She's That Founder: Business Strategy and Time Management for Impactful Female Leaders

040 | Scale Your Business Now: Overcome Overwhelm & Boost Efficiency for Female Founders

• Dawn Andrews • Episode 40

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In this episode we're diving into a goldmine of organizational wisdom with the guru of getting-it-together, Wendy Ellin. She's not just rearranging your pens and papers; she's reshaping your entire approach to running your business. 

Imagine transforming your chaotic, paper-strewn hellhole into a zen den of efficiency—Wendy's got the secret sauce. And it's not about working your fingers to the bone; it's about smart systems that spark joy and breed productivity. We're peeling back the layers on why your desk looks like a disaster zone and how to flip that script. 

Wendy's not just your guide to a tidier inbox; she's the mentor you never knew you needed, turning your work life from a source of stress to a wellspring of satisfaction. Buckle up, because this episode is a game-changer for any business owner who's ever felt buried under a mountain of unsorted papers and endless to-do lists.


In this episode, Wendy and I discuss

  • How to scale your small business by transforming chaotic workspaces into models of organization and productivity.
  • Systems that not only streamline your business processes but also infuse the joy and efficiency crucial for scaling your small business.
  • The psychological barriers to organization in small businesses and how overcoming these can be a game-changer for growth.
  • Practical, scalable solutions customized for your small business to ensure your growth is sustainable and manageable.
  • Taking charge of your small business growth, reducing stress, and finding greater satisfaction as you scale your enterprise.


This episode at a glance:

[02:11] It's one thing to love what you do and it's another to love the way you do it 

[08:29]  Piling is not an option any longer. Cause if you let it be your option, it's gonna be your one and only option. 

[12:36]  It just makes me want to cry hearing the story of this woman who was buried under piles and now she's sitting in a beautiful space that she's proud and excited to invite people into.

[21:47] I have a core value that speaks to who I am and the way I live my life, and that's reliability. And so I'm never going to tell you I can do something if I can't do it.

[31:20] Get rid of everything you like. Because that's what gets you in trouble to begin with. You see it, you like it, you buy it. We're consumers, we're consumed with consuming. You like it, so you buy it. But it doesn't really make you look good. 


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Want to increase revenue and impact? Listen to “My Good Woman” for insights on business strategy and female leadership to scale your business. Each episode offers advice on effective communication, team building, and management. Learn to master routines and systems to boost productivity and prevent burnout. Our delegation tips and business consulting will advance your executive leadership skills and presence.

My Good Woman
Ep. 40 |  Scale Smart: Organize Your Way to Success with Wendy Ellin

Dawn Andrews:

Have you ever felt like your business is running you instead of the other way around? That every day, despite your best efforts, it ends in a muddle of unfinished tasks and missed opportunities. What if I told you today's guest has the secret to flipping that script completely? Get ready to find out how.

Hello friends! Welcome to my good woman, the podcast for new and future female leaders. I'm your host, Dawn Andrews, a happily married hockey mom and the founder and CEO of Free Range Thinking Business Strategy Consulting. Grab a seat at the table with me each week for candid conversations. with culture shifting, glass ceiling busting, trailblazing women leading impactful enterprises.

We discuss what makes them tick, how they get it all done, and actionable strategies to help you lead with confidence and grow the visibility, reach and revenue of your business. We're classy ladies, but we don't bleep the swear words. Listener discretion is advised.

Imagine this. Your desk is a mountain of unsorted papers. Your email, a labyrinth of unread messages and your mind a whirlwind of unfinished tasks. Now picture a world where every paper has its place, each email is efficiently categorized. And your thoughts are as orderly as a well-oiled machine. Sound like a dream. Well today's episode of my good woman, turns that dream into a tangible reality. I'm Dawn Andrews. 

And in this episode, we dive deep with organizational guru, Wendy Ellin. Wendy isn't just any expert. She's a master of transforming chaos into clarity, especially for the overwhelmed business leader and friends, she has been up in my office. Her unique approach isn't about working harder. It's about systems that bring joy and efficiency to every aspect of your work. So, whether you're a CEO struggling to find your desk under the paperwork. Or a founder who's to do list, never seems to end this conversation is your first step towards a revolutionized workspace. 

Trust me, you don't want to miss the wisdom Wendy is about to unfold. Get ready to take notes. And let's embark on a journey to not just love what you do, but love how you do it. Enjoy my conversation with Wendy Ellin.

