Ep. 104/ Pharmacist Turned Entrepreneur Richelle Peña on Building a Positive Mindset
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Want to build a more positive mindset so you can have confidence while growing your business? Richelle Peña gives us her advice on entrepreneurship, finding the right market, feeling confident despite setbacks, and building a business with her husband which she details in her new book Power Couple.
You will learn:
How networking helped Richelle grow her business (6:22)
Building a team culture in your business (9:28)
What it takes to build a strong mindset (19:18)
The trap of comparing yourself to others (21:40)
More about Richelle: Richelle is a pharmacist, serial entrepreneur, wife, and mother. She received a Doctorate in Pharmacy at Nova Southeastern University in 2007 and became an executive team leader at a Fortune 500 company shortly after graduating. She is the co-founder and former director of corporate development at American Pediatric Dental Group, a pediatric dental service organization in south Florida. She is also a media personality, appearing on shows such as Good Morning America, NBC, PIX11 New York City, Breakfast Television Canada, and Fox News. Her expert advice featured in Success Magazine, Yahoo Finance, Mom.com, Mamas Latinas, and HerMoney. Together with her husband, they help entrepreneurs find fulfillment in both personal and professional lives with their consulting company and online courses
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Want to build a more positive mindset so you can have confidence while growing your business? Richelle Peña gives us her advice on entrepreneurship, finding the right market, feeling confident despite setbacks, and building a business with her husband which she details in her new book Power Couple.
In this episode you will learn:
How networking helped Richelle grow her business (6:22)
Building a team culture in your business (9:28)
What it takes to build a strong mindset (19:18)
The trap of comparing yourself to others (21:40)
Quotes from our guest:
“My mindset is so strong, my confidence is so strong that I'm like, you know what? I may be here, but I know I'm going to be there one day. And it just takes baby steps. And remembering that everybody starts with one client.”
“The confidence comes from knowing that I can control what I can control. I can't control what the outside world thinks of me.”
“Stop comparing yourself and stop looking at what other people are doing.”
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RICHELLE’S LINKS:
Follow Richelle on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/richellepena
Kim (00:01):
Richelle Pena joins us. She's a pharmacist and a serial entrepreneur and talks about starting a business with her husband, scaling it, selling it, and now they're coaching other entrepreneurs.
Kim (00:14):
Welcome to the exit interview with Kim Rittberg. Do you work for yourself and want to supercharge your business while still having fun? Well, this is your go-to podcast part MBA Part Cheer Squad. Every week I'll be joined by top business owners who share the secrets to their success. After I found myself working during childbirth true story, I quit my executive media job to bet on myself fighting the fear and imposter syndrome to eventually earn six awards, an in-demand speaking career and features in Fast Company and Business Insider. Now, I'm here to celebrate all you rock stars betting on yourself, and I want to help you win. Tune in every Wednesday to hear from remarkable founders and don't miss our Solo Friday episodes, a treasure trove of video and podcasting mini masterclasses with me. Exit the Grind, enter success on your own terms. Don't forget to subscribe today and grab my free video tips at my website, kimrittberg.com.
Kim (01:15):
Can't you just smell the summer coming? Maybe that's not a smell. Maybe that's just the heat wave. Anyway, I'm really excited and gearing up for the summer. I am trying to take a little time for myself, my family, and scale down a little bit. I would love to know how you balance, what does balance look like for all you entrepreneurial rock stars out there? Don't forget, you can download my free guide to make amazing videos and then it comes with a bonus download of How to Be Confident on Camera, and you can visit that at kimrittberg.com/newsletter or right here in the show notes. Richelle Pena joins me and we have a great conversation about being entrepreneurs and about being comfortable in that uncomfortable position where people are telling you no and how we could be more resilient. We talk alot about how to build the confidence muscle and not just fake it till you make it, but actually how to look at nos in a healthy way that helps you build your resilience, helps you build a positive mindset to continue in your growth. We also talk about what it's like to be the children of immigrants and how that's changed us as business owners ourselves. She formed American Pediatric Dental Group with her husband, so we talk a little bit about what does it mean to work with a partner, whether that's your spouse or somebody else. Anyway, it's a great conversation, so make sure to stick around. Alright, I'm really excited to bring in Richelle Pena. She's a pharmacist, serial entrepreneur, wife and mother. She received a doctorate in pharmacy at Nova Southeastern University in 2007 and she became an executive team leader at a Fortune 500 company shortly after graduating. She's the co-founder and former director of corporate development and American Pediatric Dental Group, a pediatric dental service organization in South Florida. She's also a media personality appearing on Good Morning America, NBC Pixel 11, New York City Breakfast Television, Canada, and Fox News. Her expert advice has been featured in Success Magazine, yahoo finance mom.com. Mom is Latinas at her money together with her husband. They help entrepreneurs find fulfillment in both personal and professional lives with their consulting company and online courses. Richelle, thank you so much for joining me.
