Ep.68/ Building a Billion-Dollar Business: TransPerfect Co-Founder Liz Elting

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Liz Elting is truly a star of the business world: she’s one of Forbes’ Richest Self-Made Women, an entrepreneur and a philanthropist. She co-founded TransPerfect, the number one translation company in the world–starting it from an NYU dorm room and is going to share her tips on how to grow your business, the reality of what you need to give up and how she balanced growing the business with being a parent. Her book Dream Big and Win: Translating Passion into Purpose and Creating a Billion-Dollar Business is full of personal stories and also tangible, concrete tips that you can apply.

Plus I talk about speaking at and leading a workshop for the Fast Company Innovation Festival in New York City entitled The Secrets to Creating Social Video That Gets Noticed. I share a little behind the scenes of my speaking career, how I book speaking gigs, how I prepare for the speech and the content I’m capturing… and how it went!

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Are you ready to scale your business but you aren’t sure how to do it? Do you wish someone who has been there would share all their advice with you?

In this episode you will learn:

Scaling your business and the importance of having goals
Why confidence in yourself is the key to success
Sacrifices you have to make to grow your business

Quotes from our guest:

“Your first million is by far the toughest and then sort of the first five million is the second toughest and then it gets so much easier after that because you really have the infrastructure.”
“I had no reason to think I was going to be able to create my dream company out of my NYU dorm room, except I thought I will give it everything I have.”
“The key to success to scaling the business really is actions driven by goals with deadlines.”
“You want to hire people smarter than yourself.”
“Work today like no one else will, so you can live and give tomorrow like no one else can.”

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GUEST LINKS:

Get your copy of Dream Big and Win: Translating Passion into Purpose and Creating a Billion-Dollar Business by Liz Elting: Click Here!

Liz Elting’s website

Kim (00:02):

Our guest has landed herself on the list of Forbes, richest, self-made women, and she's sharing all her secrets to success. Plus she's just a really awesome person. Liz Elting is here. Make sure to listen to this episode.

(00:17):

Welcome to the Exit interview with Kim Rittberg, the go-to resource that celebrates people who are working for themselves and crushing it while still having fun or at least not being miserable. Each week you'll get motivation, inspiration, and action. Every Wednesday I'll invite a self-employed rockstar founder or business owner to share concrete tips you can apply today across business development, revenue growth, finance, marketing, publicity, sales and social media, content creation, all the ingredients to grow your business, and a little bit about wellness, happiness, and balance. Plus, you'll hear the ins and outs of how they built their own lucrative businesses and found success on their own terms. And every Friday you'll get a solo snackable episode, basically a masterclass on brand building, video and podcasting from me and it's free. I'm Kim Rittberg. I had a high profile executive job in media and I loved it.

(01:12):

I worked at Netflix, US Weekly, Fox and more. But when I found myself in the hospital working during my son's birth, I thought is this success? So I quit corporate, but I have to fight through the fear and imposter syndrome to launch my own digital marketing business. But it's now wrapped up six awards. I've been featured in Fast Company and Business Insider, and I now have a national speaking career. I get to teach business owners like you how to grow their business through video, and it is so rewarding. All in all, it's been worth it. So if you're ambitious and self-employed, a founder, entrepreneur, coach, real estate agent, consultant, or solo practitioner, and you're looking to grow your business while achieving that elusive work-life balance, it exists. I promise. This is your show. Don't forget to hit the subscribe button.

(02:04):

Super important favor, please tell two people you know to listen to the show and don't forget to hit the follow button. And as for me, I just spoke at Fast Company's Innovation Festival. It was such a rush. I always love speaking, but I am a huge over preparer. Basically, I do drafts of what I'm going to say. I practice a lot, even if it's something similar to what I've done in the past. I practice with a coach. I record myself a bunch. I just keep doing it. I order different outfits usually from Rent the Runway, I pick my favorite. I take pictures of how I look in it because it's about the speech, but also you're capturing content from it. So you want to make sure it looks good later and you're not like, oh, I don't wear that color. It's an awful color. So the speech went awesome.

(02:46):

I taught Secrets to Making Social video that gets noticed, and it was in New York City, my hometown. So my mom and my oldest brother came, which is incredibly fantastic and rare because I'm usually traveling for these speaking gigs. So my family can't really come and they have been such a support system forever, even before I was married with kids and now I have a different additional support system. It's just really awesome to have them join me. And I've also been asked Kim, how do you get these opportunities? How do you get speaking opportunities? How are you asked to be on all these podcasts? And the answer is a really strong content strategy. It is not a coincidence. I have a very specific strategy. I put my name and specifically my message that I've honed in all places, podcasts, video, social media, in the press. And I know how to do this because I was a TV news producer, a journalist for about 10 years.

