Talesha Carter lost all the money she had at the rodeo with friends. Fortunately she was only 9 years old.  But the money lesson stayed with her and created a money focus that is helping her to serve others.

In Talesha's money story you will learn:

I loved it, yes. I grew up in a small town. Rodeos were a big deal. This particular rodeo was actually down in Salt Lake City area, so about an hour and a half away from where I grew up. This was like the big rigs.

Bobbi Rebell:
The big time.

Talesha Carter:
Yes. It was so much fun. I went there with my friend and her family.

Bobbi Rebell:
And you were how old?

Talesha Carter:
I was nine years old. I was a little wee one.

Bobbi Rebell:
So cool. Okay, so this is sort of a little bit of independence that you're getting, and your parents gave you, really, your first taste of financial independence, and spoiler alert, you failed spectacularly. Tell us exactly what happened. What did they do? They entrusted you. They said, "Okay, you're a big girl, you're nine years old, we're going to give you this responsibility." What happened?

Talesha Carter:
Yes! So they gave me the money. It was $50, and they told me, "Be very careful with this money. Please don't lose it. We're trusting you that you can be responsible with it." Years before they had started to teach me about saving money and spending money, so I had my little buckets and everything, so I had a pretty good concept. I'm the oldest child, so again they entrusted me that I could do well with it. I was so excited that they would let me have my own money, and therefore I got to have my own wallet to keep the fancy-pantsy money in.

Bobbi Rebell:
So you're all organized, you've got your money and your wallet, and what were you going to spend it on? What was this money for?

Talesha Carter:
Yes. Oh, anything I wanted. It could be food, it could be souvenirs, it could be little outings that we were going to do, because we were also going to be going to Lagoon, which is an amusement park here in Utah. So lots of good things that we were going to be able to use with it, and so I was there, and just having so much fun. I was obsessed with the broncos, and just being able to watch the cowboys there and watching the bull riding, all that. I just was so entranced by it, and had a lot of soda beforehand, and about midway through, I was a little kid. You don't have much bladder control.

So I'm like, "Okay, I've got to go to the bathroom." I remember having this distinct memory of, "Oh, I have to take my money with me. I can't just leave my wallet here on the fence." Then the next thought was, "Oh, I'd better take it with me, because my parents said, 'Always keep your money with you. Don't lose your money.'"

Bobbi Rebell:
So you were being financially responsible.

Talesha Carter:
That's what I thought, yes. As a nine year old. So my friend and I, we went and found the bathroom, and I remembered, I didn't want to put it on the gross dirty floor, so I put it on the back of the toilet seat. I went to the bathroom, came out, washed my hands and everything, and I left it there on the toilet seat. Completely forgot that it was even there. Came back to our seats, we were enjoying the rodeo, and then I just had that sinking pit in my stomach of, "Oh my gosh, where is my wallet?" You know, as a grown up woman now, if you've ever left your purse somewhere and you have that moment of panic, that's what I felt as a nine year old, was that moment of, "Oh my gosh, I've got to go get my money. Where is my money? Where did I leave this money?"

And so we quickly went back to the bathroom, and of course, we went into every single stall, and nothing was there and no one had turned it in.

Bobbi Rebell:
Aw. You went to the lost and found?

Talesha Carter:
Yes. Yes, we did everything to try and find it, and you know, hopefully someone else enjoyed that $50.

Bobbi Rebell:
It's disappointing that somebody did not turn that in to lost and found. I mean, did you have your name on it, anything? As a nine year old, we tend to put name tags on our kids' stuff.

Talesha Carter:
Yes. Yes. You know, I'm sure I probably did, but I don't remember how that was. But I think one of the most disappointing things was that people could be dishonest. And that was a real big gut punch.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right, because you left it there, and I get it. That's irresponsible.

Talesha Carter:
Yes.

Bobbi Rebell:
It's a lesson when you're nine, but somebody also took it! And that's also a lesson, that if you don't pay attention to your money, someone might take it.

