Episode #16 - Passion P.I.P.E.L.I.N.E with Sandra Colton-Medici

Episode Transcript

Meredith Matics: Welcome to Business Reflections with your host Meredith Matics, and we are here to reflect on the business topics that are affecting you today and how you can better run your business. Today I have Sandra Colton-Medici with the Passion P.I.P.E.L.I.N.E. And I know your book came out earlier this year and actually just to go back, our listeners don't know that we tried to report record this podcast in 2020, but per the 2020 curse, it did not work out.  

Sandra Colton-Medici: Right.  

Meredith Matics: So, we are here for round two with Sandra, and so when we interviewed you last time, you had just released your book. But now your book's been out for a little bit of time and it's the Passion P.I.P.E.L.I.N.E., so let's start with telling me about what in your career path led you to this stage and in starting your own company slash writing your first book. 

Sandra Colton-Medici: I've been a writer all my life, so I've kind of had this creative outlet in a few different areas, first being dance, and then, you know, performing in LA and, you know, kind of in a global realm. But my, I guess you could say my backup plan along the way was always being a journalist and or educator. Education has always been at the forefront for me and writing was always a part of that. When I was performing, I wrote a book called "Book Me: How to Become a Successful Working Dancer in Hollywood". And that came out back in, I think, 2009. 

So this book, Passion P.I.P.E.L.I.N.E was not my first foray into writing a book.  It was just kind of my, um, you know, everybody found something to do during the pandemic, hopefully, and this was my something to do. Um, and I, you know, I decided, you know, what is your true passion? And, you know, I graduated from USC in May 2020, virtually like everyone else. And, you know, with my doctorate and in virtual hand, so to speak, I was like, now what do I do? So around the middle of the year, I was like, gosh, you know, I think I need to figure out what makes me tick. And if I can figure that out, maybe I can help other people do that too. 

So in writing the book I went through, sitting down for 45 minutes, talking into my phone and taking that sort of talk to text dictation and turning it into a book 45 minutes later. So it really is one of those things where I thought, you know, going into it, I'm just going to write a book. 

And I, and I did.  

Meredith Matics: You did, how's it doing so far?  

Sandra Colton-Medici: It's doing well. And really it has given me an opportunity to talk more about how people can really do what they want to do for a living and not be held back by any other restrictions. And I'm kind of that proof of it because in, um, you know, uh, what was it in October? 

I did leave my nine to five job and I started doing really full time, I got into more of what makes me have fun. And I feel like during the pandemic, we need a little bit more fun, cause it's been a bit of trauma and tragedy and disaster chaos all together. So my fun is designing and, creating and finding ways to help other people do that. 

And I've always done that kind of on the side. I've worked in education, through different, you know, higher ed, if you will. Helping students get to their goals through working as an admissions advisor and also counseling students, even after they've left trying to help people just get to the next place. 

And I felt like that's really my calling. And so I really started consulting and doing that end of things and feeling like I was really helping business owners, like entrepreneurs, really get to where they wanted to be. And that was really going with what I led with first, which is doing what you love. 

And if you do what you love, it's not a job anymore. And maybe there is some work in that because doing what you love, isn't always going to be easy. But I always felt like if you lead with that, then you can figure out and fix it. The other parts, like the operational parts, you can always fix those with either hiring people or finding someone who loves to do that, you know? 

Meredith Matics: Right, you have so many different elements to your company and to having the book and having your career focusing on digital strategy, digital marketing, and you're saying, do what you love. So which part is the part that you truly love? 

Sandra Colton-Medici: The part that I loved the most is the creative side. And I really feel like that comes down to design. That's why in the last, you know, three, I would say two to three months or so I've really tried to my word for the year, by the way and you can adopt this if you're listening, it is alignment. 

And I have felt like a lot of what I've been doing, and this is kind of back to the book is a lot of creative people and even other, you know, um, you know, if your right brain or left flight or left brain, you can be unfocused. Creatives tend to be more unfocused, and I felt like alignment was something that I needed to have as my word of the year. 

And that everything that I did this year is, has to be aligned with my one singular goal. Well, I have many goals, but the big goal was to brand what I'm doing and at the end of the day, have people understand what it is that I do. Because I've been in so many Facebook group after Facebook group and I've had people add me. 