(03:40):

I shifted over time into more creative TV and then digital video, social media. So I use all that. I put that all together, my experience at Inside Edition, Fox, Netflix People Magazine, all of these places. I put that together and now I apply it to myself and to my clients. So if you are looking to become a thought leader through video and podcasts, make sure to reach out to me. And now you have such an amazing guest today, Liz Elting is truly a star of the business world. She co-founded TransPerfect the number one translation company in the world, and she started it from a dorm room. She's going to share her tips on how to grow your business, the reality of what you need to give up. She'll share the sexism she experienced in her very first job and how she balanced growing the business with being a parent.

(04:25):

And she just came out with her book Dream Big and Win. It is an incredible read. It's full of personal stories and also tangible, concrete tips that you can apply. She got blurb by all these well-known names like Mike Bloomberg and Cheryl Sandberg and Anne Huffington. Without further ado, let's get into it. Alright, this is going to be an amazing interview. We have such a superstar on the show, Liz Elting. The amount of awards that I'm about to read is basically going to blow your mind. She is the founder and c e o of the Elizabeth Elting Foundation. She's an entrepreneur, a business leader, a lingua file. I love that, philanthropist, feminist and mother. After living, studying and working in five countries across the globe, Liz founded TransPerfect out of an N Y U dorm room in 1992. She served as its co CEO until 2018.

(05:12):

And TransPerfect is the world's largest language solutions company with over $1.1 billion in revenue and offices in more than a hundred cities worldwide. That is unbelievable. Liz received the 2019 Charles Waldo Haskins Award for business and public Service from nyu, CERN School of Business, the American Heart Association's 2020 Health Equity Leadership Award, basically a million other awards. She's been recognized as a now woman of power and influence, American Express and Entrepreneurs Magazine, woman of the Year, and one of Forbes richest self-made women every single year since the list's inception. And guess what? She wrote a book. It's coming out Dream Big and Win, translating Passion into Purpose and creating a billion dollar business. Liz, I'm so excited to have you here,

Liz (05:58):

Kim. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you so much for having me. I

Kim (06:02):

Mean, your bio is just like, I was like everything is more and more and more. You've done so you're so impressive and so amazing. I want to jump right into it's 1992 and you started TransPerfect. What made you start TransPerfect? I know you were young, you were right out of your business school. Tell me a little bit about what made you start your company.

Liz (06:23):

Well, I had always loved languages growing up. I had studied four languages by the time I graduated from high school, majored in languages in college, which was wonderful. And then I was fortunate to live in Portugal in Canada and then during college in Spain and then after college in Venezuela. So loved languages and all that was international. Shortly after graduating from college, I got a job at a company, which at the time was the largest translation company in the industry, although it wasn't very big, it was about 90 people. So I thought perfect a way to combine my passion for languages and my interest in business. So I did that job for three years. I was first in production and then in sales and thought, I absolutely love this industry. And I see there's, there could be a big need for this industry going forward because this was the late eighties.

(07:14):

It was really the beginning of globalization. So I thought, I love it, but I think it can be done better. I thought there was a real gap between what clients needed and what was available in the industry in terms of service quality and a real one-stop shop. So I ended up going shortly thereafter to get my M B A from N Y U after working at this other company for three years and loved it N Y U I thought I should try majoring in finance because it was very practical and international business because I loved all that was international and business. So right after getting this M B A, I thought, what do I want to do? And I was able to get a job in the proprietary trading division of a French bank and I thought, great, that's a way to try out finance, which is supposed to be so exciting and lucrative.

(08:04):

And it's what 70% of the people I graduated with from Stern did. Everyone wanted to be an investment banker back then. So I thought, I will try this. Got the job. And I arrived at the bank and the first thing I noticed is I was the only woman in my role. I was the only woman with a newly minted M B A in finance. And I got there and I thought, okay, well I will learn this industry, I will deal with this. And the first thing that happened when I sat down and got to work was whenever the phone rang my bosses and basically everyone around me would yell Liz phone. And I couldn't believe it. I thought, wait, I have this job in equity arbitrage. I have my M B A in finance and international business. Why me? And clearly it was because I was the one wearing the skirt to work.

