Episode 86: From Laid Off 8 Times to Building Her Own Business | Sharifah Hardie | Entrepreneur & Activist
Sharifah Hardie is a powerhouse. An entrepreneur, consultant, community activist, and the host of three talk shows. She’s dedicated to making real change in business, community, and beyond. From building her first website in 1994 to launching the Round Table Talk Show, Ask Sharifah Video Cast, and Face to Face Talk Show, she’s spent her career creating platforms for important conversations and practical solutions. Sharifah shares her journey from being laid off eight times to building her own businesses, why she believes most Americans are just one action away from change, and how she helps others level up their ventures. She talks about running for City Council, mentoring under inspiring leaders, and her belief that we have more in common than we think. Her story is a call to action for anyone ready to step up for what they believe in.
“I believe we have more in common than we have that’s different, and change starts with a conversation.”
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Instagram: @SharifahHardie
Twitter: @SharifahHardie
Facebook: Facebook.com/ILikeSharifah
Website: AskSharifah.com
Email: Sharifah@asksharifah.com
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Follow along using the Transcript
Chapters
00:00 Meet Sharifah Hardie
03:15 Building Her First Website in 1994
07:40 From Stay-at-Home Mom to Entrepreneur
11:20 Being Laid Off Eight Times and Starting Fresh
15:30 Creating Ask Sharifah to Answer Growing Demand
19:15 Launching the First Radio Show in 2009
23:30 Running for City Council and Lessons Learned
27:50 Creating the Round Table Talk Show
32:10 Expanding to Ask Sharifah Video Cast and Face to Face Talk Show
36:25 Lessons from Mentors Like Belinda Baker
40:15 The Connection Between Service and Success
44:00 Why Change Starts with a Conversation
48:30 Advice for Entrepreneurs and Community Leaders
99% of Americans right now are either unemployed or they're one paycheck away from being unemployed, from losing everything, one accident, one medical emergency, one job that they there's not a lot of safety net for people, and that's a reflection of our society.
That's Sharifah Hardie, and this is The Powerful Ladies Podcast.
Hey guys, I'm your host, Kara Duffy, and this is The Powerful Ladies Podcast where I invite my favorite humans, the awesome, the up to something, and the extraordinary to come and share their story. I hope that you'll be left, entertained, inspired, and moved to take action towards living your most powerful life.
Sharifah Hardie is a powerhouse. She's a mom, an entrepreneur, a talk show host of not one, but three talk shows. She's a consultant and a community activist across all the areas that Sharif is committed to. What's consistent is her passion for being of service to making real change. She's not here for fluff.
She's not here to let herself or others coast. She's here to make your business work, to make your community work, and to make our world work and actually work for everyone. Why? Because she sees a way to make it happen. On this episode, we talk about how she started her business, how you can level up your own business, and why it all matters.
All that and so much more coming up. But first, if you're interested in discovering what possibilities and businesses are available for you to create and to live your most fulfilling life, please visit the powerful ladies.com/coaching and sign up for a free coaching consultation with me. There is no reason to wait another day to not be living your best life when you instead could be running at full speed towards your wildest dreams today.
Welcome to the Powerful Ladies podcast.
Thank you. Thank you for having me on the show.
You have been such a generous guest on all of our so far powerful conversations at America, topics about racism, and I've been a guest on one of your shows, so I know how powerful you are. But let's begin by telling everyone who you are and all the things that you are up to.
Again, thank you for the opportunity, Kara, because I know how powerful you are. I launched one of my talk shows, the Round Table Talk show, March 30th, and you were on one of the first shows, and it's August now. So looking back at all the shows and some of the things that I'm doing now different, I'm like, those initial guests must have been like, what is Sharifah doing?
She could have done this. She shoulda have done this, and it could have been a lot different because I've learned some tips and some tricks, but you have been supportive this entire process. You have referred people, I have had a wonderful experience with you, but who I'm.
I started on this path in 1994 when I built my first website. And so the motivation in building my website is I simply wanted to be a stay at home mom. That's all that mattered. That's all I care about. I had this beautiful brand new baby, and I wanted to be there for her first steps. I wanted to be there for her first word.
And back then, in 1994, people said I was crazy because it was unheard of to earn a living and work from home. Computers were large, printers were large, so you physically had to leave the house in order to go to work. So I was ahead of my time and I always tell people, if I would have known then how far ahead of my time I was, I would've been stronger.
I would've been more confident. I would've done things different, but I didn't know. Looking back, I see it. And so that's really what started me out on the journey. And since then I was laid off eight times. And so I kept going from company to job, but in the meantime, I always had my own website.
There's never been a point in time since 1994 where I haven't been online in some form or fashion. So when I built my first website, people came to me and they said, Sharifah, I want a website. So I built their. When I started marketing my website and I gotta page one position one on Google, people came to me and they said, Sharif, how do I get to the top of Google?
And I did the same thing for them. And so I had so many people asking questions. I took over the brand, Sharif, and I launched my first radio show in 2009. And that was just simply as Sharifah Radio where people could tune in to ask me questions about online marketing, website design, S-E-O-S-E-M, social media marketing, branding, raising capital.
So many different things. But it was interesting to me because I always say Ask Sharifah is not just about people asking me, I have the opportunity to ask the experts. Just like when you were on a guest on my show, Kara, I could ask you what have you done to be successful? What works for you? Because then I can take your information and your expertise and I can share that with someone else.
I also just love learning the stories behind a company, because we can look at a business and we can sell, oh, that business or that business owner is successful, but I guarantee you mark my words and there's no doubt in my mind on this. Everyone who is successful has a story. There's some obstacle that they overcame.
There's some struggle that they went through, but nobody sees it because they don't share those stories. And so I had just finished my run for Long Beach City Council. I had spent the last year prior to that hosting my own video cast called Video Cast and Podcast, which I still do today. That's my one-on-one interviews.
But after running for city council, I felt like they wouldn't gimme city council. So I took the round table, but I'm gonna have a platform to have a voice, to have discussions on what's going on in the world. And that was March 3rd. I launched it March 30th. In between March 3rd and March 30th, the world went to hell in a hand basket.
And so what happened is we had a community of entrepreneurs and a community of business owners who came together on the round Table talk show. And we shared information, we shared tips. We, because the conne, the question initially was, is your business being affected by COVID-19? And it went from, is your business being affected to how is your business being affected?
