SOS Dance Global: Choreographing change and empowering a generation

Entrepreneurship is a lot like dancing; both require resilience, adaptability, and the courage to step outside your comfort zone.

Find out how one startup, SOS Dance Global, is combining these elements to reach the top of the industry. This is a story of empowerment, resilience, and defying the odds.

Bonnie Parsons, shares her remarkable journey from professional dancer to pioneering entrepreneur, and how she's empowering a generation of women through the universal language of dance.

Key Takeaways

- How to confront challenges head-on. Hear the harsh truths behind the obstacles facing female founders and the keys to success in balancing entrepreneurship and motherhood. 

- Empowerment as strategy. For Bonnie, she's clear on her mission to positively impact lives globally, providing strength and confidence to women. 

- Scaling up requires a transformative mindset, implementing systems, and spreading culture and processes for business growth

- Persistence pays off. Building a startup is a long game where patience, strategic planning, and understanding your worth are essential ingredients for success.

Have questions about this episode? Ask our hosts, chat now via our website

Transcript

Unknown: 0:00

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Dr Becky Sage: 0:23

you're listening to find it and grounded with Ollie collard and Dr. Becky sage. The podcast brings you the honest realities of startup life. If you're a founder or aspiring entrepreneur, this is for you. We know running a business can be lonely and tough at times, and we want to help you get ahead with simple tips and sound advice. Every fortnight we hear inspiring stories from an early stage business owner, who's only a couple of steps ahead of you, talking about what they've learned. And as your hosts, we share our insights and experiences as founders so you can apply this to your own business. Hello, I'm Dr. Becky sage. I'm co host, our founder, Dan grounded and I'm here today with Ollie collard. Hi, Ollie. How are you this week?

Ollie Collard: 1:16

I'm doing great. Thanks, pokey. How are you?

Dr Becky Sage: 1:19

Yeah, really good. I think I was just telling you before we started recording that I'm training quite a lot for an international gymnastics competition I'm doing in the summer. And so I train a lot on the weekends. So it's no Monday morning, when you'd think I'd be kind of refreshed and rested. But rather my body is, is aching quite a lot, but otherwise, very happy to be here.

Ollie Collard: 1:45

Excellent. And we're rattling through these episodes. I can't believe we're nearly into March already. And spring is around the corner, which is nice.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:53

Yeah, let's let's hope the weather gets the memo on that one. So who is it we're talking to this

Ollie Collard: 2:00

week, we've got the incredibly passionate Bonnie, who is founder of a business called SOS dance global

Dr Becky Sage: 2:08

iPhone listening to Bonnie incredibly inspirational as a female entrepreneur, but as an entrepreneur who has this vision to impact millions of people. So let's go ahead and listen to Bonnie's story and find out more about SOS dance global

Ollie Collard: 2:27

barley Good afternoon, how you doing?

Unknown: 2:29

I'm fabulous. Thank you just saying we've had a an interesting morning. And this podcast came on my literally across my desk. And I'm very pleased that did so I'm thrilled to be here and be chatting with you. Well,

Ollie Collard: 2:43

thank you so much. Seizing the opportunity with both hands. I know. It was mentioned through Kim, who was supposed to be recording this afternoon who couldn't make it due to the ongoing train strike. So thank you for really seizing it and being open to the opportunity as well. So before we dive into SOS dance global talk to me about your experience as a professional dancer, and your first startup which was called seen on screen.