(08:52):

I was the woman. So that was incredibly frustrating. But I worked hard. I came in at seven. I worked till midnight every day because I was ambitious and I thought, I'm going to prove myself in this job. And I got my work done and then I went back to my boss and said, I'm learning a lot, I'm getting a lot done, but is there any other work you have for me? Anything else I can learn and any other way I can contribute? And he said, well, you could go around to the guys and ask them if there are any supplies they need, anything you can order for them and check out the supply closet while you're at it and then you can place that order. I thought, oh no, this is not what I signed on for. So in addition to that, I realized this was not the translation industry.

(09:35):

I had loved the language industry for so many reasons. I loved languages, combining languages and business solving clients' problems. And I loved the family of people that were at the company I was working with. I loved the culture of the company. So I thought, this is the time, this is my aha moment. I can do this better. As I was saying, I had seen a gap between what was needed and what was available in the industry. So at that moment, after about four weeks, I went to my boss and said, I'm sorry, I made a huge mistake. How much time do you need? And he said, Liz, two weeks is fine. So after six weeks I quit and started TransPerfect.

Kim (10:11):

I love so many things about this story. So I think people who are entrepreneurs, maybe it's just a lack of fear or just a lot of confidence. Did you feel as you started TransPerfect like, I can do this. I know that I can build this business. Or were you questioning how confident were you when you started it like this was going to work?

Liz (10:31):

Well, the answer is I was extremely scared, fearful, thought. This may not work, I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm going to give it everything I have. It's funny, I had no reason to think I was going to be able to create my dream company, the billion dollar company out of the N Y U dorm room, except I thought I will give it everything I have. And I saw my peers from business school, they were in finance, they were in marketing, and I thought, but I know I love the industry. I know there's a need to for it. And I thought, I will just outwork them because if I'm going to do this translation company thing, I want to do it better. I want to create the biggest and the best. And when we started, there were 10,000 translation companies out there at the time, but they were started and run by translators who were extremely talented, but they were busy doing the translation work and building the company. And I thought, you can only be so big if you're busy translating all day. That's very high level labor intensive work. So I thought this is a new idea going to be business people building the company with the talent of the linguists. But no, I was definitely nervous, definitely under confident. Absolutely.

Kim (11:47):

I know you started it when you were kind of in this N Y U college dorm room scenario. I love the early scrappy years of a business. Tell me about what those early years were like. I assume you didn't have an office, you didn't have business cards. What did those early years look like?

Liz (12:03):

Oh, the early years were crazy. For example, there we were in that N Y U business school dorm room, tiny dorm room, not attractive at all and working 14 hours a day. And I remember going to my coffee machine there thinking I need a cup of coffee to keep me up. I got four hours sleep last night, five hours sleep. I opened it up and a crazy number of cockroaches just streamed out of it. I was just like, oh gosh. Oh gosh, this is not the dream. This is not what I want. And it was really at that moment I thought, okay, got to get out of this dorm room. This is where goals come in. My goal is to sell enough to be able to pay for an office within six months. And that was really precisely the moment where I said, we need to be out of this dorm room in six months and I'm going to make sure we sell enough where we accomplish that goal where we're able to do that.

Kim (13:00):

I love that you just mentioned goal setting. I know it's an important part of your ethos. I think so many people think of the mythology of the founder and of building a business and it seems very interesting and glamorous, but a lot of it's really just about the work you do. Talk to me about goal setting and the importance of that.

Liz (13:17):

Sure. Well, I really think the key to building an incredible successful company or the key to being wildly successful is goals combined with deadlines.

Kim (13:29):

Alright, Liz, I want to hear more about those dorm room stories.

Liz (13:33):

Great. Well, it was pretty crazy in those first six months. I remember when we first got a job, our very first project, and I was beyond thrilled, and this was back in the day where there wasn't email. So upon finishing the project, I remember calling the client up and saying, it's ready. And she said, great. She said, I would love to stop by your office, check out the operation and meet you and pick up the job. I thought, oh no, why are you doing that? Don't do that. But I couldn't tell her. So I remember I gave her the address, which was two Washington Square Village Suite to you. It was technically apartment to you, but called it two suite to you. And that's what we had printed on our word process, black and white marketing material. Anyway, basically ran downstairs, intercepted her before she checked in with the doorman, sorry to get to the dorm room to said, hi, wonderful to meet you, and here is your project.