The first thing that they asked me is what do you do? Instead of like, who are you?   I found that in Hollywood, that's what people ask you all the time. What are you working on? And it's the, what do you do? Question that I always find so offensive sometimes. 

I really think the, who are you? What are you about? Questions are way more personal. Maybe you are a CEO, is that who you are? 

Because you work for a company like Xerox but are you into paper or, copying, like maybe that's not you. So, I always feel like I wanted to change the conversation and my mission was going to be alignment about who I am and not what I do, because I want other people to be who they are and what they do will follow that. 

Does that make sense?  

Meredith Matics: Yeah. I think as business owners, you get stuck in that. What do you do? What are you there? What are you do? How do you think small business owners could better align themselves to balance that? What do you do and who are you?  

Sandra Colton-Medici: I think balance is all about a roadmap, if you will. And sometimes it takes writing things down to really see things in black and white, because you always try to balance, you know, every day.  But when you think about being a business owner and finding balance between what you do and who you are, sometimes they do mesh over, and they cross over and that's great.  But the balance, I think, comes in knowing when to take breaks and knowing when you are overwhelmed and need somebody to come in and take over different aspects of your business, knowing when to delegate. That's the kind of balance I think you can map out on paper, like writing down what you do. 

Like what do, what do you do for the morning to night? Okay, well, what five things can you take away and give to somebody else? That's a balance that you can actually look at and materialize and measure like, okay, well, I just saved two hours of my day because I delegated the 10 emails that I just spent 20 minutes writing. 

I delegated that to somebody else or the research that I was trying to spend or trying to do on the internet about competitors or click-through rates or whatever you're doing. I delegated that to somebody else. So now I have an entire six hours open that I would have spent to research on my competitors or whatever. 

If you're doing those kinds of things to open up your, your time, and I think that's gonna bring in other elements that will balance out the business side with the personal. 

Meredith Matics: What about business owners that maybe don't have somebody to delegate to yet? How can they better balance their selves? 

You know, especially if they're really small and going through a pandemic, they're probably low on staff. What is their recommendations that you have for balancing that and finding how you can maybe delegate those things in a different way than necessarily delegate them to like an assistant.  

Sandra Colton-Medici: Yeah. So for me, I am not, you know, employing 14 people, you know what I mean? 

Like I wish I had all of that kind of, bandwidth, but for, for me, I look at it this way. I have to put it to bed. It really is making a decision and I know that everybody needs money. And so you're up late at night, but the other part of running yourself too thin, which is basically what a lot of small business owners do is then you're not fresh for the next day either. 

So if you were, you know, if you're doing it, can't running the candle - what do they say at both ends? 

Meredith Matics: Right, burning the candles at both ends. 

Sandra Colton-Medici: And then you're not, you're not fresh for, for the morning or the night. Like you're just, you're just running and it's not a good, it's not a good marathon run.  It's a bad run. 

My advice is, what I have to do sometimes is look at the clock and make a decision on when I'm putting it to bed, because I will go all night. Because I have that kind of stamina. And if you can't delegate, then I would extend your plan. 

So if you had a one-year plan, you need to have a five-year plan. You're still making goals, but you're making them okay. A little bit further out so that you aren't scaling as fast as you wanted to, but you're still going to get to that goal, but you're also going to arrive there. 

I've been using the hashtag arrive accomplished because you want to arrive to that goal, not dead at the, you know, at the door you want to arrive for the next. Portion of that leg of your journey, like really, really fresh and ready to go.  You want to be like, Oh, I've got so much left in me that this is just another portion of the journey. Does that make sense?  

Meredith Matics: Yeah. And does your book help with business owners finding that balance and not burning out?  

Sandra Colton-Medici: I think so. I think it's really just a matter of revisiting some of the steps in the Passion P.I.P.E.L.I.N.E. 

