monique said, we will have the links and information and the show notes, but definitely appreciate you, Monique, for the time you took today and all the awesome work that you do. I appreciate you and I hope you have a phenomenal today.

16:14 – 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 at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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