SDH192: Putting in the Work to Make Your Dreams a Reality with Megan Minns

Is your passion in life really what you should be building into a business? How would you go about figuring that out? Megan Minns, went all through that painful epiphany, and her business today offers project management services to higher level business owners. However, she spends most of her time helping new business owners develop productive systems to keep them organized and efficient. Her underlying passion and fulfillment in her work comes from helping people make their dreams into reality by encouraging them to see their potential and start building their brighter future.  One area she flourishes in, and offers the most guidance in with her services, is the technology realm. As a kid, she was able to master new technology with ease, and with her programs and tutorials she offers simplified methods to navigate scheduling and organizing software and apps; such as Asana. Originally, she almost went into the medical field with a concentration in psychiatrics due to outside pressure. While she loved science and the medical field, she found herself spending a lot of her free time sketching because half of her heart belonged to the arts. She eventually gave into practicality and stability, and with her degree in psychology, she got a full time job in human resources and recruiting. In this role she felt that it was a nice blend between the creative and science thought process. She also found a way to mix her two loves with a blog she started in college called, Organized Meg. Admitting that her blog wasn’t that good, she said it introduced her to the blogging world, as well as website building and design through blogging platforms like Zanga. She said she also learned that there was a way to build a business without a college degree, and following a structured corporate ladder. About a year later she began to actively seek a creative outlet, and in May of 2013, she officially launched MeganMinns.com in which she offered creative services. Through MeganMinns, she offered branding, web design, and custom handwriting for projects like logos and wedding invitations. As her business began to take off, she started to live an unhealthy lifestyle due to balancing a full time job, gaining a masters in organizational and human resource development, and MeganMinns. She started working during the nights and weekends and isolating herself socially, butby January she had relaunched her MeganMinns as an LLC. While she was proud of her of her growth, running her business became a chore and the creative workload was no longer something she loved. She said being in the art industry left her in a bad mindset where she was comparing herself to other artists, and felt less than when she didn’t meet their skill. Art and creativity was something she loved expressing for herself, not for other people, and she didn’t like having her creativity up for debate. And so, she took a break in 2014, and began re-evaluating her business direction. With the help of a mentor she curated her strengths and found what passions she could express in a business. She asked her what are some things that she was good at, what comes to her with ease, and what projects are people thrilled with of hers in the corporate world. Through those questions, she found that she was good at identifying areas of improvement within companies, creating a plan for improvement, as well as managing and executing that plan. She also remembered her savvy-ness for software and tech, and concentrated that skill into the world of corporate HR. From there, she relaunched MeganMinns with virtual assistant services focusing on implementing new tech systems, establishing new work flow and processes, and organizing digital files. In an instant, she was booked out via Facebook groups she had been blogging through. By summer 2015, she successfully launched her first online course, and the positive reaction from clients showed her that she can launch a profitable product, and it validated that she could develop her business so it would provide a steady income. By that November she finally quit her full time job. Hear more about what it was like for Megan making that transition, uplifted her clients, grew her passive income with downloadable products, and learned how to be a CEO! In this episode you will… Learn how to balance and blend your opposing passions Figure out if your passion is better expressed for yourself or for clients Find what strengths and passions are applicable in a business Be able to evolve your business as well as your personal brand Learn how to remain the CEO of your business while keeping the personal touch with your clients Find a place for yourself within your business once you have a team INSIGHTS “My deeper purpose in business and in life is kind of helping people realize that they…can accomplish their dreams, and just encouraging them to take the action, make the commitments, and start actually doing the work to make it a reality.” –Megan Minns “I can do web design…I can do handwritten logos, but it really boils down to this realization that even though I can do those things, that’s really not what I should be doing. And it was this painful, but really good ‘Aha’ moment…this has all been a path of self-discovery for me, and that was a harder one for me to learn.” –Megan Minns “I was amazed at the reaction, and I was amazed at how happy my clients were, and I loved doing the work because it was finally back in my zone of genius, things I felt good about doing, things that felt easy…it was this awesome validation and it totally made the pain of pivoting and the fear totally worth it.” –Megan Minns “I’m a huge fan of change and pivoting and evolving, and I think as a business owner you have to evolve, and be open to that, and even though it’s hard and scary you’re supposed to evolve. All businesses are supposed to evolve.” –Megan Minns RESOURCES Megan Minns Website Megan Minns LinkedIn Megan Minns Facebook Megan Minns Instagram Megan Minns Twitter Megan Minns YouTube Channel Asana Brain FM Slack The Pomodoro Technique Productivity Planner She Means Business by Carrie Green Profit First by Mike Michalowicz You Are a Badass by Jen Sincero