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Finger Painting and Forensics with Molly Montgomery, Ep. 38

Mar 22, 2018

When you think of fun and happiness, generally the three things that come to mind are family, maybe traveling, and of course, accounting. No? Just us? Well, on today’s episode of Just the Tips, Dean and I welcome somebody who went from being an accountant to being sort of an entrepreneur whisperer, helping startup founders achieve their goals and, yes, happiness. She is the creator of Founder's Haven, which believes that “the driving force behind a startup's ability to succeed is in the founder's capacity to evolve, personally and professionally, while actively leading their company through its early stages of growth.” What that means is ensuring there is joy alongside all of the hard work. If you’ve been feeling like the grind is just the grind these days, this episode is for you.

Compassion for the fraudsters

Molly told us about how she started out getting her degree in accounting, and actually took a very interesting left turn, conducting audits for casinos and other huge organizations around the world. And while she said the work was fascinating, it wasn’t really what she wanted to do. She found herself fascinated with the people behind the audits, even finding compassion for the people who were committing fraud. And as she heard more and more stories about people starting businesses, and struggling at the outset, she found that was her calling: Helping entrepreneurs. But before we got into that, and because this is Just the Tips, of course we had to hear some good casino audit stories.

Get back to the “why”

After seeing so much fraud and corruption in her job as a forensic accountant, Molly decided she needed to do something that allowed her to use her empathy and compassion. As she says, often entrepreneurs lose sight of their own well being while pursuing the dream of their business. And often, when doing that, they lose sight of all of the reasons besides money that they love what they’re doing. So what Molly does is go in and reconnect business owners with the “why” of what they’re doing, set new expectations and new goals to align with why they’re doing it, and take off in a new direction. If you’ve ever felt that you’re caught up in the slog, you’re going to want to hear this week’s episode of Just the Tips.

Molly’s framework for clearing your head

A lot of what Molly talks about in today’s episode of Just the Tips jibes with what Dean and I have been saying this year: It’s important to keep things focused and simple. She says she often talks with entrepreneurs who are scattered, losing their way, and one of the first things she suggests is: Turn off social media, turn off your phone, and just grab a pen and a piece of paper and write down everything going on in your head. Basically, do a brain dump of everything you’ve been thinking about or worrying about in your life and in your business. Do some meditation, and then identify what it is you need to focus on.

Reset your expectations

One of the things that Molly mentions that really resonated with me and that I think will hit home for a lot of our listeners, too: If you’ve been in your business a year or two years or even longer, you’re different now. You’re a different person maybe doing the same things. You need to stop and check in every once in a while and see if what you’re doing is working, if it’s working for you, and if it’s still leading you where you want to go. Molly calls that “resetting your expectations,” because as things change, so should your expectations. Molly was a really interesting guest with a unique, warm perspective that you don’t often hear when talking business, and I think this episode of Just the Tips will really strike a chord with you.

Outline of This Episode

  • [2:26] Molly’s backstory
  • [6:15] Casino stories
  • [10:06] Hotel caper
  • [14:36] How Molly helps entrepreneurs
  • [19:29] Molly’s framework
  • [22:58] Resetting expectations

Music for “Just The Tips” is titled, “Happy Happy Game Show” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

Resources Mentioned

Connect With James and Dean

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