Because every business, every entrepreneur, every person, every individual on this earth in some form or fashion, was affected by COVID-19 and the global quarantine. So to bring five people a day together to say, what do we do? How do we fix it? And then it just became a conversation. And what I noticed.
During the course of this time is that I can pick the most random people there are. This person could be in one industry, that person could be in another industry, but there were always commonalities. We always found something in common. I remember one show where I was feeling like, okay, I don't know how this is gonna work out, because I had a couple of business people and then I had two other people.
One was suffering from mental illness and one was a counselor. And I said, okay, we have mental illness over here, but maybe the business people don't wanna talk about mental illness. But then all of a sudden, one of the most, what I consider corporate. Just broke down and started talking about her cousin who suffers from mental illness.
So it was like, you never know what a person is experiencing. You never know what a person is going through. But I really believe that we have more in common that we have that's different. That change starts with the conversation. So those are my first two shows, video cast, and then there's also the Round Table Talk show.
More happened in the world. We had George Floyd, we had all these discussions on racism and I wanted to ask people questions about their beliefs and do you agree with this? Do you agree with that? Or should you call people certain names? And there's Black Lives Matter, there are antisemitic conversations.
But I didn't want business owners and authors who just came on a show to promote their book, to be put in a place in a situation that made them awkward. And so I said, you know what, I'll just create a third show. And so that's face-to-face talk show with my co-host Paul Fos. He's the president of Ring Boost com and we ha, he's also a Jewish man who deals with a lot of anti-Semitic conversations.
And so we said, you know what? Let's sit down and have face-to-face conversations and make this world again a better place. So that's what I do in between my actual business, which is website design, online marketing, social media management, and being a business consultant. But I always tell people I came here to serve mankind in some form or some fashion.
So every at the heart of everything I do is about helping people. How can I serve people today,
if you look back at 8-year-old self. Would she be surprised that you're doing all the things that you're doing today?
8-year-old self would be, I would say disappointed, honestly. And the reason I say this is because I took one of those Facebook quizzes.
When I get bored and I'm doing too much work, I'm like, let me just play on this little quiz on Facebook. And I saw one in my timeline and it this.
I wouldn't, mine was sloth. And I got that and I was like, huh. But then all of a sudden it clicked, because I could have, all the things that I'm doing now, I could have done years before, I could have done a long time ago. So I think 8-year-old me would be like, it's about time we waiting for you.
But I understand that everything has its time. Like everything and everyone had to come together to have this perfect storm. And that's what all of this is right now. It's the perfect storm that's happening to lead me on to success.
Yeah. I, you know what I find so fascinating about you as, a whole person, you are so committed to what's happening in your community.
You're so committed. And was that something that you grew up focusing on? Being part of changing the social structure? Or is that something that you have gotten over time and as you've, become an adult?
I love that question. That's an excellent question. And it's really funny because where I am now in my house is me and my son's 23 and he lives with me.
And there are always people around, and it's always the homeless people and everything. And my son's mom, it's your little friends, your little homeless friends. And I be like, they're not my friends. Like they're in the. It was all, they just show up. I dunno what it's, but people just show up because I always, it's a safe haven, a safe place.
Even with my business, it's always about helping people. So if I ever see someone in need, I always think there, for the grace of God, go I've been homeless, I've lost everything that I own, aside from the clothes and the flip-flops that I had on my feet. That's all I had. So I know what it's to feel like.
Just having electricity to charge your Obama phone will, will mean the difference between life or death. Trying to figure out how you gonna eat, what you're gonna do, how you're gonna survive. Being laid off eight times, you have to figure it out. But each and every time, I promise you, it was someone who came in and said, let help you.
So now I just try to be the service to so many people and they just show up.
What was the moment that had you pivot to want to be running for city council?
It was because I have a dear friend of mine, I just love her to life. Mrs. Sally Martin and Mrs. Sally Martin will be 99 this year and she's just so wonderful.
She cracks me up with her stories and everything, but she called me and she said she knew what I did in business and I was a business consultant. I had just in thousand 16, from thousand 16 to thousand 18 did a IPO, we took a company public, we raised about $6 million in capital. So she called and she said, Sharifah, I want you to do for Long Beach what you do for businesses.
And that was my focus because this is what I think a lot of people don't understand and what's going on in the world is that my belief is that hungry people steal. At the base of it, hungry people are the people who go out and commit crimes. And so anytime you look around and you have a high crime rate, you also have a high unemployment rate, you have a high homeless rate, you have a whole high mental illness rate.
And so it's not enough to just say, let's take people off the street. You have to be able to, first of all, give them hope, right? Yeah. Because most people today they don't have hope. And I don't think people truly understand that. And the main reason that they don't have hope is because they don't feel that they can get a job that would allow them to pay their rent.
So if I say, if someone was on drugs they cleaned themselves up, they changed their evil ways. They put everything aside. They says, you know what? I wanna be a better person. I wanna be a productive citizen in society. I'm gonna go get a job. That job pays them 10,000 hour, their rent. A month. At some point of trying, they give up hope that they can ever overcome that obstacle.
And so they go back to the things that at least they know that are safe, secure. So we have to be able to create jobs and create businesses. Because what most people forget is that small businesses are the heart of America. And it, and what happens when your heart stops, Carol, you stop. That's right. And so we have to start pumping our blood and our life back into America, creating jobs, factories put people back to work.
And that's my focus and what I try to do to the community because once you allow people to be able to take care of themselves, you'll see a lot of the other issues go away by themselves.
I 100% agree. And a anyone that studies the economics of what happens when you don't have an opportunity, it impacts everything.
And I even see this need for, letting, giving people hope is it's bigger even than people who are homeless or people who need assistance right now because I see it every day with the clients I'm taking on. As for co private coaching, I see it in people who are fellow entrepreneurs. I just see it in people in general, and I think it's just exacerbating all the issues that are percolating right now because the hope being missing is what people are using to their advantage who maybe don't have the best interest in mind and, taking hope out of an equation.
Really makes people wonder why they should do anything. And it breaks my heart because I realize that all of my businesses are built, the foundation is, we give you hope first, and then we can create something.
And, I really admire that's what's driving what you're doing as well, because, if you don't have hope, and like why bother?