Richelle (03:11):
Oh my god, I'm so excited to be here and have this conversation with you. Thanks for having me.
Kim (03:16):
Of course. I want to jump right in. So you started this business with your husband. Take me through gloss over the boring stuff. Just kidding, but take me through. You've done so much. How did you end up starting that business? Tell me a little bit more about that.
Richelle (03:32):
I will give you the shortened version and skip the boring stuff. I was a pharmacist straight out of school. I became a manager and I worked heavily in operations hiring and I learned the business side of running a pharmacy and my husband is a pediatric dentist, and so how I got into business with him, I was done, done with a corporate world. I was pregnant on my feet for 10 hours and my husband wanted, he was also done working for someone who he didn't quite like how they operated, and so he looked at me one day and he's like, Richelle, will you leave your six figure secure safe job to open a dental office with me? And I was like, are you crazy? Both of us are going to leave our jobs, move in with my parent. I was pregnant with my first baby, but you know what? I saw the big vision and the goals and I wanted to bring my corporate knowledge into a small mom and pop and eventually grow it and scale it. And so what, 12 years later, here we are and I am so happy I made the decision because I wouldn't have been able to learn all the things that I did about entrepreneurship working in a corporate company.
Kim (04:42):
And so what did that company look like? So you're running it with your husband, what did it look like at the beginning and then what did it look like at the end?
Richelle (04:48):
It looked very scary in the beginning.
Kim (04:50):
In the beginning
Richelle (04:53):
As healthcare professionals, both him and I, we love what we do. Me empathy, dealing with my patients, loves the patient care, but then you have to deal with marketing, networking and all the things that they do not teach us in school. So you know what? It was survival of the survival of
Kim (05:13):
Fittest. Fittest of the fittest, right?
Richelle (05:17):
Tongue twisted. And so within the first three months we had blew through all the cash that the bank had given us to ramp up. But what I'm really good at is networking, building relationships, and I learned quick on my feet to be uncomfortable and be where moms were. And slowly from a team of literally three people, we grew it in 10 years to seven locations, 150 team members. But we learned so much along the journey. But most importantly, we had a huge mission and vision to really serve the underserved children. It was an untapped market and everybody thought we were crazy for having a big team, for seeing children on state Medicaid, children with special needs. But for us, we knew that we were doing something different and we had a niche market and now everybody takes all the insurance plans, seat special needs, but we were definitely the trail trailblazers here in south Florida and we took a chance. We knew that these kids also needed a dental home that I truly believe was the secret to our success.
Kim (06:22):
So talk to me about that. Not to get too in the weeds, but I used to work in news and covered healthcare and I have some healthcare clients. There are a lot of healthcare professionals who really don't want to take insurance and they certainly don't want to take Medicare Medicaid. So how did you build such a profitable business if that's really the basis of your patients?
Richelle (06:40):
We were able to really partner with these insurance companies. Nobody was accepting their patients, so there would be months and months of wait time. So by building those relationships, we were able to negotiate higher fees. Nobody would see these patients. And so we were able to solidify our stance in the market and get better fees, build relationships, and also really just figure out, okay, if this is the market that we're going to see, how many patients can a doctor see without being overwhelmed? And what are the things that these kids needed most, which was their dental cleaning? A lot of them had cavities and really hire the right team. And through word of mouth, honestly through our guest service, our customer service, we treated them like real people, like patients, like everybody should be treated. And that through word of mouth referral, that's how we grew so fast because there's a lot of offices that started taking Medicaid afterwards that started seeing special needs doing sedation dentistry, but they didn't have that customer service. They would treat them less than, and that goes a long way when you lead with love and that's how we were able to be successful.
Kim (07:54):
And talk to me, how did you decide that you were going to serve underserved populations? How did that become the focus of the practice?