(14:34):

So that was the first one. So she never did come upstairs, the second one basically. And the first one was an English and too Slovak document for a law firm, a small law firm. The second one was for G M I, which actually was the owner of Penthouse Magazine. And at first we thought, oh boy, a project for Penthouse Magazine. That's crazy. It turned out being the holding company for Penthouse Magazine. But that second client came also to pick up his project. Back then for some reason, everyone wanted to see the office Office. That doesn't happen now. People are working remotely now. But there was a knock on the door. I opened the door, it was client number two, and this is when we had a cat and the roaches and it was just the last thing we wanted. And he said, hi, I'm here to pick up my project. So another crazy story. So these along with the roaches made it clear we had to move into that office A S A P, and fortunately at the end of six months we were able to move into our first office.

Kim (15:35):

Talk to me about you go from starting this business, running this business, you're just out of business school and then it's a hundred million dollars company, then it's a $600 million company and that is a billion dollar company. What were the keys to scaling? What was the biggest key for you?

Liz (15:51):

The key to success to scaling the business really is actions driven by goals with deadlines. It's really that simple. It doesn't sound exciting or sexy, but is the most important thing because I think so many people have wonderful ideas like I want to build a world changing app, or I want to build a company that solves this problem or does this. But what they don't do is they don't say, okay, I am going to do what I need to do every day to make it happen. And in our case, it was making 300 phone calls a day, sending out 300 letters a day for many, many years basically for an extended period of time. And that got us to a million. And I do believe in revenue. I believe your first million is by far the toughest. And then after that to 5000001st 5 million is the second toughest. And then it gets so much easier after that you really have the infrastructure and it's much easier to get to the higher levels after that

Kim (16:57):

Because building the team and the infrastructure to even start growing two millions, then you're saying then you can kind of multiply that out once you have a strong infrastructure. But it's the really hardest building blocks are the beginning.

Liz (17:10):

Yes, it is. And to elaborate on that, there are a number of things I would say. So often entrepreneurs work in the business rather than on the business. You need to step back and think, okay, what is the company I want to create and what are the positions I need to fill? So certainly that's an important factor. The other thing that a lot of entrepreneurs do who have wonderful ideas and they even have the backend production and the infrastructure, what they're missing is the sales team. And it's so important that the key salesperson for your company is not you. If you're the entrepreneur, you need to build that sales team and grow that sales team really as quickly as possible because that's how you scale. And so that was a huge part of what differentiated us as compared to our competitors initially for the first few years, yes, we were the salespeople. I was a sales person. I dealt with every client. I remember JC Penny, our first million dollar client. I dealt with 75 individuals at JC Penny. So really I was the salesperson then. And then we had many other clients too. But as soon as possible after you have that million or a couple million in revenue, building that sales team, bringing them in and training them, developing them and retaining them is so critical.

Kim (18:34):

And I love that you're saying that because I think a lot of times when people build a company and it's their vision and they're so passionate about it and when they're selling, they feel like their passion comes out because they're the founder. But you have to hire people who will also be able to exude that passion, also be really committed to the company. I know you are very passionate about hiring and keeping good people and treating them well. I think to your point of scaling, to scale properly, you need a really good team. But to have and keep a good team, they need to be invested. They need to feel appreciated. They need to feel heard. They need to feel seen. So saying you need a great sales team is obviously so true it you've built a billion dollar company. But I think it also goes into another thing you're passionate about nurturing those people and making them feel as dedicated, as invested as the founder because a lot of people want to see the founder, but when you have a great sales team, they should be able to bring that passion and excitement as well.

Liz (19:29):

Oh, absolutely. And certainly, first of all, you want to hire people smarter than yourself. And obviously that was quite easy. Didn't have a problem with that. I found so many people who were so smart and so impressive. So I think that's one huge piece of it. Secondly, the way you set up their compensation system. I mean, to give you an example, early on we would hire a person or hire a person in another city. And when we first wanted to open these satellite offices and we'd say, okay, you're going to start a loan as we did on your own. When you sell $50,000 a month for three consecutive months, you can bring on a second person, an assistant, whatever you would call them after the two of you sell $120,000 a month for three consecutive months, you can bring on a third person. And when the three of you sell 190,000 for three consecutive months, you can bring on a fourth person and so on.

