We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Lee Gray a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Lee, thanks for joining us today. Alright, so you had your idea and then what happened? Can you walk us through the story of how you went from just an idea to executing on the idea

Had a great job as a director of marketing – thought I would retire at that job. Then one day I was fired. My husband said well, you have the best years of your life left, better do something you love.

Started looking at franchises, did not want to reinvent the wheel.

Found ActionCOACH – checked a lot of coaches and liked what I heard.

I invested a chunk of my retirement to invest in the franchise, so its sweat and fiancial equity in my business.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I started my business when I was 50 years old some people may say that’s kind of late in life to begin something of the magnitude that I did however I wouldn’t change a thing I have a degree in organizational leadership and management lots of sales experience and I’ve always owned businesses alongside of the jobs that I’ve had some you could say were side hustles but others were actually real businesses that made real profits. When a client comes to me in search of sometimes not even what they know I begin with questions you know what is their goal where do they want to be in life if their business provided for them everything that their life desired what would that be sometimes I think as we get in the day-to-day grind of making a living we forget what we are even passionate about what we want our lives to be about first thing we do with the client is have an alignment session which is aligning their business goals to their personal goals the personal goals should be achieved through the business it’s not the other way around once we know what the person family couple partners want in the business we then set goals how soon do you want this to happen 10 years five years three years and what does your business look like when you don’t have to show up every day we have the client begin to imagine themselves owning a business where they don’t have to be at work every single day from that goal we set that 10 year plan that five year plan that three-year plan that one year plan and we work back to the 90 day plan the coaching session is a weekly check in for accountability financial looking at the numbers KPI’s are we on track to have the business work without us that’s what we do in coaching it’s the most powerful amazing thing that happens seeing someone realize their dreams realize they can achieve their dreams and then helping them to achieve their dreams some of our clients have gone from $300,000 to $1,000,000 to 3 million in just 24 months – lives change with those kinds of numbers it’s so exciting

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

One lesson I had to learn is business is not difficult business is easy and business can be fun having a business should provide freedom. The freedom to do more, to help more people, to build more businesses. One of the things I often say in business is we have about six to seven inches really to work on and that’s the six to seven inches between our ears the things that go on in our brains the beliefs that we’ve had since we were very young the beliefs that we’ve had because maybe in our life we’ve had a failure overcoming beliefs that don’t serve us as business owners has been pivotal for myself and I find that it is the exact same for every single client I work with. We all have baggage beliefs values and identities that do not serve us as business owners. When we can change those beliefs reevaluate our values and challenge our identities we can become who we are meant to be

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

My reputation is in part a great advantage due to my age being seen as someone with experience having owned other businesses and actually lived through what I teach clients. Whatever time in your life you come to market is really irrelevant actually that’s not true it’s very relevant and you have to decide is it going to be something you’re going to leverage or is it something that you’re going to let hold you back my age is now 61 I can command tespect from other people simply by virtue of my time on this earth. My whole adult life has been focused on business working in business owning a business helping others with business and now for the last nine years coaching others to have great businesses some other things that have served me well have been constantly learning I remember taking a PowerPoint class in 1984 having that skill 10 years before it became mainstream was so beneficial to me I’ve always tried to stay ahead of the next big thing. Also learning to take the talents that I already have and make them better one example of that is being a member of toastmasters for more than 10 years. Toastmasters is a speaking organization business owners who speak on behalf of their business or industry are 25% more successful than business owners who do not speak. My reputation for learning and walking the walk has been very powerful for my business and my reputation

Contact Info:

• Website: kansasbizcoach.com
• Instagram: kansasbizcoach
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kansasbizcoach
• Linkedin: inkedin.com/in/kansascoach
• Youtube: @kansasbizcoach

Image Credits
Kara Kauffman