Richelle (08:02):
My husband, when he was in his residency program in California, he saw the huge need that patients were literally traveling all over California, other states just to be seen. And it was his idea since he's the pediatric dentist, he saw the need initially, and I was on board, I was like, you know what? I see the need. There's definitely something that we could do here if we just followed what every other dentist did, worked Monday through Thursday, played golf on Fridays, not open on Saturdays. Let me tell you, we wouldn't be as successful. So not only did we see state Medicaid, we saw children with special needs, did hospital dentistry. We were open on Saturdays and Fridays and late evenings. And at first we got a lot of pushback from our team, from doctors that would join us, but we had to know that they wanted to be with our company to serve the children because parents work until five. So we were open six 30 and we were open eight to two on Saturdays and still are now. So when you're thinking of business, you can't just copy somebody next door, you have to do something that stands out. And that's where it evolved from, was seeing the need all the way in California, came back to Florida and saw the same need here.
Kim (09:13):
I always laugh because I love corporate. Everyone here on the show works for themselves, but I do always really value the time that I had in media and in corporate. What are the things you felt like you really learned from corporate that just paid off so well as a business owner,
Richelle (09:28):
The number one thing that I learned was team culture is really being a servant leader. It goes such a long way, and it was definitely, especially in the medical field where sometimes, and if you're listening and if you're a doctor, sometimes doctors think they're God and they could talk down to people, to their patients, to their employees. And I learned that being a servant leader, we had so much more of an impact. When we would talk to our team and say, Hey, you guys are frontline. Tell us what's stupid. What's a stupid policy or process that you think we could do better? And when they would tell us and we'd implement it, let me tell you the buy-in and the drive and the positive attitude, that is something that I learned from corporate, especially at Target. You have to be fast, fun and friendly. And I literally took that and I was like, look, nobody's being forced to work here, so if you come to work and you have a bad attitude, then this might not be the place for you. And we were very, very slow to hire and quick to fire.
Kim (10:29):
Yeah, that's really interesting. I was a manager in media and I actually got to, it was like, I like to think I got to build my own business within an existing business on someone else's dime, which is good, but I got to hire everybody. And I think you're right about team culture. I was always very clear, I'm like, we're all going to work really hard. We're basically a startup within an existing organization. I had to fight with it to get materials. People didn't understand video. It was in an existing print media magazine area. And I'm like, we're going to be fighting against some just natural flow misunderstandings. People don't know who we are, what we do. We're not at a TV company, we're a video unit in a print magazine business, so there are things we're going to do. And I said, we're going to work really hard, but you're all going to be respected.
(11:11):
We're going to have fun. And if you have a problem, you come to me. There's no chitter chatter amongst yourself, negativity like that. No, and I think the other thing is to your point about this team culture is always giving respect. So I felt like people are going to come here, even if it's your second job out, I'm going to talk to you about the bigger picture goals. Even if you're the assistant, you should be knowing how you're contributing to this larger company. I think a lot of times, especially when you're starting, you're kind of like, what's the point? Or this tedious or these hours are long, but you're a part of a larger thing. Building something and bringing people on to that point of team culture, making us all feel like we're rowing in the same direction on the same boat,
Richelle (11:50):
Yeah, we would always say that we need to all row together. And one of our guiding principles is there is no I in team, every single person's role is important. And we made everybody feel valued important. And it's not just about raises and the extra dollar that someone is going to give you if you switch from our company. We made sure that we listened and that we led with love and as leaders, our admin team, whoever we hired, we sat on the bottom and it was an inverse pyramid where we were uplifting them and saying, what is it that you need from us? What can we do to make your job easier here? And I think they really valued that. And something that we would always say is, our team comes first and our patients will naturally come first. So people always say, customer's always right For us, we led by example. If there was something that the customer was disrespecting our team member and we would evaluate the situation, we have had times not many where we've had to dismiss a patient because they were just rude. And that really created that loyalty. And when you have intrapreneurs working in your company, that was gold.
Kim (13:01):
I love that. And we were talking about the boat. The boat metaphor is like we all have to row in the same direction. And if you row in the opposite direction, throwing you off the boat, you're off the boat. That's it. You're capsized. Talk to me about, I know your parents were entrepreneurs. Tell me about what you saw growing up and how that impacted your journey.
