We were lucky to catch up with Lauren Lefkowitz recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Lauren, thanks for joining us today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

I grew up in Corporate America the way I thought a high-achiever like me should: work hard, get a promotion, work harder, get more work, stop getting promoted, get a new job, work harder, work harder, get another new job, work even harder, make sure you’re the hardest working one, and then work a little harder.

Easy. Peasy.

Only it wasn’t.

For years I worked progressively more hours–maxing out at eighty to one hundred hours a week–and took on the role of Vice President of Whatever-You-Need. I raised my hand for everything, interim managed nearly every department, and never said no when asked to pitch in.

At the same time, I was working a side-gig as an executive coach, which I enjoyed much more than my job as a human resources executive. I was supporting other executives and emerging leaders so they could find joy, success, and balance in their lives, while I worked myself to the bone.

I said it was fine. It wasn’t.

I claimed I loved being able to contribute at the level I was contributing. I didn’t.

I justified that I was paid well, had the executive level job, held the responsibility, so this was just the way it was. It didn’t have to be.

Finally, I hit my literal breaking point. In a freak slip-and-fall accident, I broke both of my shoulders at the same time. The first joke from friends and family? “Look who can’t be a hand-raiser anymore!”

After a year-long physical recovery, and a habitual return to my people-pleasing, workaholic life, I finally realized that if I didn’t change my ways, I would be working like this until I retired, by which time I would probably be too tired to enjoy myself.

It was time for me to break the work, sleep, repeat cycle and escape the trap of being ‘fine’.

I finally hired my own executive coach and learned to set boundaries the way I worked with my own clients to help them learn to set boundaries. I received the support I needed to finally say out loud that what I really wanted was to own my own executive coaching company. And within a year, I’d made the decision to leave the corporate life so I could work full time to support other high-achieving workaholics to find their versions of an amazing life.

Now, I live the life I never imagined I could have – I have a satisfying, fulfilling, fun life. I have a beautiful integration of work, play, and rest. And I partner with clients like me, who start off never dreaming that they, too, can find that integration, and leave with the careers, money, and balance they deserve.

Fine is a trap. Believe in more.

Lauren, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I worked in human resources for twenty years, after a few false starts to my career where I tried my hand at meeting planning, then accounting, then sales. I was lucky to have a corporate leader who saw potential in me to work in human resources, a department I was well suited for.

While building my HR career, I had friends and family ask for help with resumes, which grew into a little side business of resume writing and job search training. Eventually, people started coming to me to ask me how to figure out what they wanted to be when they grew up. This blossomed into a long-term side-gig coaching people about not just what they wanted to do, but also who they wanted to be and how they wanted that to go for them.

I had learned to coach organically and through some training classes, and eventually became a certified coach.

When I took my business full time, I decided I wanted to work with people pleasers and workaholics who had given their lives to the careers they didn’t even love.

I recognized how often we say “it’s fine” when it’s not actually fine. Fine is a word we all use automatically. Ask almost anyone how they’re doing and they’ll say, “I’m fine.” They almost never mean it. In reality, ‘fine’ is a self-soothing word we use when things aren’t fine…when things are far from okay.

It’s almost as though we’re patting ourselves on the back and saying, “There, there, self. I have to say it’s fine because if I admit it’s not fine, we’re all going to feel terrible and systems and processes will simply crumble.”

Fine is not fine. Fine is settling. Fine is not speaking up for what we need, what we want, how we can best work together. Fine is not setting boundaries, not following our own goals, and really just giving up on better. Fine is the trap of complacency, overworking, damaging teams, and slowing progress.

What we think is actually in service of others – being agreeable and helpful and in-service-of – actually burns us out and makes us less than fine. It burns all of us out.

There is a world in which we all stop settling for fine. It’s a world in which we have real conversations about what the goals actually are, what is actionable and what is time-wasting, what is achievable and what is too much for one person, one team, one year. It’s a world where we stop settling for fine and start going after amazing.

How did you build your audience on social media?

When I began my social media journey, I was overwhelmed by the different platforms available. A friend gave me a great piece of advice: Find one platform that resonates with you the most and build on just that one to start.

I spend some time lurking on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn and found that I related the most to the people, posts, and videos on LinkedIn. LinkedIn was filled with the kind of people–corporate people–I had known throughout my career and it felt like we all spoke the same language. By curating my feed, connecting to other people whose posts resonated with me, and following hashtags that I liked, I found real community among the people of LinkedIn.

Shortly after I decided that would be my main platform, I started commenting and posting and then I started live streaming. Today, almost all of my clients come to me from my presence on LinkedIn. I tell stories of my own corporate life, client success stories, and even share pictures of my dog sometimes.

For those starting out on social media, I recommend simply lurking first, seeing what you like, unfollowing posts and creators who don’t spark joy, following hashtags that relate to the work you do or the clients you want. When you get comfortable with that, start commenting on posts to teach the algorithm what you like to see. Then start posting your own content, in a way that feels friendly and human. And know that it’s okay to talk about and brag about your business.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

There are two things that have strongly impacted my entrepreneurial experience.

The first thing that impacted me has been having a coach and a therapist. When entrepreneurs go out ‘into the wild’ for the first time, so many think that if they’re going out on their own, it actually means being totally on their own. That’s simply not true and is a great way to self-sabotage! When I first left my corporate life, I hired a coach who also worked with business strategy. She helped me set up my operations, taught me how to have a strategy (sales) call, and showed me how to sell on social media without cold pitching or direct messaging to get clients.

I also decided to work with a therapist. I’ve always been a strong believer in the power of therapy and being an entrepreneur is a scary path. Having mental health support is vital to my success.

The other thing that has impacted my experience as a solo entrepreneur has been building community around me. I’ve joined several networking groups and have stayed with the ones that most align with my values and that have supportive and fun people in them. I take a lot of networking calls, many of which have turned into supportive friendships. And I created my own small coaching collaborative–a group of newer entrepreneurs like me, who are building our businesses synchronously, for support and camaraderie. Even though we are building our own solo businesses, we do not need to be alone.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://laurenlefkowitzcoach.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauren.coach.fineisatrap
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/laurenlefkowitzcoaching
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurenlefkowitz
• Other: https://anchor.fm/icouldtalktoyouallday