Why bother? Why bother fighting? What's wrong in the world? Why bother starting the company? Why bother even like trying to get a promotion wherever you are. I wish more people were talking about the impact of hope being out of the room and out of the space because it, technically America was founded on a whole lot of hope.
And if we don't even have that in the conversation. I'm not really sure what we're talking about anymore,
but that's exactly what America was founded by. That's why it doesn't say America offers you happiness. It offers you the pursuit of happiness, and everybody should be able to pursue their own happiness.
But the reason why it's more than just homeless people or people who are struggling is because the majority of Americans right now, 99% of Americans right now are either unemployed or they're one paycheck away from being unemployed or being homeless from losing everything. One accident, one medical emergency, one job that they, there's.
There's not a lot of safety net for people, and that's a reflection of our society. And so what happened, especially, because we always talk about racism and that's the conversation that we have. Often what people tend to forget is, again, everything that happened was a perfect storm.
You took people, humans, and you lock them in cages. That's what our homes have become. You're not allowed to go anywhere. I can't go see grandma. I go visit grandma every week, but I can't see grandma now because of COVID. So now I don't have that personal interaction with grandma. I can't go hug her. I can't spend time with her.
I can't go check on my grandkids. And so I'm forced to be in a situation I don't wanna be in. It's a situation that's outta my control and there's absolutely nothing I can do about it. And it's not about whether it's right or wrong, it's COVID. It's a virus. It's something that happens, but. I'm used to being social.
I'm used to being able to call Kara and say, Hey girl, let's go have happy hour. Kara's what time? Six o'clock. And we're there, but we can't do that now. And so we're frustrated. We're at home. Our whole lives change in a way that we could have never imagined. And then guess what? You have civil unrest that breaks out.
So now I'm mad, I'm angry, I'm broke, and there's so much going on and I have to figure out a way how to handle it. So this is just a result of all the feelings and all the emotions that are going on. But I think it's calming down now. And I also think as a result of this, just like any other recession, more millionaires are made.
Any other time is because they become creative, because they have to figure it out. When you're comfortable, you don't have to figure it out. You have that hundred thousand dollars a year job, 50,000 a year job you're not worried about losing your job. You're sitting there doing what you have to do, but all of a sudden you lose everything.
And even the relationships with the people you have to figure out what to do next.
There's so many ways that we can make an impact and make changes, and I think a lot of the people who we need to be stepping into those conversations, like they're very similar to like how you start a business, right?
Like, where do you begin? It's always the first question. If people are in that place of okay, everything's gone. How do I begin right now? What would you tell them? What are some things they can do to start being entrepreneurial with their life and what matters to them?
The number one question that I'm asked as a business consultant is, what is the number one business that is guaranteed to be successful? And my response is always the business that you're willing to do day in and day out, period. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what the product is or the service is, it's the business that becomes a job that you're willing to do day in and day out.
So if you do what you love, the money will follow regardless. Even during the A global quarantine, you have seen so many business owners, and you mentioned a key word pivot. They have pivoted in order to remain successful. You've seen brick and mortar companies who had absolutely no e-commerce aspect, all of a sudden are making more money online than they ever have in their lives.
I would say one of the first things that you can do, and I always recommend is start your website. Build your website. You just, with hosting a loan, you can spend $10 for your domain. Name another few dollars for hosting through a company like GoDaddy. I recommend GoDaddy. I've been with GoDaddy since they.
Five, 10 a month, you have 30 days before you have to renew your hosting. And in that timeframe, you can consult with experts such as yourself. You can network, you can build relationships, and you can get better. If you wanna do a do it yourself website, and that's what a lot of people do. Or people hire me to build their website, consult, start their social media, and help them through the process.
Totally agree. We we have in August our course came out how to sell What, or it might be called at that time,
Knowledge sharing products. And I'm a big believer that so many people have. I say that you have a hundred ideas already of things that you could make money from just by what you already know and people get so stuck on.
I don't have any, things people wanna buy from me. And it's it's such a lie that we tell ourselves. 'cause there's so many things that we know that somebody else doesn't. My favorite example that like, that's stuck with me so much is I went to a CASA event. The court appointed special advocate for foster youth.
And they were telling a story how this foster kid had gotten a job and he was doing great. He was working part-time, they loved him. He got a promotion and his advocate checked in with him like six months later and said, Hey, like, how's it going? What are doing with your money? How are you spending it? And he's I haven't gotten paid yet.
Six months later, he had asked him about this. He's what do you mean you haven't gotten paid? Like I, they tell me you're doing great. Everything's awesome. He's yeah, they give me these like papers, but they don't gimme cash. No one had taught the kid that you get paid with the check and to sign it and to deposit it.
And so great news is he had saved up thousands of dollars on accident. But we don't realize how we skip over these things that we think are common sense, that have so much opportunity to change someone's life in this huge way. And we think it's no big deal.
Even having people be like, what?
What are the things that you do so well? You forgot about them. That's a great place to start. And having, I agree, insight, as you said, is like a perfect way to do that. 'cause then you start to make your own brand, which, sounds scary if you haven't done it before. 'cause how do you become a brand, like a Nike or something?
But it just starts with your name,
right? It starts with your name, but it also starts with your passion. What is it that you're passionate about? We talk about this on the show all the time and just listening to people's stories. You can start to tell, like I always talk about my cousin Carrie, who's in Columbus, Ohio.
He's on A, B, C, or NBC, I should probably know this, but he's on television, on a major news.
But when was nine years old, he would walk around the house with a spoon and he would literally interview all of his cousins and what's going, we knew there was never any doubt, and I always wanted to be more like him, to always know what is that one thing that I was born to do. And for a long time I didn't know.
But when I look back, I was that talkative little kid. I was always talking. I joked my mom crazy because I was just why and why and why. That was me and my personality. But I went from being that little kid, like you talk about that 8-year-old kid who was always talking to a talk show host. So there's something in us, we know innately there's something in us, there's a purpose, there's a gift, there's a reason why we came to this earth.
We don't know what that is. We don't always recognize it. So I would implore anyone if you wanna do something different, if you wanna pivot, if you wanna change your life, you're watching this right now and you're sitting on the couch and you're saying, okay, it sounds good, it sounds wonderful, but what do I do?