Talesha Carter:
Yes. So then from there I had to have that hard conversation and call my mom and dad, and tell them, "Hey, I'm really sorry, but I lost your money." I could hear their disappointment through the phone, but my parents are so amazing and incredible, and they just walked me through it. They said they were disappointed, but that they loved me and it was okay, and we could make that money back, and it wasn't earth-shattering, but I think for me the biggest thing is that nine year old was feeling that guilt that I had lost my parents' hard earned money, and then as well, feeling upset that someone would take it, and then me feeling like, "Oh my gosh, now I'm always going to lose my money."

So especially when I started my own business, that was where I started to see it come through a lot. I've always loved money, but that belief of, "Oh, I'm going to lose this money." So then I got really, I would hold onto it, and I almost created this scarcity mindset with money of, "If I don't keep it with me, or if I'm not tracking it 100% through my bank account, it's going to lose money," or some hacker is going to come on and take it.

So it made me almost shift into that scarcity greedy side of money, instead of just money flows to me easily, side of things.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right. And negativity about money, that money is not something that can empower you, it's something that you have to kind of hoard and protect and keep because someone else might take it from you. And that can really weigh on you.

Talesha Carter:
Yeah. It was a huge, that was probably one of the biggest lessons in that, is that I had to be able to let go of that fear that money was against me instead of for me.

“I had to be able to  let go of that fear that money was against me instead of for me” 

In Talesha’s money lesson you will learn:

Yeah, so I had to really learn how to identify my money beliefs. One of the ways I like to do that, and what I teach my coaching clients, is to start to look at the money that they have right now, and ask themselves, how do they feel about it? Are you happy? Are you sad? Does this overwhelm you? Does it stress you out?

And then from there, write letters to your money. Identify what your money is trying to tell you.

Bobbi Rebell:
Do you actually write letters to your money?

Talesha Carter:
I do. I do, yes.

Bobbi Rebell:
What do you say in your letters to your money?

Talesha Carter:
When I was first starting out, it was, "Why do you always leave? Why is there never enough? Why do I feel like any time I make money, it just quickly leaves?" The bills, whatever it is that you have. And so it first started out very negatively, like, "I don't like you. Why do you always leave me?"

Then it has slowly shifted into, "You're pretty awesome. Thank you so much for showing up in my life. This is really cool that I made $100 today by helping out a person, and now I'm going to turn around and utilize this to help my family or another family." Just writing like I would write to my best friend.

“ I had to learn how to identify my money beliefs”

In Talesha's everyday money tip you will learn:

Talesha Carter:
A lot of times we do things electronically, and so I like to cash my money, and put it into cash. And then I carry $100 worth of cash with me, and it's in the range from $2 bills all the way up to $100 bills. From there, I look at it every single day, and I'll say, "Thank you for showing up in my life. How can I help serve another person with this money?"

Bobbi Rebell:
So gratitude.

Talesha Carter:
Yes. So much gratitude.

“People could be dishonest and that was a real gut punch” 

Financial grownup tip number one:

Look out for your friends' money and possessions. It would be obvious for me to say, "Keep tabs on your own stuff when you are out and about." That goes without saying. But I'm going to share a story, and I still feel sick to my stomach about it.

I was in London with a friend in college, we were at a restaurant. She went to the ladies' room, and I did not realize it, but she had left her bag somewhere. Maybe it was on the floor, the back of the chair, I wasn't really paying attention.

She hadn't said anything, but I was at the table, and her bag was somewhere. The thing is, I wasn't paying attention. And when she returned, she didn't notice anything either. But when we went to pay the bill, we noticed the bag had disappeared.

I still feel bad. Someone obviously came by and swiped it while she was away, or maybe it was when we were just talking, who knows? The point is, we weren't paying attention. We need to have each others' backs.

Financial grownup tip number two:

You probably won't get a do-over, so come up with a do-next. What are you going to do next time, after something goes wrong.

I want you guys to give it some thought, and when you have time, please DM me and let me know how you have come back from doing something cringe worthy with your money, like leaving your wallet in the bathroom. Because as I said at the top of the show, we all have those moments that we wish we could get a do-over on.