(20:25):

And that was how we scaled the company, that's how we grew it. And it was very important. We didn't have outside funding. And if you can do it outside funding, it's so much better for so many reasons. And the way we could internally or organically fund the company was through the revenue that I just talked about, the revenue people had, the revenue goal, they had to achieve it, and then they could add people. And of course that revenue slash profit would pay for those people. Another important point about how we scaled the company was I said, what if I had a boss here? What would I need to deliver to my boss to let him or her know how I was going to grow this company? I said, okay, well, opening offices is a great way to accomplish our goal of being the world's largest, the premier company in the industry, a billion dollar company.

(21:12):

So I said, okay, let's say we will open an office every quarter and then literally put together a plan, San Francisco, April 1st, and then went on each quarter throughout the year, a different office, Washington, dc, Atlanta, Chicago, every three months over an extended period of time. And then we did whatever we had to do to make sure we accomplished that objective. And that's really the whole issue with the goals and deadlines and making sure you actually do what's necessary. And I think you need to give up some things, some hobbies for an extended period of time, but it really pays off. And the last thing I'll say, because I think it's important, people think, well, how long do I want to give up my life for? And I get it, it can be intense, it can be grueling, and it is. But if you can create an environment where you have people who are as passionate as you are, and I talked about why are they that passionate?

(22:13):

Because you hire them and you set them up to be entrepreneurs too, as I was describing with the office, is they get to hire additional people and after they're selling a million or 5 million or 10 million in their office, they have bigger and bigger teams and they're the entrepreneurs and they're making more than they would elsewhere. And they really are having super exciting, interesting careers and working with people who work hard and play hard. And we certainly added that to our company as far as the culture as well. So that was very fun and exciting and interesting.

Kim (22:45):

And how long do you feel like an entrepreneur needs to sort of be tunnel vision? There's no hobbies, there's very little outside life. How long do you think that period needs to last?

Liz (22:54):

That is an amazing question because I was an entrepreneur for 26 years and it definitely got so much better. So much depends on the business and the situation. For me personally, it was probably about eight years. I know that sounds like a very long time to people, but that first eight year period was crazy, crazy hours for all of us. And along the way we learned and we learned how to keep the hours in check and importantly for the people we hired, keep their hours in check and still grow the company at first eight years were very tough as far as the hours and then I would say the next eight years from maybe years eight to 16, a lot more manageable and then after 16 years manageable beyond that. So I think it so much depends on the situation and I think it also depends on how big you really want to make your company.

(23:49):

But if you can do it in such a way where you love who you work with, where you have a great culture where it's interesting and exciting work, I think that's great. I also believe in compartmentalizing. I'm such a fan in compartmentalizing where you go in in the morning, whatever time it is, say it's 8 30, 8 30 to start the day, you worked super intensely during the day. And then at six o'clock or whatever the end time is, you shut it down, you leave, you get off email, you go home, you be with your family because you need that time with your family where it's quality time where you're off your devices and it's really all about them. And then of course when the kids go to bed, 10 30, 11, I mean actually most kids go to bed earlier than that. My kids somehow didn't go to bed till 10 30 or 11 every night.

(24:41):

So that was a bit crazy. But then you're back on it. And obviously that's important for your own emotional wellbeing, but also for anyone who works for you, they don't want to think they have to be on 24 7, so be intense during the day and then have a number of hours and then get back on email, whatever, 10 to 11 at night or whatever the time is for you. But I think that's so important because if they see you as the boss, if your employees see you as the boss doing it or their boss doing it or whatever, they're thinking, I don't want to be here. This is not sustainable. So it's important for you and to scale your company and the people who work with you.

Kim (25:19):

And talk to me about having your children during this basically rocket ship of growth that your company was having. Talk to me about becoming a parent at that time.

Liz (25:26):

Sure. And that's why I think I say the first eight years, my first son was born literally eight years after I started my company. And it was hard. I mean, it was a different time for me. It was particularly hard because I didn't get any maternity leave, not one day. And there were a number of reasons for that. And fortunately people are not in that situation now. It's wrong, can't be. I think it's super important for people joining a company that has the right family policies in place with good maternity or paternity leave and paternity leave. But then as an entrepreneur, putting those policies in place at your own company. And then of course succession planning. It's one of the things that gets neglected even at the biggest and best companies. And certainly in our case with our company eight years into it, we didn't have that set up.

(26:19):

That is obviously a super important piece of it so that if you're off for maternity leave for three months or whatever time it be, you have someone who can step in and take over for you and doesn't miss a beat with the clients. So that's so incredibly important. And of course that's important in any business long-term outside of maternity leave, you need that if someone, whatever gets hit by a bus quits, whatever it, but I think related to the mom question, it was hard because I didn't go on proper maternity leave. I always felt guilty when I was working and not with my kids. I longed to be with my kids. I wanted to be with my kids even though I loved building the company and growing the company and working with really interesting, ambitious, fun people. And then when I was with my kids, I felt like, oh my gosh, I should be at this event or I should be at this conference.