My response to that person would be like, what do you love? What is it that you love to do? What is it that you wake up in the morning and go, you know what if money was no option, I could, and I had all the money in the world and it was not an issue, I would do this. Because in business, people always think about the competition and they ask me about the competition, and I'm like, what competition?
I don't have any competition. There's only me. I'm Sharif Hardie. I'm the only Sharif Hardie that there is. That doesn't make me better than Kara Duffy doesn't make me worse than you, but it just means that I'm my own unique person. And that applies to everyone in the world. So what is it that makes you special?
You different, you unique. What do you bring to this earth? Because in business they will tell you, not everybody likes apples. Not everybody likes oranges. Not every like likes, bananas, tangerines, grapes, whatever, watermelons. So find the thing that you love and you'll see your tribe a attracted to you.
Because one of the things that I've seen since I've launched the Round Table talk show is that. At first, I had to look for guests. I made my little health reporter out, my little hero post. The first time I got about a hundred replies. I did one a month since then. And each time I would get about 50 replies.
But what changed was I got more and more referrals, more people saying, you have to be on this show. You have to be on a round table talk show. You have to sit with Sharif Hardie. And it took time to build. But over time, like now, in August, I made my aug. Every month, every first of the month, I do a new post.
August 1st I made a post, and this post was different than any other post. I said, this is the hottest show out people are raving about this. Show you, this is what it offers. Five guests a day, organic conversation to promote you and your business. 202 responses. 202 people pitch themselves to be on the show.
Like our Zoom, but they felt that energy, they felt the passion. They felt that this is something that I wanna be a part of. So it doesn't matter what your product is or your service is, the people aren't buying your water because it's the most special water. It is. Like I always tell people, if you go to any grocery store, doesn't matter what the, it could be Safeway Smart and Final v, Ralph's, it doesn't matter if you go to any grocery store and you go, just go down the bottled water aisle.
Yeah. You'll see 62 different types of bottled water. And they'll tell you, this one is the cleanest and this one is the purest. And this one came from the mountain and this one away from the mountains. But at the end of the day, it's bottled water and everything comes down to marketing. So create your product, create your service, build it so they can come.
That's what I always tell people.
Yeah. And then when you're building it so that they can come, don't forget to put you in it. Like I have so many private clients I work with that are trying to figure out how can I go to the next level? And I say, do more of you. And they're like but this isn't about me.
This is about, I don't know, dry cleaning. I'm like, if it's not about you, then that's what's missing. Because to your point, what's gonna separate you from the path is you. It's not how we deliver whatever our thing is or our gift is. It's who's delivering it is a huge factor.
To your point, somebody else doing the Ask Jordan show, for example, it's gonna be a completely different show. And I just, I wish people weren't afraid to be them and be their selves and braid that into what their business is because. That's when you start, separating. That's when you start getting that distance between the other people that could deliver the same results, but in a completely different way.
Yes. But
there's room for everyone. Yes, completely. I had a really good friend of mine when I launched, the 2.0 version of Powerful Ladies and was launching the podcast component, say to me like, why are you doing that? There's so much competition for women based things. And I was like, what?
It caught me so off guard and I like, it stuck with me to a point where I'm like. Is just, it made me think about what I've heard on this show from other guests, right? You'll be surprised who supports you and who doesn't. People think there's too many people, it's too crowded.
All these things that people say that are all fear based.
And if you are a builder, and if you're a creator and you're entrepreneurial, there really is no space for fear. There's space for risk assessment, but there's no space for fear because every day you're doing something that seems ridiculous to somebody else every day.
Yes, I do. Because I knew when I lost it. This is funny thing to me, is that when I launched this show, especially my close friends and my family, my Facebook people, they were gonna be like, okay, Sikas doing this now. And then give her a couple of weeks. And then I had five guests per day.
So I know people went, there's no way in the world she can keep this up. My show is booked into November. You know what I mean? It's because at five guests per day, that's 25 people a week that I sit down and talk to about their business and their lives and their story. But most people probably say, okay, there's no way she can feel those seats and that I wanna go.
You touched, I wanna go back to the whole 1994 and people telling me I was crazy and I was lazy. It was because I was ahead of my time. Yeah. In that timeframe, if you didn't go to work, if you did not go to a nine to five, you weren't able to survive back in that time. We did more by our brute force, by our body than our minds.
So we weren't used to sitting in front of computers, thinking and technology. That's a mindset. And sometimes the people who love you the most are the people who can cause you the most harm because they want you to play it safe. They don't want you to risk everything. They don't want you to have to wind up homeless.
They know that if you just go get that job, you'll get that paycheck and you play it safe and you'll be okay. And so entrepreneurs always say, the way I recognize an entrepreneur is. Will tell you it's a calling. If they may not have those words, but they'll tell you, I tried to stop. I've started, then I went back, got a job, and then I came back.
But it's always something that they can't, something that they can't put down. It's something that, it's Sunday, so maybe I'm getting philosophical, but it's something that's bigger than them. You know what I mean? And most people like myself, 26 years, there are times when I'm like, this is crazy.
I'll never be self-employed. I'll ne but you have a bad day, yes. You cry it out and you get up and you keep going because it's something that you have to do.
No, it, it's it's the poke, right? Like you keep getting this, like what about that? Oh yeah, that sounds good. Or you.
Powerful ladies in particular. It, these things don't leave you alone. If you are getting a message that you should do something else, it's like, whether it's your calling or your knowing or your purpose or your spirit guides or God, whoever, I don't think you can be an entrepreneur and not have some spiritual relationship because you know that it wasn't, if it was up to you by yourself you, why would we choose this crazy path? What, why? And so it's what keeps poking at you? What keeps, what are you noticing? And to me, the sign is when you like, just can't ignore it anymore. You can't tell to be quiet, sit in the corner. Like it's just not an option. And some people come at it that way where they're trying to avoid it.
Trying to avoid it. And other people are like, why would I want to avoid it? No, this is crazy.
That was me. I tell people that mine started this aspect of it with consulting and being a speaker, started with God telling me, Sharifah, I want you to help people. And it was a argument that we had and I was like, no, I'm not gonna help people.
I'm gonna go get a job. And I go get a job, I get laid off. God would say, Sharifah, I want you to help people. And I would say, no. I'm gonna get a job because I was like, okay, nothing says I love you, like direct deposit. That's my thing right there. Like knowing on Friday that money was guaranteed to be there.
