IAM2106 – Business Strategist Helps Entrepreneurs Unlock Business Efficiency

In this episode, we have Amanda Furgiuele, a solo parent, serial business owner, entrepreneur, Amazon best-selling author, and expert in creative problem solving, shares her journey from being a rebellious 20-year-old to becoming an accomplished business strategist.

Amanda discusses her approach to helping businesses identify inefficiencies, her philosophy on entrepreneurship, and the importance of adaptability and understanding one's ‘why'.

The conversation delves into Amanda's personal CEO story, her insights on overcoming failure, and her belief in the power of trusting oneself.

This episode is packed with advice for both new and experienced entrepreneurs looking to streamline their operations and achieve their business goals more efficiently.

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Transcription:

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Amanda Furgiuele Teaser 00:00

So it's all about meeting you where you are because we're all in a different place within our business.

It doesn't matter if you're a brand new to business or if you are a seasoned entrepreneur, there's places that you just might not see it because you're so in it. It's really hard to see when things are going wrong or where they're going wrong. So I love to come in and I just look at your business, look at what's working and what's not.

And then we try to bring it to a place where it's better and not only better, but more efficient.

Intro 00:27

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.

Gresham Harkless 00:56

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 Amanda Furgiuele. Amanda, excited to have you on the show.

Amanda Furgiuele 01:03

Very excited to be here.

Gresham Harkless 01:05

Yes, absolutely. Amanda is doing so many awesome things. And of course, before we jump into that, I got to read about some of those awesome things that you can hear a little bit more about Amanda and Amanda is a sole parent, serial business owner, entrepreneur, best Amazon, best-selling author, award-winning author of The Pursuit of Badasserie series, podcaster, educator, expert in creative problem solving, time management, and productivity.

Her no-fluff attitude towards business and life has led her to start, buy, sell, and mentor businesses across the globe. A fearless and accomplished strategist with over 20 years of experience, Amanda leads with a relentless determination to succeed and guides others to do the same.

And I absolutely love Amanda story. She has that entrepreneurial tendency for a very long time, has a super phenomenal, awesome, all the words I could say story with everything that has led her to get started.

And what I think I love most is the range of different types of businesses she's worked on. I read TV production, Pilates, journalism, commercial fishing, even.

And I had the pleasure of being a guest on her and her co-host show. So super appreciative of getting the return, the favor, Amanda, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

Amanda Furgiuele 02:07

I am super excited to let's do that.

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Gresham Harkless 02:08

Let's get started then. So to kick everything off. I know I alluded to it a little bit.

Let's rewind that clock a little bit here. A little bit more on how you got started when I call your CEO story.

Amanda Furgiuele 02:17

Oh, yeah. Whenever somebody asked me how I got started, I always feel like the real reason or reason I got started was that I was a petulant 20-year-old and I didn't like people telling me what to do.

So basically I had this experience where my boss. denied me what I thought was my right as a 20-year-old. And and I got really mad and I saw that there was a problem and I was like, you know what, I can fix this better. And so I opened a company and I just dove in with no other options. And luckily I would eventually swam to the top.

There was definitely a lot of failure, a lot of trial and error there, but it all worked out in the end. So it came from being petulant and stubborn as most things do.

Gresham Harkless 02:57

Yeah, absolutely. But I think the beautiful thing is you actually did something about that. So many times people can be petulant and just stay petulant and don't actually go and create solutions.

It sounds like you had that fire to be able to make sure not just to be petulant, but to say, Hey, this is why I'm being petulant.

Amanda Furgiuele 03:11

Exactly. No, yes, I was being a little bit ridiculous. I recognize that now as an older, wiser adult, and it didn't change the fact that I needed to make change in my life.

And I was ready to step into that entrepreneurial journey and go all in. And I was so young that it didn't feel as scary because you make a lot of scary choices when you're in your twenties. And it just really worked out that, But because I didn't have any major commitments, I didn't have a kid, I didn't have a spouse.