 Dawn Andrews: Hello, Boo. This is my girl, Wendy Ellin today on the my good woman podcast. I'm so glad that you're here. 

 Wendy Ellin: I'm so glad to be here.

 Dawn Andrews: For those of you that are listening, this is a, one of those hang out with your bestie moments. And Wendy and I have been besties for I think it's 10 years Wen, right? I'll let her tell you how we met cause it's pretty fun. We're having this conversation with each other mere moments before we get together for one of our off sites that we do to plan and be business friends and business owners together. So welcome my love. It's good to have you here.

Wendy Ellin : Good to be here. It's so good to be doing this the week that I get to see you in person in a couple of days.

Dawn Andrews: I know it's very good. Why don't we back it up? Tell them a little bit about yourself, what's up to Wendy in the world?

Wendy Ellin: I am up to... Let's just say this, I care deeply about people not only being successful, but enjoying the ride along the way.

Dawn Andrews:  Love what you do and love the way you do it is the way you've said it to me. 

Wendy Ellin: Yup it's just not, it's one thing to love what you do and it's another to love the way you do it, and I'm all about the way, the how. Not the who are you working for, not the what do you do, not the where do you do it from. But the how, really makes a difference and it's not a conversation most people have.

 Dawn Andrews: So how did you how did you get started in that conversation of love what you do and the way you do it?

Wendy Ellin: Oof, let's go back to when I was five years old. 

Dawn Andrews: We'll go way back people. Here we go

Wendy Ellin: I come from a blended family. So my mother had two kids and she got divorced and she married a man who lost his wife and he had three kids. And overnight I went from the youngest of two to the middle of five. Like literally overnight. I like literally got on a train and got off the train and moved into a bedroom with someone else that I called my sister for the rest of my life. 

Dawn Andrews: Yeah, that's a big change.

Wendy Ellin: It's a big change and at the time my mother was 28 years old and she had 5 kids ages 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7. Like it doesn't get any crazier than that. It didn't get any crazier than that. And because of that, I was raised with a lot of rules, and a lot of chaos, and a lot of overwhelming energy that this wasn't my thing. So I knew early on chaos wasn't going to be my jam. At all.

And then I grew up and I went into corporate America and I saw how most of the world was chaos. Everybody was swirling around and they were overwhelmed and they couldn't find things and they were always late and they never delivered their word and it was just like one thing after the other.

 And I wasn't judgmental as much as I was curious. Why were these people having such a hard time getting this job done? But I wasn't. Why? Why were they swirling in this and I wasn't? What was I missing? And as it turns out, it was what were they missing? What did they not have that I had? It was really what I didn't have. I didn't have any chaos. Because I had one thing that I think was the game changer, and that was I had systems.

Dawn Andrews: Nice.

Wendy Ellin: I had systems for how I lived my life. Because I knew that if I did it, and I followed it, it would work, and I wouldn't have stress. So I literally looked at the way other people operated in this crazy world of radio sales, which I was in for many years, 100 percent commission.

So I had to sell. It was like, that was putting food on my table. And I was driven by it, so that was easy. And I did it, but I did it without having to work that hard, I just worked smart. I know the old saying, why would you want to work hard when you can work smart? But there really is something to it. 

Dawn Andrews:  What do you think is the inroad to that Wendy, coz I was just having a conversation with Frank today about feeling like I am all over the place again, doing too many  things, not getting the things done that I think are most important to me and my business. And I have systems, I have ways that I decide to do or not do things, I have a decision making process; how do people know that a system is needed and how do they know a system's gonna work? 

Wendy Ellin: How do you feel? 

Dawn Andrews: Yeah. 

 Wendy Ellin: How do you feel?  Everything always comes down to what things make us feel. It always comes down to that, no matter what. Everything in life boils down to one thing and one thing only. How does it make us feel? What does that feel like when you take something on and then right away, the minute that person walks away, you go, "Oh, I shouldn't have done that. There's no way I'm going to get to that. Now what do I do?". It's stop saying yes to everything when you know it doesn't serve you well. But you don't go to, "Oh, before I say yes to that, let me think about it. Does that serve me well? "And if you did, you might not say Yes, to that. Right? 

 It's so getting realistic about what you can get done as a human being in 24 hours, which nobody even thinks about. They don't think about how long it takes to get things done. They don't think about how long it takes to get places. They think because there's a number on a calendar that doesn't have something next to it, it's fillable.