Richelle (13:19):
Man, when you become an entrepreneur, you look back and you reflect of why you are the person that you are today. And I really started having this intro back when I wrote the book is my parents were nurses. They came from the Philippines, a lot of Filipino nurses here. There was a need. And my dad, again, he saw a need to build a nursing agency and he staffed some of the biggest hospitals in Miami. And so growing up I saw my mom. My mom is very similar to me. She's a hustler, she's a networker. She loves, she gives gives. And I would see her making gift baskets for all the hospital CEOs to thank them for using her company. And naturally I saw that, and I am such a giver. I give more than I take. And I think people see that and they see that there's no hidden agenda.
(14:11):
And from my dad, he was like, the brains okay, he's more quiet, kind of like my husband. My husband would never do marketing, never go on tv. And I really see a lot of will and I in my parents because it takes two of different personalities to work together because if we're both so extroverted and great at marketing, then where's the strategist? Where's the one? Looking at the finances, eventually I had to learn everything. But with my parents, I kind of saw the same thing. And growing up as entrepreneurs, we were able to go on vacation for a whole month and leave here. And my friends were like, how are you leaving for a month? I'm like, I don't know. My parents own a business, not a job.
Kim (14:51):
Yeah, it's funny because how we grew up, I think we see it and it impacts us and sometimes in ways we don't expect it. So my dad was an immigrant and he had his own business and he worked so hard and was always so tired. And I'm like, that doesn't look that fun. And of course now I have run my own business, but I was like, oh. And I've always been a super hustler and a super hard worker. And I think what I've realized over time is that you're going to work really hard. And so I can't turn off the hustle aspect of myself, but now I'm in control and I reap all the benefits. I mean, I reap, I have all the risks, but I reap all the benefits of how hard I work, how much I want to help people, how much I put myself out there.
(15:30):
And so I think it's accepting what part that you saw that is intrinsic to you and what lessons you took away. So I did see him work so hard in some parts of it I was like, I'm sure he probably wants to relax a little bit more. So I do make sure to create more balance in my life because I saw that being a small business owner is not all just control and freedom and money. It's really a lot of hard work and you are proud of it and you have to set an example for all the people in your office and for anyone who working for you. But I do think as I've started this podcast and talked to more entrepreneurs, it's made me look back at a little bit about my parents and their journey. And my dad, before he passed away, he was so proud because all three of his kids were running their own businesses and he was so proud. And I was like, yeah, actually that is cool. I was like, alright. But I think the element of just the hustle, I'm the same. I don't know if it's genetic or if your parents's an immigrant and they hustle, they don't know anything else. So you also have that,
Richelle (16:37):
You touch on something so important. I think the difference between our parents as immigrants being entrepreneurs and ourselves being entrepreneurs, our parents were in a new country, they didn't go to school here, and so they hustled. And I saw the same thing with my mom. I'm like, oh my God, my mom, even though we traveled, she's always on the phone. She would come home late. She was hustling and working hard. And for us, I see now the second generation of entrepreneurs myself, well, I saw that she already built the bridge for us to say, you know what? We went to school in America. We know the language. I think it's a little bit easier in that sense and also that work-life balance as an immigrant work-life balance. But they had to make it. This was a new country for them. And so for us, it's easier to be like, oh mom, you didn't have work-life balance. No, Richelle, I was trying to send home money to the Philippines while taking care of you guys. And she's like, you have it easy. You don't have to send money back home to anybody. There's no other person you're trying to support. And so it's that introspect that you're like, yeah, you're right. It's almost selfish to think now my parents were working so hard, but we're working hard, but in a different category I guess.
Kim (17:48):
And then you also think about all the nuances of communication when you're new to a country. It's language, but it's also all of those subconscious, nuanced cultural class issues that it's a really big deal. So not just, it's your accent, your foreign, blah, blah, blah. It's all the other things of not really understanding these things that we growing up here just take for granted. But to your point, you just said something about how we raise balance. It's funny, my mom, she was home with Buzz for a little while, but was also a journalist and then went back to law school and we were in middle school and she had this cable news show, and recently, six months ago, I asked her, I said, wait a second, mom, if we didn't really have babysitters and we were little, how did you have some cable news show that you won some award for?