Unknown: 3:13

Um, so I became a professional dancer when I was 18. That's all I wanted to do. You know, when someone says when I grow up, I want to be I was like, when I grew up, I want to be a dancer for Britney Spears. So essentially what I wanted to do, which came off the back of a Britney Spears concert I went to when I was 14, and then a whole like childhood of watching MTV and smash hits and copying the dance routines seen on screen. And so essentially, my parents were like, sure. If you want to be a dancer, they were kind of there. My mom was thrilled because she always wanted to be a dancer. And she ended up going into the music industry. So I was getting to live her dream. And my dad was kind of like, if you want to be a dancer, be a dancer just be the best. So I was I got it. So yeah, so I trained between 16 and 18 some I called Arts educational training Park. And then I moved to London when I was 18. Long story short, got an opportunity to go to New York, when I just turned 19. And then I lived in New York for three months. It was essentially a job that fell through but I had everything set up in New York. So I went anyway on my own. I go my parents were like moved to now you know, so you're on your own way. 19 Sure. The Big Apple is the best thing ever happened to me. And I feel like I was forged in those. You know, that time that I spent in New York. And one of the beautiful things about the dance industry that I'm in the pie man, is that the best choreographers in the world, particularly in America, teach at the Broadway Dance centre Millennium dance complex in Los Angeles. All of these dance studios where you don't have to audition to do a class anyone can just rock up and go. So suddenly I found myself In these dance studios with the best in the business that I had spent my childhood, watching literally on screen and learning from them. And then I moved to Los Angeles because I had an another opportunity came up in LA. And then I got my first job in Los Angeles. Again, with the most incredible dancers like pinching myself, there was one dancer that I was working with called charm who I'd seen on Madonna's tour the year before, she has gone on to be a huge choreographer. But then I'm on a job with charm. And I'm like, Oh, my God, it was just incredible. Any dance fans watching this will know Trump, he's currently developers, choreographer. Then I moved back to London, and I got my first agent in London, because the agent in Los Angeles had recommended me. And then I got direct booked, which means you don't have to audition. So you they just essentially text you and say you available. And my first job in London was with seal on the Royal Variety Performance, where I kind of met the Queen, I want to say I met the Queen because I stood behind Russell Brand when he met the Queen, and I got to see all diamonds. And she was just like, you had to wear sunglasses to look at the Queen because of all the diamonds, like glistening everywhere. So my first job was through a variety performance. And then I kind of essentially got kick started in London, as a professional dancer. And I worked on The X Factor and for sugar babes in one direction. And Florence in the machine and Kelly Rowland, Professor Green, the mobile rewards. And though you know, there are some amazing moments, there's so much hustle so much hard work, but really, it was essentially you worked hard and were rewarded for it, which is different in the business world I found, which we can get into. And then when I was 23, I'd been a professional dancer for five years. And I was sitting on this while I was actually 22. And I had the idea and I sitting on the side of the stage on The X Factor set. And 20 million people watching the show. And I that was my third year. So I want to think that maybe I was a bit more relaxed my third year doing the show, which is why I had the time to think of a business idea. And I think I was literally looking at a camera thinking there's 20 million people that will be behind that on Saturday night. I'm thinking I wonder if any of those 20 million people watching this want to learn to dance like us, because I'm one of these dancers now. And all my friends are the professional backing dancers you see with celebrities and pop stars. So why don't I just set up some dance classes with me and my friends. And people can learn how to dance with us. And then I was telling some random dude, coffee shop in Covent Garden, this AI business idea. I don't know who he is, but he was American. And he went, Oh, what like seen on screen? And I was like, Thank you. Yes, exactly. That's how I came up with the idea. And then I launched my first few classes, I hired an amazing publicist. I could a massive PR firm that got recommended to me. And I told them my budget and they were so sweet. They were like, Yeah, that's a little bit small for us. But someone's just left. She's had a baby. She started up her own firm. She's incredible. Why don't you talk to her. She's called Natalie Luke. And she just set up a juror communications which has gone on and on great things. But she was my first publicist. And she started getting and I tried as well. I was calling up like, cosmopolitan and timeout in my lunch breaks. I was working on Sony Playstations don't stop party video game, when I was kind of like, finding product market fit for seen on screen. And in my lunch breaks. I was calling up journalists. And they'd be like, Who the fuck are you get away like go? And I'd be like, Why don't they want to know as like, the pot like the backing dancers pop stars are available. This is this should be on the headlines like this is a bit for me it was a big deal. And then Natalie essentially got in touch with the same people and managed to get lots of press for us. And we got featured by the stylist magazine. And we managed to get the product market fit at the right time with the press features going live and our website just break down like time and time again. Because like BuzzFeed had go live and you know, these huge features. And every time that would happen, I would just get requests for our classes, literally all over the world. I've got an inbox in my old inbox for my first company called SOS dance global SOS global because it's just full of emails from people all over the world asking for our classes. And then essentially, I was like, right, what's next? Like, how are we going to scale this all over the world? And here we are and who

Ollie Collard: 9:54

we are? Yes. So talk to me about SOS dance global. What do you do? too. And what was the main point of setting the business lap in 2019?

Unknown: 10:06

Yeah, so I had been running seeing on screen. So I found this thing on screen in 2011. While I was still a professional working dancer, and I did it as a side hustle, then it took off in 2013. And then I ran that just focused on the business, no fundraising, nothing. What am I going to do? How am I going to scale this across the world? I just focused on that for a good two years, and it just boomed. It tripled in that time, to the point where I was like, I can't keep up with this business. It was quite stressful in a way because it was there was so much to do. And so I was like, right, how am I going to scale this? And then I looked at online dance classes, that seemed like a really, a really obvious option. But I also knew that people wanted to dance in real life still. So like, how am I going to do that? So I started looking at Zumba and Les Mills and different franchise models. And just doing my market research essentially like looking at different ways I could expand, or we could expand, but I always knew that I wanted it to be for the mass market. So it had to be very, very much priced affordably. So there was also the question of how do I take something that's very exclusive, and very finite? Like there's only so many professional backing dancers? There's only so many. Yeah, there's essentially only it's a very small industry, how do I scale that tiny little industry globally. And then I started looking at, essentially becoming a content business where we create routines, we train up people that love to dance, but aren't professional dancers in our teaching, or my teaching method. And then they licence our brand, the choreography, all of our intellectual property that I built up over by this point, at best part of a decade. And then I knew that I could also scale the professional dance side online, and then you could access these dancers online. And if you want to do it in real life, you do it with our instructors, we call bosses because they're the boss of their like micro dance empire. But if you wanted to access jailers, backing dancer, you do it online. So then I looked at, like a dual strategy of online offline. And I started raising money at the end of 2015. And then I got into the investment ecosystem, which was a whole new chapter.