 It doesn't all have to be fillable I got two things done today. Two. I only had two things I had to do today. Really important things. I spoke at an event this morning, and I had to get there, and it was 45 minutes each way. And then I have, I'm doing this. But if I do nothing else for the rest of the day, I was super productive with only two things.
Why do people think that they have to get ten things off their list to feel productive? 

Dawn Andrews: Well, because they've said yes to all the things that added the 10 things. So then, yes, they do have to get 10 things off the list.

Wendy Ellin: If they want to honor their word, and I want them to be that in the world, right? It's who do you want to be in the world is number one. Looking at what your core values are. And then, are you living in alignment with them? My core value, Dawn Andrews, and you know this about me, I am reliable.

I do what I say I'm going to do. But in order to be reliable, I've got to be a planner. So when someone asks me to do something, I have to immediately go to what's realistic. Can I tell them I can get it done today? Am I willing to get it done today? Or do I say, you know what, I promise you'll get it by Friday and then deliver it on thursday?

So I always say, this is really interesting, it's a great question, when I did some research to find out how many people in the world had MBAs, it was mind boggling. How many people go for that MBA because that MBA get them a job at a certain level and a certain income. But what I say I have, which is nothing anywhere near an MBA, but I think is way more important, is an MSA.

 And that's a degree in mindset, systems, and accountability. When you have all three of them together, when you stop and decide, Okay, I need to be a little more intentional about the way I operate. I'm going to focus on this. I'm not going to just walk into my office and autopilot that notepad that I have that I just came from a meeting from, right?I'm not going to take this stack of paper and just drop it. That's what autopilot means. You're automatically piling it. Okay? And you say to yourself, Okay, what's the smartest way to do this so that I can find it the easiest when I need it next? Immediately your brain's going to go to the decision, the system that we set up.

 So I literally did this the other day with the general counsel of Home Depot. On a Sunday, I went to her office, and she and I worked together for four hours. Cause I walked in there, and I can show you the before and after pictures, piles everywhere. And I said, here's the thing, the first thing we need to get is, pile is cancer.

 It's a disease, it's not an option. It's not an option in my life, unless it happens. Piling is not an option any longer. Cause if you let it be your option, it's gonna be your one and only option. Okay, that's number one. Piling isn't an option. Number two, I'm going to call you at the end of every day and I'm going to ask you if there's any piles on your desk and you're going to want to tell me the truth. Okay? 

Dawn Andrews: So just for everybody listening, my camera is cut in real tight so you can only see my face and the wall of CDs behind me, Wendy knows what's in this office y'all and though piling is not an option, let's just say I'm flexible with that option sometimes.

Wendy Ellin: But here's the deal with this kind of stuff, you've got to take no prisoners. You're not going to use a pile as an option . And when you don't use a pile with an option, you use the other options, but you got to set it up. You got to have a system that works, and you got to have a system that's in place. So I literally come in and I set up a paper system. Now remember, not, the whole world is not dealing in paper anymore. And I always say, you're either paper, you're either technology, or you straddle both worlds. I straddle both worlds. I have a mixture of paper. Here's four pieces of paper right here that I was on, working on, right when I got on the call. Other than that, my paper is relegated to one little box. That's it. If it doesn't fit in that box, it doesn't stay . So the question is, do you have a system, a fail safe system, for ensuring that piling isn't an option? 

Dawn Andrews: Once you have that set up, so there may be folks that just don't even know how to build that system and design it. So you help them and train them or offer them the courses that you have so that they can learn how to set up those systems. But everything that you're describing to me requires deciding right? And sometimes people can get overwhelmed just from decision making.

Wendy Ellin: Yeah. Or they don't make a decision at all. 

Dawn Andrews: Yeah exactly. Either they don't make a decision have to make too many of them and it wears a person down. And so that's when you start falling off of the system that you create, how do you help people with that decision making support?

Wendy Ellin: Here's the thing, you make the decisions easy. I'm not giving you one of 17 decisions. I'm giving you one of two. Okay? 

Dawn Andrews: Just like my kids. You, here's your two dinner options.

Wendy Ellin: One or the other, right? Or the last one is starve. Okay. I got that. See, that's how I was raised. I didn't have two decisions. It was either you eat this or you starve. Pick your choice, okay? And my thinking was, if I starve, could you let me out of the table quicker than normal? I was, that's what I was hoping for. And that, you don't get excused until everyone's done. Here's the thing, Dawny, everything that comes into our life only falls into one of two categories. Okay? So you only have two choices. and they are something I need to do versus something I need to save. Dawn, Unless it's trash, it's only one of two categories.

