‘Not Done Yet!’ An Interview With Entrepreneur, Coach And Author Bonnie Marcus.

The Destiny Awakening Interviews is a podcast with Andrew Wayfinder and his guests.

Every week (sometimes more) we have a short focused interview with an expert, author, speaker designed to bring you powerful insights, inspiration and ways to break free, live life by your vision and values, and make a difference in our changing and challenging world.

Listen to the podcast at: https://www.andrewwayfinder.com/blog/da12-bonnie-marcus

Andrew Hryniewicz
Hello, everyone, and a very warm welcome to another edition of the “Destiny Awakening Interviews”. I’m Andrew Wayfinder Hryniewicz and I’m joined today by Bonnie Marcus, an award winning entrepreneur, Forbes writer, author and executive coach.

A very warm welcome to you, Bonnie. And where are you hanging out today?

Bonnie Marcus
I am hanging out in Santa Barbara, California, where it is 70 degrees, blue skies.

Andrew Hryniewicz
Well, thankfully, we‘ a’re actually starting to warm up here in London. It’s not as miserable as it has been.

Bonnie Marcus
Or as miserable as a good part of the country here is…

Andrew Hryniewicz
Oh yeah, you could be in Texas right now. So what I want to talk about today is Bonnie’s work and her books.

Bonnie is the founder of bonniemarcusleadership.com, and host of her own podcast “Badass At Any Age”. And she’s written two books, “The Politics of Promotion: How High-Achieving Women Get Ahead and Stay Ahead”. And her latest book, “Not Done Yet! How Women Over 50 Regain Their Confidence and Claim Their Workplace”, just came out on March 9 this year.

Bonnie started her corporate career in an entry level position, and worked her way up to the top levels of startups and fortune 500 companies. Her passion is helping professional women embrace their talent and ambition to step into their full potential in their workplace power.

And she’s been listed as one of the world’s top 30 coaches by Global Gurus, and a top 100 keynote speaker by the Data Bird Research Journal. So thank you, Bonnie, for your time today. And our title today is “Women Over 50 Are Not Done Yet”.

Now Bonnie is going to unpack those that idea and answer six questions. So your time starts now. The first question is: Who is your ideal client, and what’s the transformation your work helps them achieve?

Bonnie Marcus
Well, my ideal client is a professional woman who has ambition, and really wants to move her career forward. My own experience in the corporate arena had over 20 years experience where as you said, I moved up from an entry level to the C suite.

And I recognized, Andrew, that there were a lot of women who were being passed over who were really talented, but didn’t know how to create the visibility and credibility they needed to position themselves for advancement.

So, when I left my corporate career and transitioned, I started my coaching practice in 2007.

It was with that mission to help women learn how to navigate the complexities of the workplace and advocate for themselves authentically.

Andrew Hryniewicz
So question number two: What’s the biggest challenge they’re facing?

Bonnie Marcus
Well, there are two different types of challenges that I think women face: what I call the internal challenges of some of their mindset and limiting beliefs that they may have. And the external challenges in the workplace itself.

And when I’m coaching women, and also when I’m speaking about the topic of getting ahead and staying ahead, it’s understanding that: Yes, the workplace may present a lot of obstacles. We face gender bias. We’ve been facing that, you know, for decades.

But how we approach the challenges, how we react…

And whether or not we empower ourselves to navigate through those…

That is something that I want to help women do. So that they’re empowered, really, to face those challenges and tackle them head on.

Andrew Hryniewicz
Okay, great. So question number three: What’s the number one insight you would share with the audience to help them right now? What’s your top tip?

Bonnie Marcus

My top tip is that we understand the value that we bring.

I think we get disconnected. And we become so externally focused, especially Andrew, with social media. And we’re looking at what everybody else is accomplishing.

And it’s “Wow, you know, that person got the promotion… And that person launched their best seller…” and, you know, all these kinds of things that distract us from really the value that we bring.