Ollie Collard: 12:26

Indeed, and we'll come back to fundraising in section two of the podcast. But I'm interested to know about the hybrid model of doing content, teaching online, and then also doing in person events, how do you manage all of those different facets to the business?

Unknown: 12:44

relatively smoothly, I would say because the offline part runs like a routine, which is quite funny. But we released two routines a month. That's everything about building a franchise or a licence model is about process. So much of it is data driven, because if you're running something that's going to be for lots of people taught by lots of people, you have to really, really understand on a like, you know, micro level, what are the levers that I can push and pull that it's going to make the biggest difference, and especially when you're working with a really small team, you have to make sure that any time you spend on that business is going to have the biggest impact possible. So we have drilled down into our data so hard, and we really, really understand it on a granular level. And so it's a case of, you know, what's current, what's going on in pop culture, what's we've got Valentine's Day coming up, which is also Valentine's Day because you celebrate your girls, as well as the old romances that we've got International Women's Day coming up. So we create our routines very much about what's coming up in life. And then those routines are recorded and choreographed by the professional dancers that are from my background. So people that work with Beyonce, and JLo, and Rihanna and Little Mix. They're really, really amazing. But one of the things that I find so important about who we choose to work with, is you can be the best dancer in the world, but you have to be empowering and you have to want to be there beyond a job it has to be about what I'm giving to the instructors that are going to be teaching my choreography, and then what those people in the studio are going to be receiving when they learn the moves I've given them because ultimately it's about how we make people feel. Because dance is a very scary thing. The majority of people I know when I tell them what I do the first thing they say is Oh, I've got two left feet is if I'm telling them what I do they're immediately think I'm gonna like challenge them to a dance battle. We all doing and, and yeah people, which you know, getting people on a dance floor sober is a thing. Women definitely a better at it, but so much about what we do is about how we make people feel. And we always aspire to be more than just a dance class. And one of the things that happened very organically that I certainly didn't plan for is that we changed people's lives. And I would just deliver the best dance experience possible. Like going back to seeing on screen, I just wanted to deliver something like fucking fabulous and cool. And then people started writing to me and coming up to me, and you know that stuff, a lot of times start crying and telling me their story. And I realised that this thing that I had created was helping people get through major challenges in their life, it was helping them understand their worth, it was giving them a sense of self respect that they'd never encountered before. So then that's where the mission of empowering a generation came from, because I had experienced so much in my own life that I had overcome. And I knew that if I hadn't have had my dance background, they would have been game over for me, because as a dancer, you're so resilient, you're so hardcore. And I was able to give that resilience and that strength to people without putting them through the dance industry. And I figured if I can empower one woman to achieve her dreams and do something she didn't think she was capable of, why wouldn't I reach a generation? Why wouldn't I do that for millions of people? It's good for business, and it's good for the planet, it's good for my soul. Why wouldn't I, I really think, if you can put more power into the hands of Yes, women, but I think feminine, a feminine approach to doing things. It's just a game changer. So when it comes back to our choreographers, they work with people like JLo, and Beyonce, these super, super strong women that make a difference to generations every single day. So they soak all of that up. And then they bring it back to our students and our customers. And they give it in their dance tutorials. And they give it to our choreographers that are learning the routines. So in terms of how we run it in real life and online, it's essentially as long as we're giving people that experience that chicken soup, you know, that like empowering feminist bad bits, chicken soup, whether we do it online or in person, as long as we deliver that feeling. That's the goal.

Ollie Collard: 17:21

I love that and you obviously tapping something a lot larger, as you're saying and empowering an entire generation, which is incredible. But why do you think a lot of women lack confidence? And how does your business help with that?