Every email you get is only something you need to do or something you need to save. Every piece of paper that the mailman delivers is either something I need to do, pay a bill, respond to an invitation, or something I need to save, a life insurance policy that goes in. That's it. When you narrow it down to only having these two choices, when things come into your life, no matter how they come in, you're making the choice.

It's either a to do or a to save, and it goes in the to do place or the to save place. But you've got to get, it's got to be this simple that people can stick with it long enough to reap the benefits. And that's what I did with Teresa in her office on Sunday. We set up a to do system and a today system. We put everything in her piles into the system if it didn't go in the trash. And I walked out of there and she's like, Oh my God, this never could have happened without you doing this. But that's not it.

Now I've got to stay on top of her. It's accountability. It's checking in with her and saying, Tell me how it's going. What's going wrong? What are you not doing? Why are you not doing that? And then her assistant, if you have anybody in your life to delegate to, that's your accountability partner. And now, I always believed that a well organized office deserves fresh flowers. So she got fresh flowers in the mail yesterday and then I said to her, now that your office looks so pretty, invite everybody in to show them what you did. You deserve, you should be proud of this work.

Dawn Andrews: Oh my God, it just makes me want to cry hearing the story of this woman who was buried under piles and now she's sitting in a beautiful space that she's proud and excited to invite people into, that I'm sure has her brain feeling less stressed, worried, concerned about whatever is hiding in those piles that she needs to take care of.

Wendy Ellin: And this is the woman who bought this program from me, this 3P Academy for 200 of her attorneys in January. It is now September, almost October, and she never got into the program. And I went in there and I did it, I did this one, two, three, we're going to change your life. Now all of a sudden she's Oh my God, if you could do this for me, what's in that, what else is in that program I could learn

Dawn Andrews: Yeah.. 

Wendy Ellin: She's like, seriously, it was such a life changing experience. And it was like, and I said, you know why? Because I said I'd do it on a Sunday. Because she wasn't going to do it for me during the week. 

Dawn Andrews: This brings me back to one of the conversations you and I had a while ago about the subject of tolerations. What is it that has people sit in the piles, and I get that part of it is their decision making and then also having a  system. Why the piles are there and why they've gotten as big as they've gotten. But we talked about this idea of tolerations the things that we let just sit and  lightly annoy us or work in the background or annoy us in a big way that we don't take on what. So describe the idea of a toleration and what you see most often in the corporate environment or in a work environment  that people are tolerating. So what is a toleration?

 Wendy Ellin: It's when you're willing to stand for something that you know isn't good for you. Like you tolerate bad eating. You're doing it. No one's shoving food in your mouth. But you're tolerating the lack of control. For me, it's lack of control. I can go off the rail. We're talking about what we're going to have for food this weekend. Trust me when I tell you, I have thought about the bag of black licorice, several times. I'm not going to lie. And you know if I get that bag of black licorice, that sucker's gone before I even get out of the car. What am I tolerating that I'm willing to keep tolerating in my life?

Do I need to get 20 pounds heavier and then all of a sudden nothing in my closet fits me for me to say, Okay, I'm done. I surrender. Like, how much more are you willing to lose a client? Are you willing to lose a big sale? Is something willing to fall through the cracks that you're mortified about? You've got to decide for you, but here's the thing, we all have a level of what we're willing to tolerate, number one. And number two, a lot of the reason why people tolerate clutter and chaos and overwhelm is, there's two reasons.

Number one, they don't know how to live any other way. They don't know how to live any other way. They've never been taught those skills. There's no role model for them of living another way. But number two, and more importantly, there's a lot of shame that comes with that . People are really uncomfortable about raising their hand and saying, Hey, I'm a mess. Because that makes you look like a bad person. Are you kidding me? Just if you could let go of the shame and the judgment around it, because nobody really cares. When someone says to me, I'd love to have you for dinner, but you can't see my house. My first thing is, I don't care, it's your house, not mine. I'll come to your house for dinner, if you want me to, I'm happy to. And I won't judge you because it's your house. You gotta let go of the shame and the fear, all stuff around why you're living this way. 

 Dawn Andrews: How often when you're working with your clients, do you find that you're in a psychological conversation about that? That the stories about their history and how they grew up and their choices and what they think about themselves and about their situation, does that come up often in your conversations?

