Episode #15: The Financial Impact of Leading with Transparency, Heart and Putting Employees First with Sherry Deutschmann, Entrepreneur, CEO and Author

In today's episode, Christie sat down with Sherry Deutschmann. Sherry is a serial entrepreneur, author, and passionate advocate for entrepreneurship. In 2019, Sherry founded BrainTrust, a company dedicated to helping women entrepreneurs grow their businesses to $1 Million in annual revenue…and beyond. Prior to founding BrainTrust, Sherry was founder and CEO of LetterLogic, Inc., a company she grew to $40 Million and sold in 2016. LetterLogic was named an INC 5000 company (fastest-growing privately held businesses in the US) for ten consecutive years.

Sherry attributes the success of LetterLogic to its unique culture in which the needs of the employees came before those of the customer or shareholder. That culture led Sherry to be recognized by EY as one of their 2009 Entrepreneurial Winning Women and LetterLogic was featured in the New York Times, Forbes Magazine, Business Leaders, INC, and Fast Company. Sherry was honored by President Barack Obama as a White House Champion of Change in 2016.

Sherry’s book, Lunch with Lucy – Maximize Profits by Investing in your People – was released in March 2020.

Highlights: "The Financial Impact of Leading with Transparency, Heart and Putting Employees First"

Employees will not care about their work if the organization’s leaders do not care about them.
Inspiration can come from things that are not inspiring and ideas to fix that.
Leaders need to think about every team member, not just the ones in “glamorous” positions.
Worrying about utility bills, child care or insurance bills takes a toll on employees. If their employer gets rid of that for them, the employer will gain “trust points.”
How do we as leaders drive commitment to the organization and to one another?
“I would advise anybody in leadership to take the time and break bread with the people that report to you, and it doesn’t have to be fancy.”
Just listening to your employees doesn’t do much, acting based on what you hear creates sustainable change.
If you treat your employees right, they won't carry the burden on their own.
Putting employees first is a really good business model.
“It wasn’t just my family that I was trying to support, it was those 50+ other families and their extended families."
Empowering women is necessary and can begin in any organization.
A byproduct of a successful business is gaining influence; it is imperative that when given a "megaphone," leaders empower all of their employees and use their influence to give everyone a better chance at success.

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LEADING FORWARD breaks down professional assumptions through meaningful conversations that remind us all that leading, effectively, can and often does look different for each of us.

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