(27:13):

So I think working mothers always feel guilt, right? You can't avoid it, but then when you look back, you think it was worth it. I think kids so often appreciate it, and I hear that from my kids. I also think it's wonderful if women during motherhood, can it keep at least a toe in or something so that they don't stop and then have trouble getting back. And I saw it, I saw it with women who stopped working then when their kids went off to kindergarten or went off to middle school or went to high school, they had trouble getting back in. So I think keeping a foot in or at least a toe in is very valuable. And I think it makes women happier if by chance they don't though that's okay too. There are so many people who are starting companies or doing what they've always dreamed of when they become empty nesters.

(28:04):

And that's wonderful because sometimes those careers can be even better because they don't think, okay, I need to set something up where I'm making a certain amount of money because I need to make sure I can pay for college. I can pay the bills that issue. So I pick the practical thing instead of where my passion is. Or I need something where the hours are nine to three because my kids are at home. And that can get in the way of someone pursuing their passion number one or throwing themselves in all in so they can really build it into something huge. So I think their advantages of waiting, not waiting, but if by chance you are looking for something when your kids go off to college, that's an amazing time to do that second act and do what you've always dreamed of.

Kim (28:55):

Liz, you had mentioned that your kids do appreciate seeing you as a mom and working hard. Can you talk to me about that, about experiences that you've had, realizing that your kids do appreciate it?

Liz (29:05):

Yes, I will. As guilty as we feel as moms saying goodbye and going off to work. My younger son has said to me, and this is even recently, he said, mom, remember all those years you would take me to school, drop me off at eight 15 and you'd be there in your dress or your suit and your heels, and you were the only mom doing that. And all the other women were in their workout clothes. He said, mom, I was so proud of you and I am so glad you did that, and hopefully I can marry someone who does the same thing.

Kim (29:41):

That is so sweet. It's always so great when you have those moments where your kids really show up and sort of appreciate you in words and in actions. It seems like you're nodding. You're nodding. What are the other things that have happened that you felt appreciated?

Liz (29:55):

Oh, yes, my kids are and were amazing and they taught me so much along the way, but they also were there to support me. And even though we talk about the challenge of working and having kids at the same time and young kids at the same time, I remember one time, boy, my son really showed up for me. I had had this terrible situation at work and came home in tears, didn't know how to handle it, and my son saw me and he's like, mom, mom, what's wrong? Are you okay? And I said, sorry, Jay, just really bad day at work. And he said, okay, mom, I'm so sorry. And then he said, I'll be back in a few minutes. I'll be right back. He disappeared for about 10 minutes, went in the other room and then he came back. He said, mom, check your emails.

(30:48):

I opened my emails and there was this beautiful note from him basically just saying, mom, I know some days are really hard and it looks like you had a tough one, but this is my advice for when you're having a bad day. This is what you can do to feel better. And then he finished it off by saying, and mom, just know above all your family is here to support you and be here for you every step of the way, especially me love Jay. And I was just so wowed, so touched because his advice was great, and above all his support was amazing.

Kim (31:22):

Oh my God, I just got such goosebumps. Thank you so much for sharing that beautiful story. I'd love to know from your perspective, what are the qualities that makes a great entrepreneur?

Liz (31:32):

The same ones actually that tend to make a great employee or a great leader, but I think it's being ambitious and willing to take risks. Of course, willing to take risks because you never know how it's going to work out. You give it everything you have, but most entrepreneurs ultimately don't make it, and that's okay because they learn and then they just get themselves back up and do it again. So the willingness to take risks I think is very important. I think the willingness to think big and look at what's being done wrong and how it can be done better and coming up with ideas, not just looking at the status quo, but thinking outside the box and then being ambitious and thinking big. I think that's super important. I think being curious is so important for all of us. I think critical, I think being innovative slash proactive, which is obviously kind of alludes to thinking outside the box.

(32:28):

And then I just think putting in the hours, the grit, the not quitting, the outworking everybody else. I think that's so important because sure, we all to create an incredibly successful company and still have all the other pieces of the pie that we love, but it's hard to do it all at the same time. So it's the willingness to put those aside for a period of time to build your dream, to dream big and win. And then moving back to those. And one of the things I've said is work today, no one else will, so you can live and give tomorrow no one else can. I think that's the hard work that's passing on some things that you can come back to later once you have the flexibility. And I do think that's very important in order to be a successful entrepreneur.