That was safety. That was security. And then anytime I try to help people, the people were frustrated me. You know what I mean? Because I'm going through, I'm like, they ask me for help. I'm trying to tell them what to do. They try to tell me what to do. And I always tell people, look, people contact me when they need a miracle, right?
So if you knew how to perform the miracle, you wouldn't need me. So let me do what I do and work my magic to help you. So I didn't wanna do all of that. So six months. To day. Several times I was hired, I would get laid off. And so finally God was just like, I dunno, what part of I'm God do you not understand?
He was like, we can do this basically for the rest of your life. And finally I had to go. I hear and I obey, and I began to watch doors open and opportunities open and referrals. And I tell people now things that never happen. To me, but that's because I am obedient and I'm aligning myself with people who are on the same path as I'm just to be able to be a part of what you were doing with race relations in America is sitting down and having those conversations and allowing for that platform, that's powerful.
But you know what? I would've never have gotten there had I not taken that leap of faith to start the Round Table Talk show, we wouldn't have met, we wouldn't have connected. And so we just have to follow those little nudges, those little folks that tells us, this is what you should be doing and anybody, let's go back to the person watching this sitting on the couch.
After this show somehow, some way you gonna feel something, see something that's gonna say, this is what I'm meant to do, and just go with it. Just follow it. Because you'll see all the doors begin to open.
Yes. And it's. If you do what you know you're supposed to do or if you follow something that you're like, I think I should go that way, things get easier.
That's my sign that I'm where I'm supposed to be. If things get easier, if things that, you know, everything that I'm wanting to, like the doors open, or I get this new connection, this new person, but I'm also very proactive in looking for it and seeking the what's next because it's all there.
There is no, people always are asking for this one hit wonder, like the one way to make their business succeed. And I'm like, there's a million ways. Like it's not, it really is a butterfly effect of what we're doing and who we're interacting with. So I can tell you the first couple of steps, but like you might do step one and realize, oh my gosh, we're making a hard, hard right hard left.
And that's what happens. But it's continuing to take it the next step that. You feel is right and seems right on paper and there's so much faith in, you have to have faith at least in yourself if you're going to take on any project. And I really see business as a project. If you're lacking that, then who are you putting your in so that you can figure out where you're going.
N not everybody has to be an entrepreneur.
I agree. Hear. I definitely agree. I think most people I'm agreeing with you on a million different ways. I believe that there are a million different ways to be successful, but I believe that the number one way that people are unsuccessful, let's just say that, is most people don't talk about their business.
They don't speak about their business, they don't speak it, speak about their business in everyday life. They don't speak about their business on social media. The closest friends dunno what they do, and that's why they don't have all these opportunities. And that comes back to exactly what you were saying about fear based.
I don't wanna tell Kara that I'm a new representative for doTERRA because she might not wanna be my friend. She may think that it's just an mlm and the only reason I'm calling her is to talk about my business. So I'm not gonna mention it. I'm just gonna call her and say, hi, Kara, how you doing?
And so what we have to do is change our mindset. Everything is a mindset I don't look at my business. Company as a product or even a service. I look at my business as a solution, right? And so if I have a solution that can help the world, to me it would be, I would be an unkind, uncaring person to keep that solution to myself and not think about anybody else and not wanna help anybody else.
So the one thing that I've learned, and I especially learned this from working at the company where we raised millions, that CEO, he told everybody he was raising money. If he was at the gas station. It was so funny because one time we were on the phone, because I always talked to him, he was driving and he got pulled over by a cop, and he pitched the cop.
He told him, he was like, Hey, gimme the ticket or whatever, but I just want you to know this is my company. This was, and it was, he did it at that point. Make a point, because we always say pitch everybody talk to everybody. And that's what most people don't do with their business, is they make one little post.
Eight times a month, eight, once every eight months. And then they don't mention it again. And then they go, Sharifah. But I don't have any customers and I don't have any clients. And I'm like, and they're like, oh, and I focus on the law of at, I'm like have you focused on the law of averages?
So if you, the averages are that you should have these type of responses, but if you talk to two people about your business, then guess what? You haven't spoken to enough people. And that's like my main thing. What I tell people, tell everyone you speak to, this is who I'm, and this is what I do.
Hundred percent, 100% to that. We did a, I wrote a mini ebook called Stop Selling Start Sharing. And it's one of our opt-ins on the power website. And, so many people get hung up on, I don't wanna market it, I don't wanna sell, I just wanna make my thing, just let me be creative. Let me make it, just put me in front of people and I can do this.
No. If you, I used to reference like if you had a vaccine. I've taken that out of my analogies now because it's very sensitive. If you did, to your point, if you knew that your thing could change the world, then you would be annoying. You would tell everyone, and I don't know what happens when, you get, people get so excited about their ideas and so excited about what they can do, and then they go to tell someone and all between them and that person, it gets all filled up with, I'm not good enough.
This is not good. I like, I'm gonna bother them. This is too much. And so I spend a lot of time, I'm sure like you do with clients, getting them back to why are you doing this?
Why
does this matter to you? And we're going into, in August we have our a whole series about creating products.
So I do believe that every product and service needs to be created, like truly product creation. And part of that that coming from the footwear apparel world, if you're launching the next Jordan, you better believe it is the best Jordan that's ever come out. You better have 101 reasons why everyone needs to know about it.
Everyone's gonna love it. And there's this like internal pr, Nike sets itself apart from the other footwear companies because they do great internal pr so that everyone in the company is like on fire about what's coming out. And then they roll it out to the general public because there's power and momentum in the people in the company, on the brand, knowing why it's good and reinforcing what is this incredible thing because.
Fake it till you make, it just means that you need to believe what you're gonna transform as possible before you start seeing results. So it's not like pretending you know how to do something that you don't. And I just, it blows my mind. Like I know, like I can't help myself from talking about business with people.
Or powerful ladies because that's how I listen to everything. Like I am coach, there's no way for for me around it, if I hear someone talking about business while I'm listening, I have 50 things in my list. Did they do this? Should I do that? What about this? I have questions.
And
so to me, that's another sign for people what are the things that you can't stop yourself from doing?
What makes you crazy? What do you wish people would change? Because that's, if you already do it naturally and automatically, now you will. Why not make money doing what you do without thinking?