Unknown: 17:33

I think that's a massive question. Like why does so many women lack confidence, and it's essentially a systemic issue that we're conditioned with from birth. That says that as a woman, you have to be so many things that isn't actually attainable, or achievable. So we constantly feel we're failing, because the standards that were set are not attainable. It's completely unrealistic. So if you're constantly failing at one thing or another, then you're going to kind of be constantly knocking your confidence. And you're going to be thinking, why aren't I Enough? Why can't I do this? And because there's so much shame that's attached to that. We're not necessarily sharing our hardships and the true reality of what our experiences are, we're just seeing each other's Instagram feeds. Or we're saying, How are you doing? I'm great, I'm fine. You're not truly understanding each other's struggle. So you don't want to talk about what you're going through. So then the imposter syndrome kicks in, because then you're constantly hiding something. And it's just not, it's just unfair. It's just not right, what women have to deal with every single day. And of course, there's like a deeper level to that you have to look at the intersectionality. And everyone's impacted differently. But women are held to higher standards, and we can't meet them. We can't be everything to everybody all the time. And that's why I think that there's an issue with female confidence because yeah, we're kind of set up to fail. So you're constantly having your confidence not because you're wondering, is it just me that can't do all of the things? Why are classes essentially like a tonic to that or like a magic pill that if you could take it? I think it's because we addressed the reality of the what of the hardship of what you've been through. And I think one of the beauties of like pop music and the music we dance to is that these artists are singing about it. Like Beyonce is singing about real shit that goes on in her life that she's not going to talk about in the in the press, but she'll sing about so you'll feel dancing to I don't know if I pick a song off the top of my head. Break my soul. And you she's singing about things that you can relate to in your life and she's overcoming them. There's that sense of when you marry movement with music, something really magical happens and with you know, without getting too deep, there's a deep wisdom that's kind of in our bodies. If you think about the amazing thing your body does every single day, I've just made a human I gave birth 12 months ago, gratulations, thank you. I can't believe I'm capable of making brain cells, I can make a human being. I didn't know that was, I mean, I knew it was going on. But I didn't have any role, and it just happened. So there's this, like, really, really deep wisdom that's held in our bodies. If you can release that wisdom, with music, through dance, there's something that's very profound that happens. And if you can create the safe space to enable that to happen. It's it's really, really, really powerful.

Ollie Collard: 20:42

And talking of magic, so you talked about changing lives, through some of your customers. And also, you talked about some of your personal struggles that you had to deal with. And obviously being a dancer have enabled you to kind of overcome those barriers. So can you even share some stories or anecdotes from your customers or your own personal life?

Unknown: 21:01

Yeah. So I think a really about something that's just really obvious off the top of my head that comes to mind. There's one of our bosses, so one of our licencing instructors, she posted a video she had, I think she's had two babies, she posted a video that SOS had helped her overcome postnatal depression. And that she'd found SOS at the right time, and it had been a light in her life. It helped her reclaim her back, I think, again, there's something about dance that it just taught, right, it can be very destructive at the same time, like it can be very powerful. And everyone might have heard of stories of like a teacher at some point in time saying that you can't do this, and you can't do that. So it's a very vulnerable space. And it has to be done right. But done right? It can really tune you back to that like, like, go back to the bad bitch persona. That's what I'm building a generation of bad bitches. And whatever it is, that whatever the struggle is, it will tune you back into your your soul, your strength is at the core of who you are. And for her dance had taken her back to who she was before. All of the struggles that she'd had all of the all of the kids and all of the drama, and helped her overcome postnatal depression, I'd seen that when I was experiencing the same thing. And I was just blown away by how brave she was. And I felt immediately seen less alone by seeing her post. Then I went and did a podcast last week, called Dirty mother packer, which is a huge podcast for Mother's talked openly about postnatal depression, I wouldn't have had the strength to do that had I not seen my boss's reel talking about it, because I respected her so much for being so open. And then I'm able to help so many women as a CEO being vulnerable to say, I have postnatal depression. So that's like a thing that springs to mind. That's a good example of like a really good cycle that's happened that's very empowering. And then our, when our instructors go through their course, we do something called Find Your fierce. Because I was like, How can I be in the room and when I'm not in the room, because I can't give these people a script to say what I'm going to say. Because on top of remembering the routine, they're also going to have to remember what to say, and it's just gonna be so stressful. They're never gonna want to teach a dance class. So I'm like, How can I give these anecdotes that I would do in class? Like, how can they How can I be there without being there. And I thought, the reason why I'm able to resonate with people is because I share my story when I teach and I share what I've overcome. And I share my strengths, I share my successes, and I put it all into this routine. So they can express whatever they're feeling through this, like physical release, essentially. And the stories that I got told in the Find Your face sessions, whether it's overcoming abusive relationships, you know, coming out to their parents, for the first time, you know, that fear of whether they're going to be accepted or not getting through mental health pressures getting through university, you know, just day to day life that people are going through. And how they were able to overcome that the role that dance played in that, because I want them to be understand that if they can get through it, they can help other people get through it. So we help them define a mission under our bigger umbrella mission of empowering a generation. So every single boss has a purpose within SOS based on what they've overcome, and what dance has given them, so they can give it to other people. And that's one of the reasons that I would say that's why we're successful is because of that, that mission that they have.