(18:34):
And she's like, well, I would get a babysitter for two hours. And that's when I would do the show. And I'm like, what? And it's like, it's actually when you want to make something happen, you make it happen. You just figure out a way. But it took me so many years to actually ask that question. I'm like, wait a second, how did that work? How did that work? But anyway, okay, I want to get back to business owners. So I love hearing advice from other people who've built businesses. So talk to me about, for other entrepreneurs, I know that one of the things you say is entrepreneurship is not for the week, and there is that element of failure that's inherent to it. How do you think entrepreneurs can take that knowledge and use it to make them more resilient, less disappointed and all of that?
Richelle (19:18):
Building a really strong mindset, and it's easy to be like, oh, you have to build a strong mindset, but that requires you to learn. What does it take to build a strong mindset? I read a book, the Emotional Intelligence, talking about having a high eq. If something bad happens, you could sit there and cry about it. But I always say for three days, for three days, whether it was in your control or not in your control, once you pass three days, just as a healthcare professional, you can start spiraling and get into depression and start getting in your head. And so it's really important that whatever entrepreneur you want to be, know that it really requires effort and you have to find a way out, whether it's talking to a therapist, running, exercising, because if not, you could really go into a dark hole and sometimes it's really hard to get out of there.
Kim (20:09):
Yeah, I love that idea. I work a lot of times with people on how to build confidence to be on camera. And what I've realized is so much of that it's not just the technical skills, it's so much of a mindset shift. And the mindset shift is the same for entrepreneurs. It's just saying, it's really not just saying, oh, fake it till you make it. You have to believe it, fake it till you make it doesn't really work. You're not rewiring your brain, you're not actually doing the internal work. You're kind of mimicking someone else. It can work, it can be perceived in a superficial way as confidence, but you actually have to process it. And so much of that mindset work accepting, I think accepting that X percent of sales calls will be nos, that's normal. And to balance that whole thing of how do I get more yeses, but also it's okay, I got the nos.
(20:58):
It's actually kind of a nuanced thing when you think about it. It's like accept yourself, be kind to yourself, but also analyze yourself and see how you can do better. And it's like using these two sides of our brain, like the comforting side, the empathetic side, the nurturing side, but then the tough side that's like get back up, read a book, practice, get better. And so I think it's hard, and I feel like as a parent, I have to work on these own things and I talk to my kids about it. I'm like, well, you struggle with that. I struggle with this. I'm learning all these things, or I did this thing and I shouldn't have done it and I regret it. Or I have a project that's too hard or whatever. So I think it makes us better parents in the process as we fix on that. But anyway, I wanted to know some of your other advice for other business owners. What's some of your best advice for other business owners?
Richelle (21:40):
So for other business owners, and something that I use for myself is stop comparing yourself and stop looking at what other people are doing. So when I ran the dental business, my main role, which was a big one, is getting butts in the seat, getting patients into the door. And my husband and the clinical team, they would take it after that. And I didn't look at what was this doctor doing? What are they doing? I would look at Nike, I would look at Disney, I would follow and emulate. How are we going to be different in our marketing strategy? Know who your client is. So once you know who they are, where do they hang out? How can you be different? I was just talking to somebody today and her clients are entrepreneurs, maybe I'm going through anxiety and therapy. And I told her, why don't you partner with therapists that are dealing with high level executives, entrepreneurs?
(22:31):
Because at the end of the day, we're the ones who have a lot of stress. So my biggest advice amongst so many is number one is making sure that you don't compare yourself to, and I know it's cliche to say don't compare yourself to someone's chapter 10. I'm back at chapter one, building a new business with my husband all over again. And I don't sit here and compare myself with other people who are in chapter 10. What I do is I follow them and I see what are they doing good, but how can I be better? And so I think that's key is staying in your lane.
Kim (23:05):
Yeah. So talk to me about the the following, but not comparing. Explain that a little more like that. You're looking at people, but how do you get out of comparison mode? Talk to me about that.
Richelle (23:13):
Yeah, I'm watching people to see, oh, what are they doing different? What makes me like their content? But I don't copy them in a sense that, okay, if they did a video on this, I'm going to do a video on this. I'm really good at following people at what they do best and making it my own and not comparing like, oh my God, how do they do X, Y, and Z? My mindset is so strong, my confidence is so strong that I'm like, you know what? I may be here, but I know I'm going to be there one day. And it just takes baby steps. And remembering that everybody starts with one client. Everybody starts with their first TV interview. I mean, when we spoke a year ago, I had never dreamed of ever being on tv. And I would look at people, I'm like, oh my God, how did they get tv? How did they do their interview So good. But when I realized when I got to that point, I'm like, you know what? I'm going to work hard. I'm going to learn what I need to do. I'm going to get training so that I can catch up but not compare myself to them.