I know there's eight different steps, but I feel like when you are, maybe you've mastered, figuring out how to do one element. Well, that doesn't mean that you can't revisit it a little bit later because sometimes, I mean, like we know 2020, things happen. And you do have to revisit, and many corporations had to revisit, many small businesses had to figure out, like that messaging that I had put out like, Hmm, we need to, we need to figure out how to adjust in real time. And that's why it's a pipeline, but it also is something that you can revisit many of the steps again to say, okay, well, what is my first step versus my eighth step and in between you can mix and match all of them. Because there's always something that you can work on. And the reason there's always something that you can work on is because there will always be challenges in this world. There will always be new technology to learn and master and all of those things, because we don't know what's coming next. 

So there will always be something to work on. Even if it's personal goals to work on, there will always be business goals that we don't even know what the future is going to hold as far as, you know, pandemic wise or, the economy or just personally how you're dealing with being remote. 

Like there's so many elements that I really do think that we can all work smart on. But also take a moment to say, wow, most of the people who were trucking along are still trucking along like we are still working toward bettering ourselves through 2021 because we have to like, we can't stop because that's the ultimate like, Oh my goodness. 

You know, for me, I can't even think about like, if we stopped doing what we were doing, as far as building and creating where we would be.  

Meredith Matics: Well, and one of the things I really did enjoy about your book was even though it is kind of the pipeline, you can and you mentioned it like re-visit, but as challenges come up as a small business owner, I would think like even just refocusing your ideas, using your pipeline method is really interesting. 

As you are approached with a slight challenge or a slight derail of your, you know, as we talked about your goals, so if you see the goal line. But now there's a tree branch in the way, revisiting it and seeing how that derailment to it could still fit within it is I think very nice because it's nice to have kind of a framework to work within while still inspiring yourself. 

Sandra Colton-Medici: Yes. Well, and that's the thing it's it's yeah. There's a lot of times where you will, we'll try to look for inspiration in other places. And that's great, but when you can try to re-inspire yourself by learning something new, or I mean, in, in, and I don't know if anybody knows what the pipeline actually stands for. Practice.  

Meredith Matics: Talk about that. 

Sandra Colton-Medici: I know we're just talking about it  

Meredith Matics: We just skipped right over it.  

Sandra Colton-Medici: I know. Well, so. Stands for pipeline is actually an acronym for practice inventiveness, pursue excitement, live inspired, and negotiate energy. And so when I talk about the different steps, I'm thinking, you are pursuing your business goals, you are living. 

We want to live through all of these kind of challenges and face them with a moment of energetic pursuit. I feel like the energy behind 2021 is like palpitating. It's the pulse is there because people are ready to just explode with all of these great ideas that they've been working on through 2020. 

And I feel like small businesses, especially, they're the backbone of where we're all, at here. Corporations will exist. Banks will thrive, all of these things, but when you're looking at the people that, your local corner store that you go to, because they've got that one thing that your husband likes, or you know, that that is you can't get. 

Meredith Matics: Your favorite cheese.  

Sandra Colton-Medici: Can't get it anywhere else. Yes. I told her my husband is French, so we've talked wine and cheese before. But it's that thing, like what we were talking about of getting something and finding a solution in a small business is almost more gratifying than knowing that it came from a bigger corporation. 

 You want to be able to serve your customers, but you also want to be able to have, like, we're talking about balance in yourself and revisiting some of these steps as far as like living in and being excited about what you're doing. 

Like, I got really excited about writing this book. And I got really excited when I, when I put it out. And then the response I was like, yes, people understand it and they get it. And so it inspired me, right? I'm in this Passion pipeline myself to do more stuff. And so in May, I'm coming out with a membership website called "College of Style". 

Now this is something that I, I bought the URL a long time ago, back in 2017 and I let it expire. And then recently I was like, let me see if I can get it again. Let me see if I can get it again. And so I bought it back and I was like, this is meant for my programs, my educational online courses to live under one place. 

And it has to be a place, which is what I was talking about with alignment. It has to be a place where people can go and they can learn about design in a way where it applies to all things business. Design communication from an email marketing standpoint, by design, online course design, of course. 

But there's so many things that I've been trying to do where I've been unfocused, and this is my way of pulling them all under one umbrella. And one very rooted in design focus, so that people can say, okay, I get where she's going with this because I need to be able to communicate and have messaging that goes out to my customers that is designed in a way to get to XYZ goal. And then I need to be able to lead my organization with this kind of leadership style that is by design to get my employees, to buy into what I'm, what we're doing as a company. And just making sure that everything falls in line with that kind of focus because I'm living through my Passion Pipeline too. 