Heads up, everyone. Financial grownups pay attention to the news and learn from it. Here is your shortcut.

Episode/Other Links:

• Talesha's 1-on-1 coaching

• Talesha's Facebook Group- Foster Vitality: Energy Connection

Check out Talesha's website -

www.FosterVitality.com

Follow Talesha!

• Instagram - @FosterVitality

• Facebook - @FosterVitality

• YouTube

Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Broke Millennial’s Erin Lowry joins Bobbi with 3 specific things you can do today to upgrade your investing strategy, along with her take on how to be a successful investor.  For example: How much should you be paying for your investments? How long should you set it and forget it- when do you check in on your investments? What is an investment audit? Are all index funds the same? Plus a preview of her new book “Broke Millennial Takes on Investing’ . How to tell if your goals are in line with the investment choices you are making? And what to do if you don’t understand an investment term but don’t want to ask. 

Here are the 3 things you must know about actionable investing tips

• Increase contributions in small increments

• Pay attention to expense ratios- they matter so much

• write down goals and check in once a year

Episode Links:

• Erin's new book Broke Millennial Takes On Investing: A Beginner's Guide to Leveling Up Your Money

• Erin's first book Broke Millennial: Stop Scraping By and Get Your Financial Life Together

• Jill Schlesinger's Financial Grownup episode

Check out Erin's website -

www.BrokeMillennial.com

Follow Erin!

• Instagram - @BrokeMillennialBlog

• Pinterest - @BrokeMillennial

• Twitter - @BrokeMillennial

• Facebook - @BrokeMillennial

Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

 

After 148 rejections in the first funding round, Kathryn Minshew co-founder and CEO of the Muse took note of what she did wrong and upped her game when she went looking for new financing. Minshew scored close to $30 million thanks to the new approach. 

 

In Kathryn’s money story you will learn

-How Kathryn and the Muse team re-vamped their strategy the second time they raised money

-How Kathryn rebounded from the 148 rejections in the seed round of financing

-How The Muse raised $30 million from investors

-How they were able to ask for less money and come out with more than the original targets

-The way Kathryn structured her process when pitching investors

-How they organized their pitches and research to be more effective

-Kathryn’s investor prioritization strategy

-The specific thing Kathryn said to investors to get them to the table faster- and with more interest in her company

-How a second round of financing is different- and should be approached differently from a seed round

In Kathryn’s lesson you will learn:

-The advice Kathryn found most helpful from her networks and mentors

-How she got help from other entrepreneurs

-How to tell if the investors are wrong not to invest- or if your idea and pitch is missing the mark

-How to figure out who your end users are- and why it is important

-Strategies and specific things to ask in order to get honest input about your company

In Kathryn’s money tip you will learn:

-Negotiations can be about more than just cash

-How to ask for signing bonuses, signing bonuses, flextime, vacation time, better titles.

-Why budgets for professional training are essential and how to negotiate for them

In my take you will learn:

-How to learn lessons from rejection, and incorporate them in your next venture

-The importance of taking the time to throughtfully plan and customize presentations and pitches

-How to level the playing field even when the other party is clearly more powerful. 

Episode links:

TheMuse.com

Kathryn’s book with Muse co-founder Alexandra Cavoulacos The New Rules of Work

Follow Kathryn and The Muse!

Instagram @kminshew @themuse

Twitter: @Kmin and @TheMuse and @TheNewRules

Facebook  https://www.facebook.com/thedailymuse

https://www.facebook.com/minshew

Kathryn Minshew, Co-Founder and CEO of The Muse shares her rebound from 148 investor rejections to eventually raising $30 million for her startup. Listen to her episode of the Financial Grownup podcast at bobbirebell.com/financialgrownuppodcast-- Created using PowToon -- Free sign up at http://www.powtoon.com/youtube/ -- Create animated videos and animated presentations for free.