Ollie Collard: 24:51

I love that mission. And I'm just interested to know a bit about the scale of the operation. Obviously, global was in the name so I want to know a bit about you know what kind Tres you're operating in, you know, all the different choreographers, you're working with the all the bosses, the number of customers that you help and obviously transform their lives as well. So, talk to me a bit about the kind of the numbers side of the business.

Dr Becky Sage: 25:13

And so I think in total for myself personally, probably around 15,000 that either I've taught, or the people that I've taught to teach have taught. And we've got 50 locations live at the moment that are in the UK. And then it's just about kind of the right time funding plays a big role in that. Because in terms of our career, ographers, they play a role in it because of where they're based in the dance Capitals in the World of London, New York, Los Angeles. So it feels very natural for us to start rolling out in New York and Los Angeles, I know those two cities so well. And also, if you're big in LA, then it trickles through to the rest of the country. If you're big in London, it trickles through to the rest of the country. So the global part for me, is very much a case of just finding the right time because we have had a few launches in Amsterdam, Zurich, even South Korea, a couple in Australia. But in terms of like really strategic launches, America is where I've got my eye on I obviously looking down the UK, but going into America, and then it's just finding the right time to do that. Which you know, is where we're, that's where my horizons are set. But at the moment is well, it's really about giving the UK a lot of TLC because that's where we're currently operating the majority of our classes. So it's a balance. It's like when you know when to roll it out and the right strategic time to do it. Word about our sponsors. The security threat to UK tech startups is growing. Protecting your innovation is crucial to your business success. Secure innovation is here to help and it only takes a few simple steps to get started. Don't leave it too late. Visit npsa.gov.uk forward slash innovation. To find out more and download the quickstart guide for free today. Are you looking to access finance for your business but unsure where to go and who to trust? Introducing hexa finance, providing growth funding to startups and scale ups throughout the UK, Ben and stews started acts of finance with a clear mission to make finance more accessible to business owners like you. Launched in 2020. They know firsthand the growing pains you're facing their fast growth business is the proud winner of the startup of the Year Award, and has recently been recognised for its economic contribution. So if you need funding now, or it's on your horizon, the experienced team at hexar finance are here to help to access your free consultation, simply go to hexar finance.co.uk, forward slash contact. Wow, Isn't it incredible to hear about the power that Bonnie and her team has managed to channel into all the people that they teach through SOS dance global. So I wanted to delve in a little bit more to this and this incredible ability of businesses to be able to change lives to be able to help to empower people? Is this something that's really important for you in business?

Ollie Collard: 28:38

I think using business as a force for good is such an incredible opportunity to transform lives and the planet. And people at the same time. I think with businesses like this, it's not really just about the dance. It's so much more than that. It's about having that impact in people's lives and seeing the transformation and the change that's possible within them. And it's about people realising their true potential. And I think dancers got a great medium to be able to do that.

Dr Becky Sage: 29:10

Yeah, and I think we're very used to speaking to founders who have an impact led business or a purpose led business. And I certainly kind of come from spaces of Education, Health well being is you know, that end use that product certainly has an impact on lives. But I think something that all of us perhaps forget as founders is how much those small actions can then have a bigger impact. And like you said this, in this particular case, the idea that it's not just about dance, it's about so much more than that. And I love this kind of idea of basically bottling Beyonce, giving that to everyone. It's like, no wonder the business is starting to do well. But I think that it doesn't have to be that the equation of kind of movement plus to music equals magic in this case, I think for other businesses, it can be something slightly different. But know that it doesn't just come through the product, it comes through the way you conduct your business, it comes from you as the individual founder, and then how you work with your team and how your team works with people. And that's why I really liked about this story. It's like, it's not the kind of product that is dance, it's the way it's done that is really helping to change lives.

Ollie Collard: 30:29

Yeah, and I think in business and building relationships, it's always about not what you say is how you make people feel. And I think if you're coming away feeling inspired from a dance session, or whatever it is, then actually, that's going to have so much more impact on your day.

Dr Becky Sage: 30:46

Yeah, and I think for any founders who are maybe feeling that they're perhaps not hitting some of those bigger business goals, or they're not quite having the impact that they think they want to have, something else they thought they could take away from this story is this notion that it might just be one class, one conversation, one social media post, one thing you've said to your team, that then has a really big difference in other people's lives. And I think through the act of building a business and putting things out there putting your story out there, you can have this impact, even if perhaps you're not hitting some of those other goals, or you're not as big as you think you want to be in your business. And it's actually those small things, those early initial impacts that then help you to scale. And I think this is something that we heard a lot from Bonnie, where she kept saying, If I can help one person, why not help a million. And so this is something I wanted to address. So because particularly in this kind of industry, I think it's so they're so used to having, you know, a physical space, which maybe doesn't feel scalable, or being an individual dance teacher or trainer or, you know, it spreads out to the world of coaching and things like that. So what do you think stands in the wave of people, if they are helping one person being able to scale up and help a million?