It was like, you know what, let's go all in because in the end I'm the only one who can do it and it's time for me to step up.

Gresham Harkless 03:47

Yeah. That makes so much sense. So I wanted to drill down a little bit more here, a little bit more on how you're serving with and working with your clients. Can you take us through a little bit more about that, what you're doing? And of course, we'd love to hear about your podcast, but all the things that you're working on.

Amanda Furgiuele 04:00

So I am a global business consultant and creative strategist, which basically means I help my business. I help businesses get it done. Like I help them find what's wrong in their business or what's not working where they're hemorrhaging time, money, whatever, and we fix the problem. So it's all about meeting you where you are because we're all in a different place within our business.

It doesn't matter if you're a brand new to business or if you are a seasoned entrepreneur, there's places that you might not see you just might not see it because you're so in it. It's really hard to see when things are going wrong or where they're going wrong. So I love to come in and I just look at your business, look at what's working and what's not.

And then we try to bring it to a place where it's better and not only better, but more efficient. So you're not working as much or as hard all the time because for years, that was what I did. I worked 24, 7, 3 65. And I thought you know what? I'm going to work and work and work and work and work. And as long as I'm working hard and still working, I'm going to be able to do It's going to pay off, but that's not always, working to work isn't what we want as entrepreneurs.

We want to work to have the freedom or to have the financial freedom or the time freedom and all sorts of things like that. So it really comes down to more than just the idea that we're going to work and then get what we, where we want to go. So when I'm working with businesses, it's about finding what their goal is.

Yes. Whether it's time, whether it's money, whether usually it's both, and we just try to make it happen for them faster because when you eat away that productivity, it can really shorten that timeline. So maybe they'd make it on their own. Maybe they're just fine doing all the right things, but they're not as efficient with it.

So if they stay on that path, it could take them 20 years to get where they want to be. Let's shorten that time. Let's make it way faster so they can actually enjoy what they're doing and enjoy entrepreneurship at its finest sooner.

Gresham Harkless 05:48

Yeah, that makes so much sense. And I think Einstein has a quote in order to see farther.

You have to stand on the shoulders of giants. And I think one of the best ways to do that is there's a quote that also is it's really hard to read the label on the inside of the bottle. And when you have that perspective is too close to what you're doing things on a daily basis.

Sometimes it's. harder to see that there is another opportunity. There is a more efficient, better way. We something that maybe we haven't considered. So I love being able to tap into your experience, knowledge, your journey as well, too, so that you can, see on the outside of the bottom.

But too, you could do that, as you said, more efficient, effective and faster way.

Amanda Furgiuele 06:20

Yeah. And, as a type A super OCD person that I am. And I tend to have what people would consider a more masculine energy, which is fine. And because of that, in my early entrepreneurial years, I always had this like my way or the highway.

It was how I was raised. If you want something done you do it yourself. And as I progressed within my entrepreneurial journey and within my leadership style, I've come to find out there's 1, 000, 001 ways for it to reach a different solution. So one plus one is two. So zero plus two.

So there's lots of, I keep the math real simple. So there's lots of things that, you know, that you don't see when you're in that business world because there's more than one way. And so when you get stuck on this is the way I'm doing things. You miss all those other opportunities. And for a long time, that was me.

I missed all sorts of opportunities because this is the way I'm doing it. And there's just, there's, it's not necessarily that one way is better than the other. It's just maybe one way is more efficient or one way is going to work better now. And you can switch back to the other one another time. We have to be adaptable and pivot in our businesses.

And if we don't do that, it's going to take us a thousand years longer to get to our goals.

Gresham Harkless 07:27

Yeah, absolutely. That's such a powerful point. And we have to really drill down and understand like why we had that vision.