Kim (24:14):
So I feel like you're very confident, but were you always confident? Because I feel like it's easy to say to someone else, just be confident, but it seems like you've always been confident that's something you worked on or it's natural.
Richelle (24:22):
Oh my God, no. It's definitely something that I have completely worked on. I posted about this the other day and I didn't get into Stanford for my residency. And those moments when doors are shut on you, it kind of takes a toll on your confidence and you're like, what? I'm smart. I thought I did good on the interview. And I realized that it's because God was closing the door for a better opportunity. And the confidence comes from knowing that I can control what I can control. I can't control what the outside world thinks of me, what doors are closed. And that mindset, it's definitely grown over the years, but it's from a lot of nos. And when I would go to doctor's offices to do doctor runs and they're like, no, we don't need another dentist, I would say, okay, no problem. And I would go to 20 and maybe two said yes. And that helped build my confidence.
Kim (25:15):
Yeah, I love the idea of repetition, building confidence. I feel like I'm someone who's always been confident in certain ways and in others, not at all. And what builds that is just doing more of it. I had a jewelry business in my twenties, and I don't think of myself as a particularly sensitive person. I'm not super touchy feely, but I'm sensitive when people say, no, I'm sensitive when something bad happens or if I have a job that crushes my self-esteem. But I think that if you work really hard, you have accomplishments that you can then look at. So when I advise my clients who are trying to do things to build up their confidence, I'm like, write down the things you did. Look at that objectively. Those are cool. And so I think those are the sort of things that I look at. I'm like, okay, even if this didn't go well, or even if it got rejected for that, or even if that project said no or that client said no, step back like, oh my God, I just spoke at Fast Company Innovation Festival this year.
(26:03):
Like, oh my God, I just created a really great coaching program in one year that's going great. That's because I'm just working really, really hard. But also knowing when you work hard, you will build up the experiences and some of those will be positive and some of those will be negative, but you get stronger from the negatives. That is how you really learn how to do it better. And if everything is always so perfect, you're not really learning anything. That's one of the things I'm like, you're not learning anything. If everything is like, oh, well, I was born in a palace and then the butler brought me my breakfast on a silver platter, and then now I'm the queen, and you're like, okay, that's great. So it's not like that. You get that stronger mindset and that perseverance, just doing more things. And to your point of getting all those no's is like, I hate sales calls.
(26:48):
I think I'm garbage of sales calls. And then this quarter, a few of my clients are like, you're so good at sales. I'm like, really? I don't think I'm good at sales. I just think I'm honest. I'm like, I'm honest. And also I'm at this point, I've had hundreds of people come through my one-on-one and my group coaching. I'm so confident in the transformation that people will see that I don't feel like I'm doing sales. I'm just like, well, if you want this output, this is what you should do. And if your answer is no, okay, no problem. But it's funny, I don't think of myself as good at that stuff, but the repetition breeds the building that muscle, and then that breeds the confidence. And even if you don't have confidence, you at least have strength.
Richelle (27:21):
And you know what? I think what you mentioned is it's the confidence muscles. And it's same thing as being a parent with our kids. They work so hard at something, and in order to gain confidence, you got to live outside your comfort zone. You got to do something uncomfortable. And when you do it enough, you build those muscles and when you look back, you're like, oh my God, I did it. My daughter, for example, dance. I think dance is such a great thing for girls because you start off not knowing how to do tap dance or ballet. And then you come out of the year, and I've seen my little one, her confidence has gone so high because she's like, oh my god, mommy, a move that I didn't know how to do now I could do. And I'm like, one thing that I want to give my kids is confidence, or teach them confidence is by showing them how they started.
(28:08):
They didn't know how to do it, and now they come out even stronger. And those are the little confidence buckets. And I think that's why being a leader is so important, not only at work, but at home because you build a new set of kids, I feel like these days are kind of cuddled, and I could say this, we ran a dental office, kids are the boss, the parents aren't the boss. The kids are telling the parents what to do. They're entitled, not all. And I am very keen on that. So I want to make sure that my kids have confidence because life is hard and you're going to get nos, and you're not going to be number one all the time. It's so important. But doing things that are uncomfortable that pushes you outside your comfort zone is really how you gain those confidence muscles.