Meredith Matics: I think we all are; I think all small businesses once. I mean, if they took a look, they would see that. You just constantly, re-funneling what you do into something better. That's within that same thing.  

We end the podcast with two questions that we ask all of our listeners. 

And so the first one is what is one piece of advice you have received that you would want to share with another small business owner?  

Sandra Colton-Medici: Okay. One piece of advice that I received from Meredith Johnson. She, I think is the head of marketing for the Academy of Motion Pictures, Arts, and Sciences. 

And she told me, she said, people should not try to go viral. People should be, and businesses too, should it have an authenticity because being your own self may in fact go viral. A lot of people spend a lot of money putting marketing efforts into campaigns that they want to look and feel like they're going viral because they have a broad reach. 

But if you stay true to who you are, and your authenticity and you being who you are as a normal person or, or putting out your mission, your values as a company. That could attract people and then go viral just by being authentic. So that was a good piece of advice. 

Meredith Matics: I think that's a great piece of advice and I think it really rings true to what we saw in 2020. You would see a lot of things hit the news or hit the Facebook and it would be there, but gone in a minute, short-lived did not appreciated, but those small businesses that we all loved or our favorite coffee shops, we were really there for them and trying to be there to keep them in business. 

And we didn't really care about the one offs that we all thought it was really cool this one time. I think that we really saw that in 2020 is that being authentic is gonna buy you the long-term branding and the longterm customer base versus the hot new thing.  

Sandra Colton-Medici: Exactly, exactly. That what they call that know, like, and trust factor.  

Meredith Matics: And so Sandra, now that you have your passion pipeline, you have your podcast, you have your Instagram, and now you have a new website coming out, tell our listeners where they're going to be able to find you so they can learn more. 

Sandra Colton-Medici: So all of my information, is on Sandra Colton, medici.com and. That is a very long name. So Sandra and then Colton is spelled C-O-L-T-O-N. And then Medici is M-E-D-I-C-I.com. All of it is housed there. My programs will be at collegeofstyle.com and, if you go to my Instagram, which is instagram.com forward slash doctor, which is not spelled out, it's just Dr. Dr.SandraColtonMedici. If you click that little link in the bio, then you will find all of my socials and links there too, whether it's like a free resource or anything like that. It's all in the link in bio  

Meredith Matics: Wonderful, Sandra. Well, we are looking forward to 2020 and trying to balance our energy.  

Sandra Colton-Medici: 2021! 

Meredith Matics: And, Oh my gosh, we're super looking forward to 2021, but 2020 has only been gone for a few days. I know. 

Sandra Colton-Medici: I know. I'm like, I am not looking forward to 2020. I don't know about you.  

Meredith Matics: 2020 is long gone. We are super looking forward to 2021 and be able to, you know, rebalance our energy and live authentically and be small business owners and thrive again. 

Sandra Colton-Medici: Yeah. Well, that's definitely in all of our horizons and I figure if we all focus on that and we say it every day, it'll happen.  

Meredith Matics: I think it will.  

Business Reflections Closing: Please note that these are thoughts and opinions alone. For tax advice, please see your CPA or tax advisor, tax professional for business advice and legal entities. Please see your local business, lawyer, or attorney for advice. And if you'd like to reach out to us for any topics or questions about. Any subject, any episode you can reach us podcast@maticsbilling.com. That's podcast@maticsbilling.com.    

For show notes, visit Maticsbilling.com/podcast. If you liked this episode, we want to hear from you. Please hit subscribe. Leave a review and share this episode with your friends, family, and on your social media pages. See you next time! 

Business Reflections Closing: Please note that these are thoughts and opinions alone. For tax advice, please see your CPA or tax advisor, tax professional for business advice and legal entities. Please see your local business, lawyer, or attorney for advice. And if you'd like to reach out to us for any topics or questions about. Any subject, any episode you can reach us podcast@maticsbilling.com. That's podcast@maticsbilling.com.   

For show notes, visit Maticsbilling.com/podcast. If you liked this episode, we want to hear from you. Please hit subscribe. Leave a review and share this episode with your friends, family, and on your social media pages. See you next time!