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Transcription

Kathryn Minshew:
If you tell someone you're the founder of a company and ask for their input, they are more likely to give you positive impact because they don't want to hurt your feelings. If you tell them that you're a consultant helping a company understand how its market positioning lands, or helping a company better understand what it's doing well and what it's not, people are much more likely to give you totally unfiltered feedback for the series A because I was running a process.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to "Financial Grownup" with me, Certified Financial Planner, Bobbi Rebell, author of "How to Be a Financial Grownup". You know what? Being a grownup is really hard, especially when it comes to money. But it's okay, we're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, everybody. This is an episode about rejection, and what you would do differently the second time around. How to tell were they wrong to reject you? Maybe your message could be a little bit more on point. The Muse founder and CEO, Kathryn Minshew has told the story many times of how she and her colleagues were rejected 148 times when they when to raise money for their startup, The Muse. Once the company got off the ground, it has been a massive success, and many people would say, "Well, those 148 people, they must be so sorry that they rejected it." And of course, that is true to some extent. But also, Kathryn looks back and realizes she had a lot that she would do differently the next time. And in fact, she did do it differently when she went back for the next round of financing, and that's what we talked about. Here is Kathryn Minshew.

Bobbi Rebell:
Kathryn Minshew, you are a financial grownup. Welcome to the program.

Kathryn Minshew:
Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be here.

Bobbi Rebell:
And you are well known as the founder and CEO of The Muse, the amazing job site, and also well known for being rejected when you went to raise money. Tell me how many, 140 something times?

Kathryn Minshew:
148 times. It was like rejection for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, with a few meetings and noes inbetween for fun.

Bobbi Rebell:
And you are the queen of resilience, and one thing that you talk about in your book, "The New Rules of Work", which I should have mentioned to everybody. She is the author of a fabulous career book called "The New Rules of Work".

Bobbi Rebell:
You talk about your personal brand, and how important it is to define it. That fundraising and the lack of it for so long became your personal brand. So you brought with you a money story that has to do with what happened next, after you finally did get the initial funding and you went back for me. Tell us.

Kathryn Minshew:
Absolutely. Well, first of all, I'll say it's much easier as we all know to talk about failure once you've moved past it. So it became much easier to tell the story of the 148 noes after we had already successfully raised our series A and B rounds. So we've raised almost $30 million in venture capital so far for The Muse.

Bobbi Rebell:
Amazing.

Kathryn Minshew:
It's been a totally wild ride. So my financial story involves what I set out to do, or rather what I did in the series A to ensure that we had an outcome that was very different than the seed round. Because, obviously, I knew how important it was for that next round, to get it right from the go-ahead. And so to try and condense the story into something very quick, we wanted to go out and initially we were thinking about raising six to $7 million. But actually given the advice that I got while preparing for a fundraise, we were actually told to start out saying we were thinking five to six or five to seven, and then slowly let the demand build. So instead of us going out for a big number and being less sure if the market would respond, start out with a smaller number. And then, if the market is really excited about our business, let the negotiations and the demand push it up, which ended up working really well for us because we ended up raising 10 million after we had overwhelming demand.

Kathryn Minshew:
I also was incredibly structured about the process probably because I was a little bit paranoid after having such a difficult time with our seed round. So ahead of time, I really worked the story, got all of our metrics out there. I thought about how best to position them, which numbers to lead with, what to put first so that we could really grab people's attention. We were obviously lucky in that we had really great revenue growth and a lot of very strong metrics.

Kathryn Minshew:
And then, I actually created a spreadsheet. I took all of the investors that I was even remotely interested in talking to. I put them in a spreadsheet. Divided it up by location, so that when I was in New York, San Francisco, Boston, Chicago, DC, et cetera, I could meet with people who were there. Then, I included information about whether they had invested in any similar companies, any competitors. Any companies that might give them a better understanding into what we did at The Muse. I would include notes from different meetings. I actually would also rank how excited I was after each meeting to continue conversations, so I could prioritize the ones that I was most excited about. I would say that really helped to keep me on track, and so we were also able to run a pretty tight process, where we pinned all of our first meetings with investors to the same two-and-a-half or three-week period.