Amanda Furgiuele 07:33

Absolutely. If you don't understand your real why, it's so much easier to get discouraged. But if you can fall back on that and be like, you know what? This is the reason why I'm doing this. This is why I am working so hard. This is why I have to do this one thing. It can make all the days that are not great.

a little more tolerable because there's going to be really, really high highs and really, really low lows as an entrepreneur. And if you don't have a, why a really solid, why not just because I want to make money. That's a dumb why. Not to say that the money isn't good. Money's great. I love it, but it's not really going to get you through it.

When it hits the fan, like when there's times that aren't working for you, it's never going to be enough.

Gresham Harkless 08:11

Yeah, absolutely. Do you feel like that's part of your secret sauce is, of course, knowing the nuts and bolts of business and all those things, but also being able to say that, Hey, we can do this in many different ways, but we wanna make sure that we drill down on what your why is continue to take temperature of that.

Do you feel like that's part of your secret sauce?

Amanda Furgiuele 08:26

It absolutely is. I think that when I'm working with a client, we all have different goals. We all have different things that have motivated us, that have shaped us. We all have different circumstances that have made who we are today. And I, we're, and I want to think about touch on the circumstances because we are not our circumstances.

We can rise above anything. And I think that it's very easy to fall into that pattern of, Woe is me. This happens. So I can't do this and you can have a dream, but if it isn't really set in the foundation of rising above, then you're going to have a harder time reaching it because we all have stuff.

There's, that's a very nice way. It's a different S word. I would choose there's all stuff that comes up and it doesn't have to be everything about you. It's the secret sauce is using that to fuel you and using it to shape a different path because I know that a lot of people when they're writing a book for those people who are interested in writing a book or who have thought just like a tendril in their mind that they wanted to write the book.

One of the most common reasons people don't is like, Oh, who, who would care about that? Who would want to listen to what I have to say? Who has anything who really cares about that? And everybody has infinite experiences that could shape and change the way somebody else perceives their own life. And it's the same in your business.

What you're doing in your business is uniquely you. And if you're doing it authentically, not just copycat copy, copy and paste somebody else. If you're doing it authentically is 100 percent you and what you bring to your business and the passion that you have behind it can have this crazy growth moving forward, this butterfly effect if you let it.

And so part of the secret sauce is really finding like what makes you, you in your business, what is motivating you within your business and how can you use that to build a business that's even better.

Gresham Harkless 10:16

Yeah, absolutely love that. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit and I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. And I know you love these, these are apps, books, or habits that you have, but what's something that you make that you lean on that makes you more effective and efficient.

Amanda Furgiuele 10:28

There's a lot of things I could say here. So I think ultimately one of the things I lean on the most, and it's probably not a popular opinion is. Myself going back to the grassroots of what made me get where I am. I look back on my journey and some of the huge mistakes I have made and some of the choices I have made that looking back have changed my trajectory.

Like I said, exponentially. So when I am in a place where I don't know what to do, when I'm trying to prioritize something, I actually fall back on my own tenacity to get things done. Because when a bird, it's a quote that I mess up every day. I think I've literally been quoting this quote for probably 25 years and I always botch it.

So I'm just going to wing it here, so to speak. So when a bird lands on a branch, it doesn't rely on the branch to hold it. It relies on its own wings. So that's how I fall on my whole life is. When I feel like it can't be done, I just remember I've done it before. And one way or another, like there was some point in my life where I couldn't do it, but then I did.

Whenever I'm struggling, whenever I feel like this is going to be the thing that breaks me. I had that same feeling 10 years ago about X and I've overcome it. So I always fall back on you can do hard things. We can do hard things and yeah, that's my CEO hack is trust yourself because you've been there.

You've been in worse situations. And today, the things that you've been through right now is just a collection of some of the things that you're going to experience in the future. You have not experienced your worst day. You have not experienced your best day. So. Buck up buttercup. It's, this is the real world.

So fall back on yourself, fall back on your systems and trust yourself because you can do hard things.