Kim (28:55):
I tell my kids, especially my daughter who's very different from me in terms of just being, she's just a little more reserved and more going on in her head that's not as out in the world. She'll be afraid to do something and then afterwards I'll be like, I'm so proud of you because you did it because you were scared and you didn't want to do it, and then you did it. That's what being brave is. She used to be really shy and would never do karaoke. And then one day at a diner, there was family karaoke at the diner, and she got up and sang, and I was like, oh my God, that's so brave. And I said, that girl over there who loves doing it, she's not brave. That's her hobby. But for you to feel the discomfort and still do it, that's courage. And so I really work on that about being like, even though it's scary, do, and that's how you build up those, and then you have that narrative to tell yourself, okay, we could talk for another year, but we won't because this is a podcast. So talk to me about your Booker shelf.
Richelle (29:50):
Oh my God, I'm so excited. My husband and I, we co-authored a book, the Power Couple, navigating the Rollercoaster of Business while Raising a Family. And the reason why we both wrote this book together is really to show other healthcare professionals, anybody in business who may be wanting to work with a business partner or with their spouse, it is not easy, and you have to have certain qualities that make it work, but also, especially if you work with your spouse, you have to still love each other at home, be okay with your kids. And I do believe that we were able to successfully do it, although there was bumps in the roads, and there was two times where I quit. I'm going back to pharmacy, but we knew that we needed each other to make it work. And it all came down to communication. And our book not only does it talk about how to work together as a couple, it really is a good entrepreneurial book.
(30:47):
We put our secrets out there of what made us successful, what made our company different, our vision, how do you even create a vision, a mission? How do you build a team culture? And we also talked about some of our down moments where I almost had to sell my wedding ring and go back to work as a pharmacist within three months of being open because we didn't know business. And so it's a really great book of talking about how we were still able to take 40 days of vacation, not own a business, and worry that the business is going to burn down when we're gone. If you're always working in the business and you can't ever leave, then you actually own a job, not a business. So hopefully this book gives people encouragement that you can have life outside of your work, but it also takes a lot of different knowledge to run a business. Entrepreneurship, as you know, it's so difficult dealing with contractors, but I think the main thing is if you lead with love and you have a strong purpose and you're not chasing money, you can't chase money and you'll read it in our book. A lot of it has to talk about our team, the love for what we were doing for the community, and we felt like God paid us 10 times forward and we became better parents at the end of the day.
Kim (32:07):
Awesome. And Richelle, where can people connect with you?
Richelle (32:10):
Yes, they could follow me on Instagram, Richelle Pena. I love Instagram. I put great stories and also talk about how I live my life as a parent, as an entrepreneur, and also I'm building something new. It's so scary. And so I walk people through my journey and also Richelle pena.com to find out more about the online healthcare course.
Kim (32:31):
Awesome. Oh yes. Sorry. Before we go, tell us about the online healthcare course you're building.
Richelle (32:35):
Yes. This all evolved because I've been in this online world and I've been seeing, there's a lot of courses that are so helpful. I've bought some myself, just a quick learn. And for healthcare professionals in particular, our niche doctors, you learn the body, you learn the teeth. I learn drugs, how they work in your body. But when you get out of school, now you have to run a team, do marketing, run a business that they don't teach you in school, especially in the healthcare professions field. And so this online course is literally our secret to our success. It's we use an MVP three method to teach the online course, and it's really, really amazing. It's videos, it's storytelling, but it also is teaching them how to read a profit and loss statement, how to build a culture, how do you even build a vision? And so we're so excited to help other healthcare professionals really take a little bit of the load off and say, you know what? You may be scared to become an entrepreneur, but it's so doable with the right tools.
Kim (33:42):
I love that. Richelle, what a great conversation. Thank you so much for joining me.
Richelle (33:45):
Thank you so much, Kim, for having me on.
Kim (33:51):
Thank you for joining us. Don't forget to exit the grind and enter success on your own terms. This is the exit interview with Kim Rittberg. Don't forget to grab my free download, how to Grow Your Business with Amazing video at kimrittberg.com and linked out in the show notes. I love to hear your feedback. Make sure to submit to me what you learned from the show and how your crushing it on your own terms. Connect with me on Instagram or LinkedIn at Kim Rittberg, R-I-T-T-B-E-R-G. And this show is edited by Jillian Grover and produced by Henry Street Media. I'm your host and executive producer Kim Rittberg.