Wendy Ellin: Yeah, and we talk , we talk it through, and part of it's just needing, having someone to talk to. I had a really interesting conversation this morning with my client that I went and spoke to. I spoke to RHEEM, R H E E M. They make heaters and air conditioning, HVAC stuff. And they have a corporate office here, and I spoke to their 47 legal departments, maybe just the leaders of the legal department, okay?

 And I said to the main guy, Scott, who's the general counsel. Scott, I want to ask you a question, I'd love it if you would just be honest with me. In front of his group, he said, sure, anything. I said, you're sitting right now in the room with forty seven lawyers, people who work directly with you and have for some time now, because I ask people how long they're there, one of them is seventeen years, and one guy is eleven years, says something about the company.

I said, do you have any idea who amongst this crowd you are sitting in front of has any kind of challenges around organization? He said, no. I said, so you don't know what you don't know. But if you knew, Scott, that there were seven people sitting behind you in this room that had a challenge with being organized, would you want to help them? He said, hands down, of course. And I said, that's what we're dealing with now in the world. Your people who are behind you that might be disorganized are not raising their hands saying, help me, please, I'm a mess. They don't go to that. That conversation doesn't come up. And if you're being asked if you're organized when you get interviewed, you're not going to say no because then you're not getting the job.

So there's a serious issue here of people in the work world, no matter what you do, even entrepreneurs who, look, I have the other problem of being an entrepreneur. I'm really organized and I have those skills. I have no idea how to run a business. I never took a class on running a business. I know what I'm good at. I know what my gift is. I know I can solve a problem that somebody has. That's where it stops, right there. And you know that about me. When people can just get, and I looked at this group today and I said, you guys, let me just say this. I couldn't do what you do. I don't have a lawyer brain. I don't have a studying brain. I couldn't have passed the bar. But I could do what I do. We're all good at something and not good at something else, so why not get help in the thing that you need help with? 

If I didn't have a team or people to help me with the many different parts of my business, I'd be working for RHEEM. I  wouldn't be working for myself.

Dawn Andrews: Yeah. For sure.

Wendy Ellin: I think people need to let go of the fact that, oh my god, I'm disorganized and how am I going to get help? Who's going to help me? Who does this type of thing? Where is there help out there for someone to really show me how to live differently?

Dawn Andrews: I'm loving this conversation, Wendy, because this is one of those areas that is foundational, that affects every aspect of a business and their lives, there's been a lot of talk lately about soft skills and how important they are to a business because people will hire when it's revenue generating. They're excited to hire sales people that have good sales skills because it can relate to a revenue line, or they'll hire people in marketing and get excited about marketing they can see that when they put the messages out, that when they build more visibility, that more leads and more customers come in the door. 

But when it comes to how organized the person is, how good they are at building relationships and how, and communication, how they can create, and influence company culture. Those conversations are a little more quiet, and I feel like this one is even in line behind those. Because, like you said, there's so much shame around it, and if people realize that help is totally available. There are options to be able to learn these skills or to get support with these skills. I can't even imagine how that would transform  the experience of work for individuals and then for a company as a whole when they get that kind of support.

Wendy Ellin: Oh, yeah. I said to Scott, can you imagine if not only your legal team, but the entire company had the same, we're all on the same systems, we're all thinking the same way? That's a culture shift. When you guys cannot feel bad about saying, we talk about, we did a lot of talk about interruptions.

Somebody literally said that, I actually posted this on social last week, someone said to me, do you have a minute? And I'm like, time out, Let's talk about that. This is a great teaching moment. When someone asks me if I have a minute, I have two responses to that, and they're always the same. The first one is it really a minute, because most times it's never just a minute.

 But more importantly, I will say, you know what Dawn, I have a minute, give me 30 minutes. I'm in the middle of doing something right now, if you want my minute right now, you've got 1 percent of my attention, but if you give me 30 minutes, you've got 100 percent of my attention, but everybody's afraid they think they're gonna be the bad guy by doing this.

But what if you had an organization where everybody knew that was the way you operated, right? That's the MO in the company. Don't just say, sure I do, and then get off track and waste an hour. We had this whole conversation. I won't even get into it over meetings. Oh my God, it's just really amazing. And we go back to executive functioning, I'm getting ready to work with a guy who desperately needs some coaching in a lot of different areas and the way I know this is just by the way he's behaving with me in the conversation of coaching with him. 