Absolutely. You keep mentioning the word, and I was gonna leave it alone, but I'm gonna bring it back up. So that's my book signs.
You might be an entrepreneur, how to discover the entrepreneur in you, but it comes down to the certain signs that you see. And I start, I launched it because people were telling me the signs that they saw and their signs was, I don't wanna work and I don't want a boss. And I'm like, no, that's not exactly it.
It comes back to, like I said, it's so that Pope, it's something that you have to do, something that have you keep doing. But I lay out a whole bunch of different ways on if you wanna be successful, these are the different things that you should do. But if you were a guest on the round table talk show right now, this is what I would say to you because I heard some gold.
I always say that like to me, has.
It was so simple to you that you may not have realized all the goal and what you said because you went back to, you talked about the rollout of a company, and a rollout of a product. And one of the things that separates entrepreneurs and small business owners from these large corporations is that they, larger businesses understand the importance of repetitiveness.
If you watch any Christmas movie, and we all know Christmas is December 25th that, that movie premier or trailer doesn't come out on December 24th. You are gonna start seeing those movie premieres in July and in August, and it's always the coming soon coming.
I lost the book. Here's my book. Buy it, get it. Okay. Thank you. And then you never hear from us again. And then we go, okay, but can you help me? Can you tell me why my book didn't sell? Did you think it was the cover? Do you think it was the font? Do you think it was the content? No. It's because you're not marketing your book.
You put it out there. One time you made an Instagram post, and then your feelings got hurt because the world didn't respond to you, and the world doesn't respond to anyone that way. You have to tell them and tell them again. People usually don't take any actions. They've seen something at least eight times.
It has to become familiar to them. It has to come into their world. They have to associate you with your product, or they have to associate your product with a specific thing that they need before they take any action. And so often what we do is we give up so fast and we go back to those words like, oh, the competition was too stiff so I couldn't be successful.
I couldn't make it because the competition had more money than me. Most successful business owners got to a certain level of success without someone writing that 20 million check or that $50,000 check. They did it through sweat equity, through the hard work of just going out person to person, customer to customer, and making a sale.
So I think that we forget that and living this dream that everything happens immediately or instantaneously, and we forget to do that rollout. That was the goal right there, Kara.
Alright. Thank you for pointing that out. No, it, it's like what you're talking about. I totally agree with, and it makes me crazy because if you showed up and met someone and you walked away and you're like, whoa, that person was great.
Why didn't they marry me? You're like, wait, what? You're crazy. What do you mean they didn't marry you? You just met them. Whatcha talking about? And we forget that we have to take our customers through this journey, if you just pop up by my book, they've got a lot of questions. Why, who are you?
What's it about? What should I do? Where can I get it? And it, and most of the time we don't even sit there and listen because people not taking action is just as loud as when people take action. And, there's, everybody today wants to, heck, how do I do less work smarter, make more money?
And the truth is business hasn't changed. How we can do it in different ways to do, it's changed, but it hasn't. And so I I think my first book is gonna have to be this one. I keep saying it, but I reference this idea of this lemonade stand. Like business is a lemonade stand. It's no different.
And the same things you need to do to sell lemonade in an afternoon are exactly what you have to do for your business. And if you're trying to make it more complicated than that, you don't need to. And if you think you can skip any of those steps, you're, it's just not gonna work. It seems so silly and I get laughed at sometimes when I use that reference in a class, but it's if you want a quick fix, if you want a quick fix, that's when I know you're not the right client for me because there's no such thing if you wanna go from zero to hero and, hanging out with Tony Robbins next week. Okay. You've got, he has 40 years of business actions ahead of you. So are there ways to cut down some of that time? Yeah, for sure. Working with consultants like you, finding a coach, getting an expert, those are ways to hack.
That's the only way to hack. You can't, yes. You can't skip any other way.
I love that. I love that whole hack thing. I might have to borrow that from you, but people are looking for the hack. But also, let's go back to some of the gold that you mentioned. We talked about the lemonade stand, there are successful lemonade stands.
There are lemonade stands. They're not so successful, but what makes the difference between them And I can, without even knowing this hypothetical lemonade stand and the little girl that asked the lemonade stand. I can tell you there are two things that will make the this difference and those things apply to any business.
Two things. Location is number one, and number two is the size of her network. So in order to make her lemonade stand successful, she needs to either be in a busy thoroughfare, a busy street where people foot traffic happens to walk by on a hot day. And they want some lemonade, or maybe it's a little cooler, maybe they're not that many people, but the little girl goes to mom and dad and say, mom and dad, I wanna raise money.
I lemonade stand. Can you help me? Can you get on your phones? And can you call everyone you know and can you let them know I'm selling lemonade? And mom and dad and brother and sister and cousin and Uncle Bob all get on the phone and say, little care is selling lemonade for her school. Can you support her?
She's gonna be selling from 12 to four. Saturday. We would love your support. And guess what happens from 12 on Saturday? Saturday, the world comes sold out. The world comes to work, but it's the person who, number one, doesn't understand location. And the person who doesn't understand that their network is in their network.
Everything is about your network. The people that you know this interview, this opportunity was so important to me. You know why? Because you're so important to me. Powerful ladies is so important to me. I appreciate who you are, what you do, what your platform stands for. I wanna be able to say I'm a powerful lady.
Look at my interview that I did with Kara Duffy of Powerful Ladies. So I show up and I give people the best, and that's why my business is growing so people can do it with any business.
Thank you so much. That really means a lot to me. I feel the same way. And part of why I do these podcasts, like this is the most selfish part of my business.
'cause I get to hang out with people I'm admired by and get all excited. Like when, when I do a full Sunday of four recordings in a row, which is typically how we do it on Monday, I get more done that next week than I do any other week of the month. And it's because I'm spending the day hanging out with powerful ladies, like people who are reminding me of what's possible.
We're having these great conversations. It's like filling you up. And I have to return the favor about this goal because you said something. That is the number one way, in my opinion, to, to sell whatever you gotta sell. Like I'm a big believer that the only marketing you need is the amount you need to achieve your sales goals.
You do not need to be marketing 24 7. So if you need 20 people to take your course, you just need to market to get 20 people to show up. That doesn't mean talking to 20 people, but like getting 20 people, but in seats. Buyers. But you mentioned this idea, I call, I talk about the PTA phone tree.