Kim (33:20):

So am I to assume when you were running TransPerfect, you basically didn't have a work-life balance. That wasn't a thing when you're running a billion dollar company.

Liz (33:30):

The truth is, I didn't have a good work life balance. I threw myself into the company for an extended period of time, but I do feel like that's what made the difference. And I do feel like that's what makes the difference for so many entrepreneurs who get to a billion dollars or even tens of millions of dollars, I think you've got to throw yourself in and you can't quit certainly, but you have to sacrifice, sacrifice time with family and friends for a period of time and hobbies. I think that's okay. And that's why I think a lot of people who've done it, I mean in my case it was 26 years, but sometimes it's eight years or 10 years and then they realize, wow, I did it. I accomplished my dream, but I'm burnt out and I'm going to try something new. And that's wonderful too.

Kim (34:17):

Was it as intense though for all the 26 years? Did you feel like you didn't really have hobbies or you didn't have time to invest in your personal life or It was really those first eight years were super grueling and then the latter 18 still working hard, but not at that same 130%.

Liz (34:33):

Yeah, it definitely got better over time. The first eight years, yes, no time for anything but the company. And then the final 16 or 18 years, it was better. I would say part one, the first date was the worst, a hundred hours a week. The middle time was something more reasonable. And then the third part was more reasonable than that. But I will say I had my kids during parts two and three, so if I wasn't working, I wanted to be with my kids every minute, of course, right? Because when you're working 60, 70 hours a week, if you're not working, you want to be with your kids. Yes, if I wasn't working, my hobbies were my kids. But of course, as we know as moms, sometimes you can make the most wonderful friends through your kids when you have kids. And that's what I did. So if I wasn't working, it was all about my kids and then I had a social life through them, so it was much more palatable. It was wonderful. And now I am so fortunate because of what I got to do for all those years

Kim (35:36):

Because I work in marketing. I like to ask successful entrepreneurs about marketing. What has been some of the best successes in terms of marketing for TransPerfect or things that you would've done differently? Looking back,

Liz (35:48):

I am a big believer in marketing and in the early days we didn't have money for marketing. It was just sales, sales, sales, smiling and dialing, as I said, cold calling and bringing in the clients and then spoiling them with service, which was super important. And then one project would turn into multiple projects and multiple projects would turn into a relationship. So that was the sales piece of it. But what I used to say, and what we used to do was whatever profits you have, and basically whatever profits we made, we put virtually all of it back into the company and that's how we grew. But you want to maximize the amount of profits you put into sales and marketing and then minimize your other cost as much as possible because that's how you can really scale the company and get the word out. But we tried new things.

(36:36):

It was a lot of trial and error like it was with pretty much everything we did. And I think that's another thing that's really important. You asked earlier if I thought knew I was going to be successful if I had the confidence. No, absolutely not. If anything, I am the imperfect entrepreneur. I am the unlikely entrepreneur. When I thought of naming my book, those were alternate titles I thought of because absolutely not because it was really just by trial and error I learned. And the same with marketing, and the same with hiring and retaining people. So that was kind of how it worked in terms of marketing.

Kim (37:13):

So what made you write Dream Big and Win? What was the origin story of what made you want to write this book, which is awesome, by the way, listeners. It's fantastic. What made you want to write it?

Liz (37:23):

Thank you so much for asking Kim. When I started the company over 30 years ago, I really tried to read every business book I could get my hands on. I was so curious, and I think as I said, I think it's great when people are curious. I think that's helpful. And I tried to find whatever book I could and I did. I read a lot of books, but they were similar to one another. They were always written by men and they were very much just focused on the business and they were a little dry. And I thought, wow, I wish I could find a book, which is more something that I can relate to where I can relate to the author, where she's someone more like me, where I hear stories from when she was little, how she evolved when she was in her twenties, and then of course what she did, what she did wrong.

(38:08):

And I really wanted something like that. And I thought, boy, I worked for 26 years in TransPerfect. We built it out of nothing to a billion dollar company. And I learned so much along the way, as I said, based on what I did and what I did wrong, and I should be sharing this. And then of course, relating it back to the books I was reading, I wanted it to be entertaining and authentic and fun. It's more like a beach read, a beach read, business read. And that's what I was trying to create. Hopefully I did that, but I certainly tried to share a lot of lessons that took us from the dorm room to a billion dollar company.

