I learned a lot from my conversation with Amanda, and one of the things that really stuck with me was her advice to take the time and put in the effort to learn about yourself…. to develop a deep understanding of what you need personally and professionally to be successful.
I’m not the most self-reflective person so this was a really good reminder for me. And it inspires me to share one of the ways I try to learn more about myself and my teammates.
Whenever I start working with someone new, I ask them 5 questions:
- What do you need, expect, and want from your team?
- What are your pet peeves?
- How do you like to receive feedback and how do you respond to feedback?
- How do you like to be recognized?
- What are 1-2 areas you’d like to focus on getting stronger in and how can the team help?
After they share their answers, I share all of mine. This not only helps me be a better manager and leader because I have a deeper understanding of how to support this person but it also helps all of us check in with ourselves. And as Amanda shares in this episode, when we know what drives us, what triggers us and what zaps us, we’re more productive, more intentional, more confident- and ultimately happier.
Watch + Listen to the whole conversation:
Amanda Goetz built her own personal toolkit to develop the skills that she needs personally and professionally to be successful. Amanda just raised 2M in a round of funding to launch her startup, House of Wise. Yet she wasn’t willing to back down from pillars of the business that felt important to her as a working mom. The company has a 4 day work week, work hours are flexible and are driven by outputs and outcomes rather than hours. Amanda leads by example, juggling being a single parent to 3 kids and getting the CBD startup off the ground.
What was your inspiration for starting House of Wise?
I was doing exactly what I had always wanted to be doing, which was leading a big brand that I loved with a big team. And I had three kids under the age of four. I had filed for divorce and I was dealing with a lot of stress and anxiety. It led me to drinking the two glasses of wine at night, which many of us turned to during the pandemic. Alcohol was increasing my anxiety and worsening my sleep. I started realizing that what I was putting into my body was not serving me anymore.
I started to researching cannabis because I am a nerd and I like to research everything that I’m doing before I do it. And I realized all the health benefits that can come from this plant, but it has this huge stigma with the history of legalization, and criminalization, and everything. I started taking cbd during the day and micro dosing THC, never getting the psychoactive high.
My life was changing. I was feeling better and I had more energy. My anxiety felt under control, and I just felt in the driver’s seat again. The problem was, I just couldn’t find brands that spoke to me as a mom. I wasn’t trying to get high, I was just trying to help my anxiety. And so it led me to realize there is an opportunity to create a brand that spoke to women and also had functional ingredients that actually helped. I quit my job in the middle of the pandemic when I realized all my friends were reaching new lows that I hadn’t seen before and I want I truly just wanted to help them.
What does self care look like for you?
Self-care to me, is rooted in the freeing of guilt and that is a work-in-progress. But in order to free myself of guilt, I have to make everything intentional in my life. Intention to me means I am very conscious about the choices I’m making. That means if I am working and not with my kids, I’m making that choice. I try o give all of my attention to the thing that’s in front of me, whether that is work or family. When you draw intention to it, that frees yourself of the guilt because you’ve now said- this is what I’m doing and I’m going to give it a hundred percent.
How are you creating the culture at House of Wise?
We are taking a whole new approach to corporate culture. We are only about 30% synced culture and the rest is a-sync. We are a four-day work week. We allow for complete acknowledgement that you have multiple roles in life. And so we have core working hours which are school hours and then you can get the rest of your work in your own time. The culture is based on very clear outcomes, and operational excellence. If you don’t know what you’re working on and why it’s important, and what goals you’re being measured against, you can’t do any of this, right?
We really work on creating a culture of trust and empathy. Many corporate cultures try to remove all the emotion because they believe that it conflates and distracts. But what I’m finding is when you actually make space for empathy and emotion, it actually increases velocity.
Bridget Garsh
Co-founder & COO
Bridget is mom to two little boys, Hudson and Brooks, and a champion of working moms everywhere. NeighborSchools itself was borne out of Bridget’s challenge to find high-quality yet affordable child care, and the realization that so many parents struggle with these same issues every day.
Read more from Bridget, follow her on IG, and check out her new series, Work Like a Mother.