Dawn Andrews: What are you seeing? Like, what's coming up or how is he behaving that tipped you off?

 Wendy Ellin: Says one thing, does another. Circles back. Says one thing, does another. Circles back. And then here's what I say, he doesn't know that I'm thinking this way because we haven't had the discussion yet, but we're close, we're pretty close to it. You gotta just decide who you want to be in the world, and then you gotta just figure out a way to line up with it. Okay? You're gonna always be what I call swimming upstream when you're not living in alignment with who you are as a human. No one's perfect. I'm not perfect. You're not perfect. I get it. But I have a core value that speaks to who I am and the way I live my life, and that's reliability.

And so I'm never going to tell you I can do something if I can't do it. And if I can't do it because some extenuating circumstance happened, you're going to know it in enough time. But I just honor my word. Because there's a lot of trust around that, and people want to work with people they know, like, and trust. I'm getting ready to do this whole trust workshop with Spelman College on Thursday.
 
I will have done that before I see you. I know enough about you, Dawn, to trust who you are as a human and a friend and a business person. I know you enough to know who you are and what you're going to do. And so this guy that's showing me, I'm saying something, I'm doing something else, I'm saying something, I'm doing something else, I don't take it personally. I don't think he's picked me out of all the people in his world to do this. 

Dawn Andrews: Right. That's just what he does.

Wendy Ellin: And he's doing it to people who care way more than I do. And it's going to affect his job, and it's going to affect his leadership. And, here's the thing, I always say this, I love my husband to the moon and back. The major difference between he and I is that he cares deeply about what other people think of him.

And I care deeply about what I think of me . I don't care what anyone else thinks of me. The whole world doesn't have to like me. That's a big job, I'm not taking that on. But, I'll take the job on of me liking me. Cause I spent many years not only not liking me, but not even knowing who I was.

It's really important for you to sit and think, everybody listening to this, do you like who you are and are you living in alignment with who you say that is? And if not, look at why. And it could be that you just are disorganized, and you're not able to get to things, and you're always late, and then you're backpedaling, having to say I'm sorry all the time for being late, and yadda, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Look, the bottom line is when it comes to being late, you earn your reputation either way. You're either the on time person or the late person. If I say to you, Dawn, name ten people in your life that are always late, you could do it with your eyes closed. 

 Dawn Andrews: 100 percent. 100 percent.

Wendy Ellin: Right? We all could. We all could. That's the reputation you earn either way, and you can turn that around instantly . This guy could be the guy that I really know he wants to be with some coaching.

Dawn Andrews: Okay, so tell me about some other things, this idea of tolerations the things that you allow into your life or behaviors that you allow of yourself that are out of alignment with what you say you really want or who you really want to be, right? What else do you notice in business owners or in the executives and leaders that you're working with, that they're tolerating? So they're tolerating piles in the office, they're tolerating being late or other people being late.  What are some other examples? What else do you see? 

Wendy Ellin: I have a leader that's tolerating toxic environment and drama on a regular basis, on a regular basis and is worn out and basically in a spot where they're really trying to figure out how to handle it. And I don't know how to explain this. There's a mantra going around this organization that sounds something like it's the corporate way.

So the corporate way is to not fire anyone. And the corporate way is to tolerate this for as long as you possibly can and hope and pray that the person that's toxic will leave. Really? NO. You're a leader, you have a responsibility. You're losing good people because of this one person you're not willing to do something about.

People tolerate everything from poor behavior, toxic energy, physical, emotional clutter, personal baggage. I had this boss years ago, it was the only one manager that I ever respected. She worked for the classical radio station that I sold for in D. C. God bless you, Kathy Molloy. I love you to this day and forever. And I walked into the office with her one morning. We were both the first ones there, so the door was locked. We came up on the elevator together. And as she put her key in the door, she said to herself, under her breath, but loud enough for me to hear, it's showtime. And she opened the door . And I looked at her and she said, Wendy, no matter what you got going in your life, if you can leave it on this side of the door and come in and do your job, you're going to have a much better day than if you take it in with you. And I never forgot that. 

Dawn Andrews: What a cool moment you have shared.

Wendy Ellin: Yeah, it was great, even to this day I share that in my workshops and I'll even say it's showtime, right? Like when I'm getting ready to go on stage, it's showtime. Whatever sleep I didn't get the night before or whatever was going on with a sick friend, I got to give it my all. I got to show up as the person I promised I would, as the person somebody is paying me to be. And it's who are you showing up for?