Kathryn Minshew:
It was really interesting because in the seed round, we had a lot of trouble with investors saying, "Oh, I'm busy, right now. But how about in a month?" I wasn't confident enough in the business, so we would just take whatever we could get for the series A because I was running a process. I would write back to people and be like, "You know I'd love to talk, but unfortunately, I need to get all of our first meetings done by X date. So I can push it a few days, but let me know if you're going to be able to make it work. And if not, I'm totally fine. We'll keep in touch and maybe there'll be another round that you can participate in." And what was fascinating is a lot of people would say, "Oh, let me move around my schedule. Absolutely, I can make it work." And suddenly, we were negotiating from a more even position. And the ones that weren't able to or the ones that said, "No, sorry. I can't do it," they probably would have never backed the company to begin with.

Bobbi Rebell:
True. Do you think looking back, obviously when you were going for the most money, the second round, you were a stronger situation to begin with. But had you used the techniques that you were now using that you just talked about, would you have had more success the first time?

Kathryn Minshew:
You know, maybe. It's so hard to know because the seed round for a startup is really different than later rounds because people aren't necessarily looking at your metrics. They are to some extent, but they're really betting on you. And I think the fact that it was my first proper company that I was fairly young at the time, this was six-and-a-half years ago, so it was very early in my career. And I think that plus the lack of knowledge or understanding about what we were trying to do in the business were some of the biggest concerns. So I do think we could have had a better time and controlled the process a bit more, but I also think there were just some fundamental and structural things that we had to get through and really prove on very limited capital before we could really go out and successfully fundraise from bigger investors.

Bobbi Rebell:
So now, what is your advice to listeners and especially want-to-be entrepreneurs that are looking to raise money, start businesses, and especially to young women?

Kathryn Minshew:
I would say, firstly, you can't understate the importance of perseverance because it is so hard in the early days. But I think that doesn't mean that you just keep doing the same thing without adjusting your tactics and thinking about how you could be more strategic. I found it to be so invaluable to get the advice from others, especially other female entrepreneurs. Because sometimes we have a lot of great friends who are entrepreneurs, who are men, but sometimes the tactics or the approaches or behaviors that would work for them, didn't work the same when I did them because of unintentional or unconscious bias or other things. And so I found that it was really helpful to surround myself with a network of entrepreneurs of both genders to get a lot of advice, to test out different approaches to see what felt natural and normal to me. Because if it feels too unnatural to you, investors will probably pick up on that, and it won't help you communicate that confidence that you are looking for when you're starting to talk to investors about your business.

Bobbi Rebell:
So one last question about this for our listeners, how do you know the difference between maybe your idea just isn't that good, and that's why you're not getting funding and you should stop, or you should persevere as you did because your idea just isn't hitting the right people at the right time with the right message?

Kathryn Minshew:
Absolutely. So you've just gotten to the crux of what makes this so hard, which is that there is no silver bullet, and you will never have 100% confidence or certainty either way, which is incredibly difficult. However, I think there are a few things you can use to help you directionally get that sense of whether your business is likely to be successful. The first, and I think the most important is to figure out who are your end users and do as much as possible to get unfiltered feedback from them.

Kathryn Minshew:
For example, if you tell someone you're the founder of a company and ask for their input, they're more likely to give you positive input because they don't want to hurt your feelings. If you tell them that you're a consultant helping a company understand how its marketing positioning lands or helping a company better understand what its doing well and what it's not, people are much more likely to give you totally unfiltered feedback, and you need that unfiltered feedback when you're trying to ascertain if you really need to keep pushing forward on your business.