Ollie Collard: 32:16

Well, firstly, I think it's gonna come from the founder in terms of the leadership and the vision, like, you've got to want to be able to build something that big in the first place. And there's, you know, if you if you're working on a very micro scale and having an impact on people's lives, and that's great, some people might feel comfortable doing that. But some people have got this bigger vision within them. And they want to transform so many people's lives in the process. So I'd say mindset, and strategy is definitely the first thing. But there's obviously different areas that you can address within the business in order to scale.

Dr Becky Sage: 32:52

Yeah, absolutely. So I think that Bonnie mentioned these kind of different levers for scaling. So this is something that's really important for you to be able to do in your business is to look at, okay, where is there something that first of all, that we can repeat, perhaps that we can create a system or a process out of. And then once we've done that, and we're starting to move, she also talked about this use of data, and how important your data can be in terms of scaling. And the way I often frame this is kind of is doing our business experiments, essentially, looking at one particular part of the business, maybe you run a campaign, and you're looking at how that plays out. But it can be internal systems and processes as well. And I'll come on to that in a moment. But you want to run that campaign? And then look at did this make a difference? Did this not make a difference? How is this actually helping us scale? Or is this something perhaps, where we lose something by trying to scale and we're not actually replicating what we do as a business? Well, when we try and scale so doing these business experiments is the way I think about kind of pulling these different levers in the business and seeing which one makes the kind of change and allows you to scale in the way that you want to. But then the the other thing that I felt was really important, that Bonnie discussed was that scaling is so much more than systems and processes, you've got to be able to scale, your way of doing things your way of being. She said, How can I be there without being there? And the way she's making it work and I think this is incredibly important for other people to take away is this kind of excellent training and showing really good leadership in terms of allowing vulnerability and, and role modelling vulnerability and storytelling and allowing others to share their stories and realising the importance of that within the business. And this is what then helps with that ultimate impact of building the confidence. It's not just about like, here's a dance routine you'd have to do it like that we're just part part of it. But it's so much more than just that kind of the technical way of doing things. It's really about the way of being,

Ollie Collard: 35:10

it's definitely the million dollar question, isn't it in terms of like, how do you encapsulate everything within the business? Because, yeah, not everyone is going to be exactly like Bali. And I think she was saying about making sure that, you know, the ethos, and the vision is embedded within her boss, ladies, as she called. So I think it's about making sure they're very clear on her why and her vision, and making sure that they're selling the opportunity in the same way. And

Dr Becky Sage: 35:41

I think that that's kind of recognising that brand, ultimately, is an internal thing as well as an external thing. And again, that brand goes so much further than just kind of what does the logo look like? And what is a set of values that we posted on our website, you know, it goes a lot further than that. It's like how you behave in every single situation. But there are certain things like you said, she calls the dance teachers, bosses, and I said, there's things like that vocabulary that I think also kind of plays into that brand and helps kind of set the tone for what it is they want to do and means that that's what spreads throughout the whole business. So lots of things there for people to think about when you think about scaling. First of all, like, is it actually what you want? Do you have the right mindset for scaling? Have you got the right systems and processes in place? Are you able to do those experiment, pull those different levers and see what works? And then taking it further than those systems and processes? How are you going to help the kind of culture and your way of being spread throughout the whole business? One thing that Bonnie alluded to, in the first part of the interview was her investment journey. So I'm really curious to know more about how she's experienced the investment ecosystem.

Unknown: 37:06

So I don't know how much you guys talk about female founders, in particular, on the podcast,

Ollie Collard: 37:10

we do a lot. And we featured lots of female founders as part of the podcast as well. And kind of added to that question as well, there is this incoming regulatory change coming into play tomorrow, actually, 31st of January, which is basically going to affect how high net worth individuals are going to be classified as investors. And that's going to have an impact on the number of female investors. And then obviously, that's going to have a knock on effect on female founders, as well. So really interested to know, yeah, your personal fundraising journey, but also the wider picture. And what you see going on with your kind of female founders and networks you're part of?