Gresham Harkless 12:17

Yeah, I absolutely love that. So, what would you consider to be a little bit more of what I call a CEO nugget?

That could be a word of wisdom or a piece of advice. I like to say it might be something you would tell your younger business self if you were to hop into a time machine, or you might tell your client or reader or something. That you talked about in your book.

Amanda Furgiuele 12:33

I thought we, I think we just said it is fail more be okay with not being cool, with not being good, with not with just sucking.

And I always use this example because I think it's very tangible. So I am a really, I lived in Hawaii for almost 20 years and I am the world's worst surfer. I'm Horrible at it. And the reason I'm horrible at it is that from the day I got on the board, the very first time I didn't want anybody to see me fall off a board who learns to surf and never falls off the board.

Even when you're, you just surfed a wave, you have to get off the board somehow. If you're going to crash into the reef and I never felt comfortable having people see me fail over and over and over and over again, because I didn't want to look like a drowned rat out there. I wanted to be like, I wanted to go straight from, I bought a new board to like ripping waves.

And you just can't do that. And so if I could go back, imagine what kind of incredible surfer I could be now if I had just let myself fall and fail and realize that, we all start somewhere. And you're going to suck a little bit and that's really okay. And you're going to ask for help and you're going to get help earlier rather than being like, no, no, no, no, I can do this myself.

I'm, I'm smart. I'm athletic enough. I'll learn it on my own. Yeah, you could, but 20 years later, I still suck because I never, I never felt comfortable failing in front of people. And I never sought the help that I, I had one of my clients owns a surf school. Very good friend of mine owns a surf school.

I could have gotten lessons for free, but I didn't want to fail in front of her. So. I think number one nugget be, be okay with failing, be okay with looking bad because when you get to the place where you are, quote-unquote successful, people are still going to look at you and hate you. People are still going to be like, Ooh, cringe, cringe, just saying that.

So people are going to, people are going to judge you and the more successful you get, the more haters you're going to get. So why are you worried about the haters when you're unsuccessful? First of all, when. Ultimately, you're trying to get successful and gain more haters. So be okay with failing and be okay with not being liked because it's going to make you a better business owner.

Gresham Harkless 14:45

Yeah, that ends up being so powerful. So, wanted to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. And our goal is to have different quote-unquote CEOs on the show. So Amanda, what does being a CEO mean to you?

Amanda Furgiuele 14:56

Being a CEO means being a leader who doesn't get in other people's way. So a leader isn't just somebody who tells you what to do.

It is somebody who inspires a vision and guides people towards that same vision. Yeah, for a long time. I thought a leader was just telling people what to do. That was my leadership style for a while. Not going to lie a while. And a leader is guiding people towards the shared vision. It is helping people see the best in themselves and achieve the most in themselves.

Even if that is within your own company, it's protecting, it's nurturing, it's doing all the things, wearing all the hats sometimes. It's being responsible for something bigger than yourself, whether that's a vision, a company payroll, everything.

Gresham Harkless 15:44

Yeah, I love that definition perspective. So Amanda, truly appreciate you for taking some time out to chat with us. What I want to do now is pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you want to let our readers and listeners know, and of course, how best they can get a whole view to find out about the book, podcast, all the awesome things that you're working on.

Amanda Furgiuele 16:02

Best way to reach me. Two ways, I suppose you can reach me at AFconsultingteam.com or thepursuitofbadasserie.com. I am on those things. And then all the social media, all the tags just go into the command central, and then you can find me from there.

Gresham Harkless 16:16

So we're of course going to have the links and information to show notes as well, too, so thank you so much for doing that, sharing that with us today.

And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

Amanda Furgiuele 16:24

Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. I had so much fun.

Outro 16:26

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO podcast powered by CB Nation and 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.

Don't forget to schedule your complimentary digital marketing consultation at blue16media.com. This has been the I AM CEO podcast with Gresham Harkless, Jr. Thank you for listening.

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