That's the big question. Okay, let's move a little bit past the tolerating. What you're tolerating is who you're showing up as. If you're tolerating chaos, you're showing up chaotic. If you're tolerating always being late, you're showing up with that energy.

Dawn Andrews: I was thinking about who who do you show up as? Tellthe Christmas tree story.

Wendy Ellin: Oh my god. Oh my god. So in the very beginning of this crazy business that I had, I was a personal assistant to very crazy, wealthy, big, busy people in Atlanta. And one of the jobs I had was this woman paid me to decorate her Christmas tree. And I came home that day after this woman, hired me and said to my husband, Oh my God, this woman wants me decorate her Christmas tree. She has no idea I'm Jewish. She has no idea that I've never decorated a tree in my life. And seriously, Marty, we need to talk to somebody who knows how to decorate a tree because I don't know if the lights go on first, or the bulbs go on first, or the tinsel. I don't even know if they use tinsel. It was a ten foot tree.

Dawn Andrews: That's a lot of tree.
 
Wendy Ellin: That's a lot of tree. I come to find out, ladder and all. And I took my six four husband with me because there was no way I was doing that alone. That was like a lawsuit waiting to happen. And we, to this day, we still laugh about the fact that we killed it. We decorated the most amazing tree, the two little Jewish people and their Christmas tree. 

Dawn Andrews: But the thing that I love about that, it speaks to what you're talking about. Like, who do you want to show up as? It was showtime. It was showtime.

Wendy Ellin: You bet it baby, I showed up and I decorated that tree. She also sat there on the floor, we're like, no, move that a little bit over here, no. Marty wanted to kill her. I'm like, breathe, honey. Just breathe. We're getting out of here and we got the check in hand. Just breathe. There are times when I have to and I just don't want to show up. There are times when I sometimes look at a client and go, are you kidding me? Holy mother of God, you are willing to tolerate that?  Enough now, you get, you get what you tolerate. 

Dawn Andrews: So I'm curious, after you've worked with a client and you've done some time holding them accountable so they can settle into their new systems that you've created with them and their decision making and clearing their piles and being more organized, what kind of results have people shared with you? Like what has changed for them as a result of doing the work with you?

Wendy Ellin: It's all across the board, there are people who are, there was a woman from Campowerment. I don't know, I don't know if know you know her, Sarah Aaliyah, who is a lawyer in New York and took a workshop at camp with me. And to this day, still telling me how when she wants to put her hands on something, boom, she knows exactly where to go and it's always there. And that's the system I taught her, right? I have clients who are constantly telling me that they're, it's a game changer that they now have this system for navigate their email inbox. Nobody showed us how to navigate our inbox. They just turned us on to email and all of a sudden, boom, we have 15, 000 emails in our inbox.

What the heck is that about? What's down there that you can't see, right? People who have done that, clients who've come to my live retreats in Atlanta for two and a half days where I literally ask them to surrender to me, and I change every aspect of their life, that they're now doubling their income because they spend no time looking for things. They set up their email, they set up their paper schedule, they get focused work done. I, it's unbelievable.

I have a client that sort of came back into my orbit. She came to my live event. It's got to be, it's before COVID, so it's got to be six or seven years ago, who I got on a call with the other day, and she said, I need a system four- and I said, Anne, you have a system four you just stopped using it. And she went, Oh, my God, you're right. It's like Weight Watchers. If I were to ask a room of 400 women, how many of you have been on Weight Watchers? And then I would say, Okay, now raise your hand if you've been on Weight Watchers more than once. The hand goes up. If you've been on Weight Watchers, you haven't been on Weight Watchers just once. You go back to the program when you come off of it and you know it's worked before. 

It's just get back on. You know how to do this. I'm not going to come up with any other more difficult solution for you. If you are looking for difficult solutions for me, I am not your girl. I am about easy and sustainable. 

Dawn Andrews: Okay, to all of you disorganized folks with piles out there, I salute you. I understand.

 Wendy Ellin: So do I.

Dawn Andrews: So Wendy, give us the next step. What's the next thing that we need to do? Because we've decided we, we don't want to be pilers anymore. We want to know where everything is, we want to make the decisions. What's the literal next step? Call you, I think, is the short one, but besides that, what's the next thing?