Unknown: 37:53

Well, I, you know, I, the bill that's coming in tomorrow is essentially, you have to earn over 170,000 to be a high net worth rather than 100,000. Which, of course, impacts women, because there is just the reality is there is a big gender pay gap. Then there's the gender pay gap that really splits out when women start having children. And that has a really, really profound impact on women's earning abilities, their pensions across the board. And of course, the amount of money that they're able to invest. It the reality is, is that female founders is a lot of the time of creating businesses for a female market, because the the nature of entrepreneurship is that you experience a problem, and you find a solution. And it comes from a very personal experience, like I was sat on the side of X Factor looking at a camera going, there's 20 million people behind that, I wonder if anyone wants to do what I wish I could have done when I was growing up. That that is just what entrepreneurs do. Problem Solution. You need to find investors to understand the problem. If they don't understand the problem, they're not going to give two shits about the solution. So that's why female founders need female investors because you need people to have experience in the market to understand the problem to get excited about your solution. To find female angels, there are lots of Angel networks set up in the UK. A lot of them are very much behind closed doors, you can't just apply a lot of them, you have to have raised that say 40% of your round before you can access them. So there's this massive chicken and egg problem because you can access them but only once you've got certain amount raised but you need to get the first few checks in you need to get that lead investor. And one of the things that I was really taken aback with when I started raising so it's 2024. Now I've been raising for nearly 10 years is this idea of friends and family money. And I remember the first time an investor who I ended up investing he did not at that Time, but he did end up investing a few years later. He said, you know, what about friends and family. And literally, I come from a dance background, and my my best friends that I would consider friends and family are a musical theatre. And all I could see in my head was a five pound note. And I was like, yeah, that's not gonna, that's not gonna work. And he was like, no, no, not You're not literally your friends and family, like, you know, your network? And I'm going, yeah, no, because, like, dancers are many things. But Rich, they are not. They should be there's no, but you know, but the dance industry doesn't pay anywhere near what it should. So I'm going well, I don't have the personal network, that's going to put in a quarter of a million to do my friends and family money, you know, round, there was no friends and family round for me, unless I wanted to raise 25 quid, and then I'd be you know, then I'd be alright. So that was just bizarre. And that's just a term that's just thrown around so casually, like everyone has their personal network that's going to put in their pre pre pre pre pre seed money, that's gonna get them off the ground. That's BS to begin with, and is only accessible to a very, very small group of people. And I've also found raising from the creative industries, because yeah, dancers aren't super well paid. But what about the music? Video directors? What about the producers? What about people higher up? But then, yes, they're making more money, but they're not really clued into investing in startups, when you talk to them about investing? They're like, what, like stocks and shares ISIS, you know, so the idea of writing a 20, or 20k, check to a startup, how does that work? You know, and explaining to them? Well, it's equity and share price and X amount of rounds, and blah, blah, you know, exit strategies. So you have to come from a very, very specific background, to be able to do if I'm doing quotations, friends and family round from your personal network to get to be getting going. So the legislation that's coming in, I would imagine, is maybe well intended, but misguided, coming from a position of having no idea and being completely out of touch. And female founders have a huge challenge on their hands to raise capital in a market that is not built for them.

Ollie Collard: 42:24

100%, and we had a past founder on the podcast, talking about everything and how it was actually designed for men. So she founded a company called stellar insurance, everything from seatbelts to anything is always designed with men in mind. And actually, it was designed by women, for women, how much more impactful? That could be.

Unknown: 42:45

Yeah, for sure. And, you know, imagine an investment ecosystem designed by women, for women, and what that would look like. And I think it would actually look very, very different. But it's, it's something that I think, a StartUp podcast, as startup entrepreneurs, it has to be addressed. Because, you know, anything to do with your business, anything to do with your business plan is entirely academic, if you cannot fund it. And that solution has to be found, when I was raising money to begin with, so I had that conversation with friends and family. And I was like, what, you know, then I learned and I went through, you know, meeting so many different people. I got told I was early a lot of the time. And I was like, What the fuck does it mean? Like, what are they on about? And then I remember telling my dad who was an investor himself. And he was like, oh, you know, bonds, that means are too risky? And I was like, those motherfuckers what are they? And then, and then and then I was like, What does risky actually mean? And you start drilling down into it risky means I don't trust that person to give me a return. And then I started talking to male founders and peers. So my husband is a startup founder himself. He's a very successful founder in the tech industry. And he had started this, this is not he did not have any success story short, its works his co working space, but he built this amazing network through shortage works. So he introduced me to loads of tech founders, of course, they're all dudes. And they would raise hundreds of 1000s of pounds. And I would meet with them and they'd be like, so you know, how far along are you? And they were like, oh, no, we're just just got an idea. Just you know, we're just figuring out and I was like, What do you mean, you're figuring it out? Like, you know, we're just figuring out our product market fit right now. I'm like, oh, huh. I'm like, I'm sorry. I'm early and you're not Yeah. You know, I've got 1000s of customers I've been written about by every publication under the sun. I've been on TV, like changing lives and changing lives. People come up to me crying because I've had such a deep impact on them. I've got my product market fit pretty solid by this point. Ain't Amelie, and you're not. So then I started doing lots of research, then I uncovered the statistics that like at the time it was 2%, it's gone down to 1%. It's kind of bounces between one and 2% of funding goes to female founders. That's where my mission was forged of empowering a generation. And I was raising to start the second business at the time. Because I just don't think honestly, I just don't think I would have been able to keep going and have the resilience to overcome the No, no, no, no, not back, not back. We're talking about why why don't women have the same confidence as men. As a female founder, I have had a completely different experience to my male peers. And I'll go to I went to a VC event before Christmas for marketplaces. Because we're building a marketplace between instructors and customers. And these guys, were just on another planet, they were lovely, but they were on a complete, they're operating in a different world. So in terms of confidence, my confidence has to be so much stronger than theirs, I have to be so much better than them to get nowhere near the reward nowhere near the praise. Now we're nowhere near the validation. So just as a just as an insight from one person on on confidence. So I, you know, it's got to be changed. And I think the way one way of changing it is talking about it. But I really think that venture capitalists need to publish their ratio to know how much money is going to female founders, and it has to be completely transparent.