Kathryn Minshew:
So in my case, even though we were getting rejection, after rejection, after rejection from a lot of investors, we were hearing things from our users and from people who were signing up to use The Muse that indicated we had tapped a nerve and we were on a path that people love. They wanted us to use the product. They'd say I love The Muse, but can you do these five things? Make it better here. Change this. That's all positive feedback because that shows you that there is a need. You just have to keep getting better, and I think that is what gave me the oomph to keep going. But I will just call out it's not like I knew the whole time, oh my gosh, this is a great idea. I just have to keep going. I definitely struggled with whether I should accept that these people that were much more experienced than I, that were successful investors, maybe they knew something I didn't, and I just had hubris.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right. Let's do a money tip. You are the career guru, and you have so many amazing ideas and tips in your book. I wanted to pull some out of there and get maybe your favorite tips that people can use in their careers, and their ventures that they could maybe put to work ASAP at their next job interview or their next negotiation, what have it.

Kathryn Minshew:
I thought through a lot of different things I could share here, and the one I came up with that I wanted to talk about today is the fact that when you negotiate, it is not just all about cash and I think it can be really empowering to realize that because so many of us have anxiety about negotiating a salary, negotiating a raise. Whether it's at the beginning of a job search, or when you're getting a promotion. But I would encourage people, remember that there are a lot of other things you can negotiate for.

Kathryn Minshew:
So obviously, base salary is the thing that people talk about most. But what about signing bonuses, performance bonuses if you achieve certain things? You can also negotiate for flex time, for vacation time, for a better title that might help you in your career. One of the most creative things that I've heard is people negotiating for a budget for professional development and training.

Bobbi Rebell:
Specific money. In other words, not just saying, "Will you send me," in theory. It's very specific.

Kathryn Minshew:
Oh, very specific. In fact, there was someone at an organization that had mandatory salary bans that the leadership wasn't able to go beyond, and so she said great. Why don't you dedicate ... I think it was five or $10,000 towards training development conference that will include my travel, and that will help level me up to be a better employee for you, to let me do my job better, and it won't invalidate the salary cap. This will just be another way that you're investing in my growth, and they said yes, and I think that is such a great example of creativity when it comes to negotiation.

Bobbi Rebell:
Amazing. That's such great advice. Thank you so much. Tell us quickly before we wrap up, what are you guys up to at The Muse these day, and where can people find you?

Kathryn Minshew:
Absolutely. So people can find me at The Muse or @kmin on Twitter. As a company, we are doing a lot right now, but we have been really focusing on we rolled out a new feature called Discussions on TheMuse.com, where people can ask and answer each other's questions. So if you have a career question or you want to learn more about negotiating a raise, we've got a way now to get advice from our community and hear other people's stories. And then, I'm also just kind of fascinated down the road by continuing to explore this idea of how people make the best career decisions, how they find the right fits, and how we help companies tell their stories in a more genuine and authentic way that isn't about just come work here, we're great, but really shares the information people need to know to decide do I want to be part of that organization, or be part of that company?

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, friends. Here's my take on what Kathryn had to say.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grownup tip, number one. Like she did, do your homework, including learning what went wrong the first time. Even if you think the companies or whomever you were pitching to were wrong to reject your idea, we all have room for improvement. Kathryn went out and asked for advice, for example, about how much money to ask for. She actually went for a smaller number based on the advice as a strategy, and ended up raising more money, so it worked. She was also much more organized and structured in her preparations the second time around. She was specific to each company, and deliberate in her presentation. She planned geographically, so she could be efficient with her time. Kathryn even ranked how excited she was about prospects, so she could prioritize and focus on her resources and the best alow there.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grownup tip, number two. Stand up for yourself, even if you need them more than they need you. In Kathryn's second round, when prospects said they didn't have the time to meet with her any time soon, she pushed back and was not only able to get them to the table faster when they were interested, but also to level the playing field for a stronger negotiating position.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you for listening to this episode of financial grownup. Please subscribe if you have not already. Reviews are great if you have just a few minutes. You can follow me @bobbirebell on Twitter, @bobbirebell1 on Instagram, and learn more about the show at BobbiRebell.com/FinancialGrownupPodcast. I hope that you all enjoyed this episode of "Financial Grownups" with The Muse's Kathryn Minshew, and that we all got one step closer to being financial grownups.

Bobbi Rebell:
"Financial Grownup" with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stuart, and is a BRK Media production.