Wendy Ellin: If you don't want to, if you don't want to call me, that's fine. Here's what I need you to do. I need you to get rid of the crap you don't need or love. Okay? I just need you, I beg of you to get rid of the crap you don't need or love. And here's the key here, you guys. This is really important.

I just said get rid of the stuff you don't need or love. But there's a word missing that I didn't use that's really critical. And that is the word like. Get rid of everything you like. Because that's what gets you in trouble to begin with. You see it, you like it, you buy it. You see it, you like it, you buy it.

We're consumers. We're consumed with consuming. You like it, so you buy it. But it doesn't really make you look good. Or it doesn't really fit well. Or there really is no use for it. I used to go to Marshall's and I would go, Oh, that's really cool. They make a container to put a half an avocado in. What the hell am I ever going to use that for? Stick it in a bag. I gotta have the container that holds the half a lemon for half an avocado, or an onion, or a lemon. It's just stuff. 

Dawn Andrews: Wendy's an embedded shopper you guys. So just just so you know, like the most organized person I know, knows how to shop.

Wendy Ellin: Yeah, and when I shop, if one thing comes in, two things go out. That is my jam.  I need you to realize, less is more. Stop keeping what you don't need in love. Lord knows you didn't marry the person you like. You married the person you love. Make love be the choice or need. There are some things I need. I don't love the spatula in my kitchen, but I need it. But I love everything in my closet. I love everything I stand on in my house. I love everything I sit on. I love everything I look at. Create a world of love and need and not like. And you will thrive. Get rid of everything you don't need, or love. And then you're left with two things, and I said them earlier. It's either something I need to do, or something I need to save. That's it. And call me if you have questions. 

Dawn Andrews: I love it. Woo, girl. Thanks for being real and sharing with me now, I'm all inspired to go dump some piles. Yeah, I'm twisting my head and looking around my office right now. Oh, that's a like. That's a like. That's not a love. That's not a need.

 Wendy Ellin: Seriously, you gotta narrow it down to categories or you'll have a million reasons to keep everything. 

Dawn Andrews: And the funny thing is, looking on the treadmill and looking at the bookshelf, for instance.  There are so many books there that I have kept them and I would gift them again and again to people. I reread them myself, they're foundational things that I love. And then there's, a good three quarters of a stack of stuff that's filling up that shelf that I bought at one point because I was all excited to read it, do it, love it, and it's just one open ended loop. That's the first target, Wendy. It's the first target. 

Wendy Ellin: Seriously? I did the same thing. When we did a room swap and Wait Till You See Our House, because it looks nothing like it did before, I literally got rid of four huge big bags of books. And I took them to the libraries on the street. Do they have those where you live?

Dawn Andrews: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We do the little mini libraries, yeah.

Wendy Ellin: And I spread them across all the libraries in the neighborhoods. 

Dawn Andrews: Love it. Okay, last question for you. Imagine yourself in Times Square all the sparkly billboards, you get the biggest one and on that on that board, you're gonna leave message for women at work. What would you say to them to inspire them?

Wendy Ellin: Oof. It's so hard. I would say, it's one thing to love what you do, and it's another to love the way you do it.

Dawn Andrews: Nice.

Wendy Ellin: There are so many things I'd say. Live intentionally, not accidentally. Just do you. There are so many things I would say, but, the change is in the choosing. You get to choose and when you want the change, choose something different. 

 Dawn Andrews: That one I love.

Wendy Ellin: Yeah, the change is in the choosing. That's a Wendy quote.

 Dawn Andrews:  Thanks for being with me today, Wen.

Wendy Ellin: Thanks for having me, Dawny. 

Dawn Andrews: You're welcome. I'm so excited to mastermind with you this weekend. It's gonna be great!

Wendy Ellin: Yes, it is. I'll see you soon. Thank you so much. Oh, my God. It's so much fun. I could just sit and talk to you for hours. You're doing good work here, my good woman. 

Dawn Andrews: Thank you.

Thank you for joining me this week. To view the complete show notes and all the links mentioned in today's episode, visit mygoodwoman.com. And before you go, make sure you follow or subscribe to the podcast so you can receive fresh episodes when they drop. And if you're enjoying My Good Woman, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.

Reviews are one of the major ways that Apple ranks their pods. So even though it takes only a few seconds, it really does make a difference and helps our show grow. This episode was produced by me and Julissa Ramirez. Thank you again for joining me, Dawn Andrews, in this episode of My Good Woman.