And when we understand what we bring to the table… the value that we can offer to our team… to our managers, to our businesses… it helps us to really position ourselves well.

Because we know how we can serve others and help others reach their objectives, and do that in a very authentic and powerful way.

Andrew Hryniewicz
That reminds me of a comment somebody made about the 2008 crash, which was a huge amount of that was caused by the fact that all the trading and investment companies had lost all the old people who had seen bubbles and all sorts of other phenomena.

And they were being run by 20 something year old wiz kids who had no history and no perspective about how bad things can get.

Bonnie Marcus
Well, that is the danger in pushing out older women, especially, who really are important for the economy. When we look at who has the consumer power, it’s women over 50, who really hold many of the purse strings and make about 89% of consumer decisions.

So if you’re trying to have a product or service that wants to meet the needs of that demographic, you need those people at the table.

Andrew Hryniewicz
I know someone who’s who does a lot of work around diversity and inclusion, and that’s her message. If the top of your company is made up of a very tiny slice of the demographic, you’re just gonna completely misunderstand huge amounts of the world.

Bonnie Marcus
Right. And really ageism hasn’t been included in diversity and inclusion very often. It’s really under the radar.

Andrew Hryniewicz
Thanks. So question number four: What concept book program or talk has had the greatest impact for you?

Bonnie Marcus
You know, that’s your most difficult question. Because there’s so much. But I would say that recently, I read Bruce Feiler’s book, “Life is in the Transitions”. And it was so enlightening about the stories that shape our lives and how our lives are nonlinear.

And we can go through different changes in our lives and reinvent ourselves. Or we have the option of reacting to those changes in a variety of ways. At any point.

He talks about life quakes, about some major forces that are either voluntary or involuntary.

But what I really loved about his message was how stories shape our reality and shape our lives.

And I think that’s so important also for the work that I do.

Because for women of any age, but especially for women over 50, what stories do you tell yourself about yourself?Because that can either support you or sabotage you.

And so I love that type of narrative therapy approach, which is really understanding and doing some self reflection about how you create your own reality by the stories that you tell yourself.

Andrew Hryniewicz
Too true, too true. So question number five: What free resource would you like to share with the audience that would help them? And where can they go?

Bonnie Marcus
I have a couple of free resources that are downloadable on my website. Go to bonniemarcusleadership.com and click on the book tab. Both of my books have discussion guides which take you through the main themes of the book, and they’re free and downloadable.

So the first one is, how do you navigate the office politics? How do you really learn how to position yourself well given those politics.

And the “Not Done Yet!” really helps you to self reflect and see where you are, how you stand with your own ageist assumptions?

And how to overcome some of the ageist, behavior and comments that you may have in the workplace.

Andrew Hryniewicz
Okay, that sounds great. So yeah, we’ll definitely put that in the show notes. So here’s the last question? What should I have asked you that I didn’t?

Bonnie Marcus
Maybe that question should be, what I’ve learned about myself, from my journey so far?

And I have learned a lot, I would say, in my process of coaching, and I’m sure you find this as well… That the clients who show up teach you a lot of lessons that you should learn.

And that’s why I love the work that I do. And so, when women show up, and they talk about, their perfectionism, for instance, or their self doubt, or the way that they give their power away.

I recognize that I yet have a lot to learn about my own story, and how I might, how I may sabotage myself, not even understanding it.

Andrew Hryniewicz
That’s true. I had a meditation teacher, who used to ask me on a on a fairly regular basis, until I sort of got the question. “How loud does it have to get?”

Bonnie Marcus
Yes.

Andrew Hryniewicz
So that’s perfect. Bonnie, thank you so much for your time.

Bonnie Marcus
You’re welcome. Thank you for the opportunity.

Andrew Hryniewicz
It was great.

Narrator
Thanks for listening to the Destiny Awakening Interviews. If you have a friend who would benefit please share, and subscribe to the show on iTunes and leave a review. We really appreciate it. And remember, always use your power for good!