Like back in the day, you'd have to have the only way to tell someone I come from the northeast, so we had snow days all the time, had did a school with no cell phones, no internet tell everyone's school was closed. They had everyone's phone numbers, but a principal couldn't call everybody at once. That would be ludicrous.
So they had the phone tree. You called 10 people. They called 10 people. I don't know why more people just don't go back to this phone tree method of doing their business and. Influencers, like a hybrid of it or ambassadors are a hybrid of it, but you don't need an influencer to do this. You literally can call your mom, your brothers, your sisters.
And it goes back to this like just shouting from the rooftops. Everyone you know better know it's there. One of the first exercises I have my clients do is create their community map, make their phone tree, and they have to email everyone in their contact list what they've launched, what they're doing, and how, give them three things that they can do to support them.
And it makes people so nervous to do this. And I'm like, yeah, but. Just, it's an email. It's the easiest way to talk to people. But people want to support you. People want to brag about you. We had a guest recently that said, people just send me money sometimes.
They can send me money.
Right now I'm raising my production fundraiser. Send me some, somebody, I'll take it, I'll take it. But I agree with you. I hear that. But what you said in the email. Even if people do that without a coach, lemme tell you, because see, I have a gift. This is my gift. And at 44 I'm walking in my truth and understanding that this is a gift.
I can look at something and pick it apart and see the errors and different things. So where most people who would've had that idea to send that, that email would've done, they always forget the call to action. Yes. They say, you know what? I just opened up my new shoe store. It's at New York. It's in New York.
I have lovely shoes, and they're at the best prices. Thank you. I appreciate you. That's all they say. Yeah, but they miss. What is it you want me to do? What is the call to action? And gimme specific ways. Give them multiple choices. Why? Because not everyone likes apples. Not everyone likes oranges. Not everyone is gonna support you in the same way.
I made a post a contr. I love my controversial post, but I made a post other day because everybody was doing this badass woman challenge. And so tagging me and tagging me. So finally I said, look, I appreciate that you. I think I'm a badass woman. I really do. I said, I'm grateful. I said, however, if you could share one of my shows, if you could be a guest on one of my shows, if you could make a donation to my fundraiser, I would appreciate you supporting my business so much more than supporting my pretty face.
And then I had other women who were like, yeah, there's some other women. Were like, no, we're trying to help the women in Turkey. And I said, okay, but what about all the women around the world? Let's show support for those businesses. And one of the things that I noticed that people were, who were tagging me, they were my closest friends, but they hadn't supported my business.
But they wanna do these things that we're empowering women. Okay empower me by sharing my show, empowering me by coming on the round table talk show, supporting me, and talking about what you do. So I can support you. So it's nice, it's a nice gesture. But really, if you wanna support me. Just like when I was on your show, I love the fact that we can have an honest and open conversation.
I did a panel after your panel. And they sent me it. It was more people, it was like 12 people. But the day before the show, they sent me 20 questions that they were gonna ask on the show, and the first question said, how can we support the African American community? Now, this was the only question outta 20 questions that even mentioned African Americans.
It didn't even include it anywhere else. The other questions were like, how do we make this world a better place? How do we give love? How do we show? I'm like, okay, hold up. When we started this panel, I told him, I said, look, if you wanna talk. Let's talk, let's have a conversation. But what you're not gonna do is have me waste my time with fluff.
I don't do fluff in any form or fashion. So if you wanna support me, if you wanna help me, just like I wanna support you, I love what you do. Why? That's why I'm here on a Sunday. I don't even work weekends. I take weekends off. I don't answer my phone. I don't, I try to stay away from emails, but I wanna support you.
I wanna show you that I love what you're doing and the fact that you're lifting up and raising up women and telling them that they're powerful. I'm here Sunday afternoon, I'm here. And I think that's what we need to do is use our voices to help other people. But people can't help you until you tell them, this is what I need from you.
This is the call to action. This is how you can support me. And you'll see a greater response than just saying, I just opened my own business. I hope you're happy for me.
Completely. And I love that you brought up that the trend that's been going on of the black and white photos because I have not responded to things I've been tagged in.
Thank you everyone who has, who acknowledged me and I was talking to my boyfriend about it and he's like, why aren't you just posting this? This is like a very powerful lady thing to do. And I couldn't articulate what it was about it that I was like not interested in, and it, I'm not interested in passive action.
Yes,
I know that there are moments of time where we just, we need to remind everyone, they're powerful. There's so many women who are in a space, they dunno. They're powerful. They dunno that they have support. And I'm a big believer in like doing what we can to remind everyone that they are. And I, and that's what we focus on in International Women's Day when we do our big push every year.
And we are always making sure that there is a value add, whether it is how you can support people or look at who we love, like showcasing people because it's great to hold hands and sing Kumbaya, but like what happens after that is really where things change. And it, how you do business is how you can do life is like my new message because most people are not living their life in an entrepreneurial way and it's a missed opportunity for them.
How can you be entrepreneurial about your community? How can you be entrepreneur about your family, about your like. To me, it goes everywhere. So when I say in messaging like this is about your business and your life, I mean it like these habits, this mindset, the success approach, it doesn't matter what we're trying to achieve.
These same steps make things happen. And I just, when if we can get millions of women around the world to post the black and white photo, I wanna know what can we get them to do next? What can. One penny and $1 adds up real fast if everybody's involved in it. So how many of the women who posted a photo are also now donating to support women in Turkey, to your point, or how many are even sharing those posts?
I didn't even know why people were doing it for the first week and a half. So
a, I didn't either. It didn't even say Turkey. It was just like badass woman. But if you see a picture of me and you see my face, how do you know I'm a badass woman? What makes me a badass woman? What's the criteria?
What? What's the information that says Sharif Hardie is a badass woman because she does this, and this. So all you're sharing is, like I said, my pretty face. And to me, that's the thing that we're trying to get away from. I don't wanna be just a pretty face, I want you to see everything that I'm doing.
Yeah. The Round Table Talk show has been able to do so much good people have been able to make connections. One guest was on a show, she owned a bookstore, author was on the show, was passionate about his book. They got off the show, she ordered six of his books for her bookstore, and now his books are in a store in a different state that he would never have been able to make that connection.
Okay. Does it matter what I look like? No. I'm bringing people together and to me, that's what I wanna support and celebrate.