Kim (38:45):

Well, it's an awesome read, and my very last question would be about the Elizabeth Elting Foundation. Tell us a little bit about what it does.

Liz (38:52):

Sure. Five years ago when I sold my company, I thought, wow, I've been so fortunate and I was able to cash out for a lot of money, and I'm one of the lucky ones because I am in this situation where now I can do what I want. And along the way, I met a lot of people who weren't fortunate. I mean, whether it was women, whether it was marginalized populations, whether it was people inside my company, outside of my company, and I need to help make it so everybody has the same opportunities I did and the world is a fair or more equitable place. So as a result, I started my foundation whose mission is to help support and empower women and marginalized populations. And through it, I support all different entrepreneurs through educational organizations and other organizations. I also have ended up supporting other organizations that I believe in, whether it's the American Heart Association, a number of cancer foundations, also gun safety, the two biggest gun safety organizations in the world, every town and Sandy Hook Promise and then hunger. But it's all with the same goal basically to create equality for all, to make it so we all can live long, healthy, healthy lives and really that it's a fair world because that's what it needs to be.

Kim (40:11):

I love hearing that about the give back. This has been such a great conversation. I'm like, this is awesome.

Liz (40:17):

Thank you. I mean, I just think it's so important for people to just go and try things and it's okay if they don't work out. You learn from them and you move on to the next thing. And that was so much my story. Along the way, I'm finding that people can be perfectionist. That's one. I am guilty of that. But I guess the biggest thing I learned is stop being such a perfectionist. Just let it go and try things and then you'll learn, you'll get better. You'll figure out what's not to do the next time, but just go for it because it's fun.

Kim (40:52):

And one question I ask people, especially very successful people like yourself, are you happy?

Liz (40:56):

Yes, I'm happy. Thank you for asking. I think what's wonderful now is I accomplished that dream and then I went through some crazy litigation and I learned a tremendous amount about that, and I think learning is wonderful. Then I worked on my book and I've learned so much about that. I love that. So I keep doing new things in learning, which I think is very important. But as far as happiness, I think really the key for me is getting time to spend with your family and your friends. And I'm certainly so fortunate to get to do that and to pursue your passion and ideally make it have a purpose. And I'm getting to do that. And then finally getting to give back. And so I'm lucky because yes, I am happy. I mean, believe me, there are things that go wrong every day and I think, Ugh, how did I let that happen? I got to do it better. I got to fix it. But yes, I am happy. I am happy. Thank you for asking

Kim (41:56):

And thank you for joining me. I love this book. I love learning more about you and your incredible life and the lessons that you have imparted both in the book and in this interview about pushing aside the perfectionism and just if you want something, go for it. And then not just go for it in your head, go for it in life, put it on paper, then do the thing. I think there's so much of that that A, set aside the perfectionism, but then B, just go for it and be relentless and don't give up. And you're such an amazing role model for everyone. Not for women, yes, but for everyone. And it's a really great testament to just the power of a great idea, finding a solution to a problem, and then just focusing on it and never stopping. Thank you so much, Liz and everybody, make sure to grab Dream Big and Win, and I'll put the link in the show notes and thank you so much.

Liz (42:43):

Thank you so much, Kim. Love talking to you.

Kim (42:48):

Do not forget to grab Dream Big and Win by Liz Elting. It is a great read and it'll be linked out in the show notes.

(42:58):

Thank you for listening to the exit interview with Kim Rittberg. What tip will you use from the show or what stayed with you? Drop me a message@kimrittberg.com. R I T T B E R G or on Instagram or LinkedIn. I'm at Kim Ritt bird. I read every single note and I will even run it on our show. Please follow the show in Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen and drop a five star rating in review and share it with anyone you think would find it useful. It is meant to be a resource, so please spread the word. And if you run a business and are thinking, Ooh, I'm making all this content, all this video, but I'm not seeing returns, or you've hit that dreaded plateau, or maybe you just want to level up your public speaking skills, drop me a line. I help professionals become thought leaders and businesses become brands through video and podcasts. My newsletter signup is linked in the show notes, and you can grab more info at my website. This is the exit interview with Kim Riytberg, and I'm your host and executive producer, Kim Rutberg. The show is produced by Henry Street Media and Jillian Grover is our editor, exit The Grind and Enter Life on Your Own Terms.

Kim RittbergSeptember 27, 2023Comment