I think that's a perfect segue into asking you like, what does powerful ladies mean to you? The what does powerful mean Separately from ladies, what do they mean combined?
And yeah, I'll just leave it there to start.
I love it. I love the powerful ladies. I love it so much that if you hadn't thought about it, if it came to me in a dream one night and I would be like, you know what? Lemme start this powerful ladies things and I love the question and that you separated between what is powerful and what is la, the whole thing.
And it's perfect. It's perfect in every way. One of the things that people have told me. And I really stepped into it with Long Beach City Council is people would say, Sharif, you're not standing in your power. You're not standing your power. Ev all my, my, my mentors, they would tell me, Sharif, you're not standing in your power repeatedly.
I don't even know what that means. What does that mean? Because I was clueless and I didn't understand. But what I realized with the Round Table talk show is that I hadn't used my voice, I hadn't used the relationship, I hadn't used the connections that I had in order to make a change in the world.
I was just sitting back, having one-on-one interviews, not really pushing myself and not really pushing other people as well. When you say, and you mentioned the snow days. I was raised in Columbus, Ohio. And so people on the East coast tend to have a certain demeanor than people on the West Coast we're really into ladies and just, you must be a lady, especially when you go down, you have to be a lady.
No cursing, none of that. You have to be a lady. And so I love being a lady. I love the fact that I can tell someone exactly what I feel without raising my voice, without screaming, without having to curse, curse. Cursing. There must be, really something immediate that happens because I feel that I lose my power when I have to resort to curse words.
Why? Because anyone can do that. Anyone can say that. But when I can intellectually respond in a way that you never seen come to me. That's true power. Women have never had power in the history of history. Why? Because we've always had the answer to men. We didn't have a voice. And when you take away someone's voice, you take away their power.
So powerful. Ladies are kind, beautiful ladies who have so much intelligence, but their power is it speaking their voice. It speaking their truth. There's power in that and I love the whole idea behind it.
Who are some of the women who have. Ed around you to either show you how powerful you are or to keep inspiring you to, to keep expanding into the power you already had.
One of my mentors is Belinda Baker. Oh, I love her. She's. So amazing. And Belinda Baker, she's a little older than I am, but when she was in high school, she was a drug addict and she was a drug dealer. She's been sober and she's been clean for over 30 years. And so what she wrote a book. She hosted her own talk show, but she lost her own business.
And what she has right now is sober living homes. So she has sober living homes for women and children. And so for women, after they get clean, they can come to their home with their children. She has a $2 million business. She has homes all over Southern California, but this woman never sleeps.
She never stops. And she's always going. And she took what was the harm that she did in being a drug dealer And she turned it around and helped people right now. And I think that is so beautiful and to build it into a multimillion dollar business. And she's always telling me, Sharifah, you can do it, supporting me and I just, and to read her book and to hear her story.
When you think of a drug addicted drug dealer, you look and you assume, and you judge. No good can come from this. But yeah, she spent 30 years helping other people, and I just applaud her. So whenever I have a question, I always go Glenda, what do I do? And she always gives me that advice from a warm, loving mother perspective, but from a hell of a business woman.
I love it. We ask everyone on the podcast where you put yourself in the powerful lady scale, zero being average everyday human, and 10 being the most powerful lady possible. Where would you rank yourself today, and where do you think you would rank yourself on average?
On an average day? Oh, okay.
On, it's the same answer today. Every day I rank myself at a 25. Like I'm like off the scale. You know what I mean? That's where I'm, I love being at the top.
What is next for you? We've done so much pivoting, prioritizing, shuffling this year, but what is next for you and what are you excited about?
What's next for me is television. I've been doing a lot of social media. I host three talk shows, but this is just to get comfortable in front of the camera, build those relationships, make those connections. But you gonna watch television one day, just like a whole bunch of people, and it's gonna be relatively soon outside is five years, two to five years.
But you gonna look at television, you're gonna say,
because that's the next step. Everything that I'm doing is bringing me to that level because more and more people wanna see it and it's content. At the end of the day, if you make great content, even Netflix is looking for content. They want those eyeballs that will bring people to their platform no matter what the platform.
It could be Hulu, it could be a whole lot of different things, but it's gonna definitely be television for me. I love it.
I love
it.
As always, hanging out and spending my time with you is inspiring and empowering, and a million ideas are like popping through my head which is my favorite. I really believe that my love language is creating it's creating with people together.
It's making things happen. And I love that you gave me the opportunity to spend that time with you and, we've, I'm really proud of what we've done together and continue to be and I can't wait to see what happens next.
Thank you. I can't wait to see what happens next with you as well.
I am so happy that Sharifah is a part of my world and the powerful ladies' world. She is a woman doing the work. She is a woman here to pay it forward, and she's a woman who walks her talk. I encourage all of you to ask how you can be a little bit more like Sharifah. How can you take on being a stand for what you wanna see in your life, your business, and your community?
Now is the time for a pause to check in and see if there's a new action you can take to connect support to watch her shows and follow Sharifah. You can find her on Instagram at Sharifah Hardie. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at Sharifah Hardie and her website, ask Sharifah.com. We have all of her direct links to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, even her email, all available on our website, the powerful ladies.com/podcast.
You can find it all in our show notes. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you've enjoyed this episode of The Powerful Ladies Podcast. There are so many ways you can get involved and get supported with fellow powerful ladies. First, subscribe to this podcast anywhere you listen to podcasts. Give us a five star rating and leave a review on Apple Podcasts.
Follow us on Instagram at Powerful Ladies. Join the Powerful Ladies Thrive Collective. This is the place where powerful ladies connect, level up, and learn how to thrive in business and life. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube page, and of course, visit our website, the powerful ladies.com. I'd like to thank our producer, composer, and audio engineer Jordan Duffy.
Without her, this wouldn't be possible. You can follow her on Instagram at Jordan K Do Duffy. We'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Until then, I hope you're taking on being powerful in your life. Go be awesome and up to something you love.
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Instagram: @SharifahHardie
Twitter: @SharifahHardie
Facebook: Facebook.com/ILikeSharifah
Website: AskSharifah.com
Email: Sharifah@asksharifah.com
Created and hosted by Kara Duffy
Audio Engineering & Editing by Jordan Duffy
Production by Amanda Kass
Graphic design by Anna Olinova
Music by Joakim Karud