Ollie Collard: 46:34

I want to rewind back a bit into your first business. Tell me about some of the mistakes that you made with that.

Unknown: 46:40

So many so many Yeah. My main mistake with that business, so I started my first business, I didn't know how to create financial models. Now, I'm all about a financial model, I feel like they tell you, they tell you everything you need to know if ever I have a question, I just think ask your spreadsheet, because it will plug in the numbers. The numbers are the truth, you know, not necessarily your forecast. But if you you know, base it on your what you're already doing, but your numbers will essentially tell you everything that you need to know. When I built my first business, I remember it so well. It really makes me smile. But I I created a business plan, of course. And then I put our numbers, I did them on a calculator. And then I just put them into a table that I'd created in Word. And I remember going to the bank, and I got a 6000 pound loan from Simon, my bank manager. And he said, How did you do the numbers? I was like on a calculator. He's like, right? Okay, I was I was looking at him, like completely straight faced. And anyway, I got the loan. And but I didn't understand. I didn't I wasn't thinking about scalability. I was like, if I can teach this many people, I'm gonna make this much money. And I was looking at my gross profit. I'll pay the studio, this I'll pay the teacher this. I wasn't looking at my net profit. What about once you paid the marketing once about you paid for this, you pay for that you paid for this? You paid for that. So the gross profit margin was lovely. The net profit margin was terrible. And also, it was very finite. There's only so many people you can fit in a dance studio. So how would we and there's only so many choreographers, and there's only so many dancers that you are able to pay. So it's very, very, very challenging to build a business with terrible margins that isn't scalable, as fabulous and glamorous as it was. And I found that out when I'm doing our numbers and our accounts, you know, hacking my way through Excel, figuring it out, being like, why is there no money in their bank? I don't understand. We've got 1000s and 1000s coming in and dance classes, being a dance class sales and then on the left. And it wasn't until I learned how to properly model out companies and create profit and losses that I was like, Oh, whoops. So I built my second company off the back of modelling out loads of different scenarios. But I just like literally hibernated for a whole summer and just spent my summer in front of itself, you know, figuring it out. But yeah, building a business from that level of transparency is everything. So that would be a big mistake that I'm very grateful that I learnt. And then why never just for the lulz while we're here. I think not really understanding your worth as a founder. Coming back to female confidence, I would hire people because I was so sure that people wanted to do their classes over mine. So then I felt very reliant on other people for the success of the business, but then add in actual fact, when they ended up leaving, it got to a point where my classes were the most popular. And I had to learn that myself from just thankfully, being good at what I did, and learning and being like a sponge. But I think as founders, you're almost conditioned to not be important, don't have the key person risk, you know. But actually, you are really important as a founder. And I don't think there's any shame in that. And depending on what level of company you want to build, but yeah, like, only own your worth as a founder, and don't underestimate how much customers love to know the heart and soul behind the company.

Ollie Collard: 50:39

Talk to me about motherhood and the demands of being an entrepreneur and raising your family. What strategies do you use to try and keep some work life balance?

Unknown: 50:51

Well, I've never believed in work life balance. I don't know for me work is life. I don't know if you watch you know, watch TED Lhasa I love assessed. Do you know, Danny, Danny Rojas? Yeah. And he's like, football is life. That's me. But like, you know, business is life. You're my mission is life, you know, what I do? Is everything to me. So this idea where I'm supposed to put it down and switch off was never really my thing. Because it's, maybe I don't want to switch off from it. And recently, I went to a spa that my husband bought me for my birthday. And I, my team, like, I thought you said this is your day off, like get off WhatsApp, essentially, because I was really excited about a project we're working on. And taking time out of the like, out of being behind the laptop actually gave me a bit of space to think. And I wanted to be thinking about that problem. Because I'm so excited about it. I'm really passionate about cracking it. Obviously, there's times where I need to kick back and watch some TED lasso, obviously, as well. But work life balance was never a thing for me to begin with. Because I put my life into my work. And that was just something I was going to do. And having a baby was like, yeah, that's not gonna work. So that was a massive wrestle of like, how am I going to do this, because my business is my life. And now my business is my baby. And now I've had a human baby. And now I can't remember right now I have two babies and my dog. So I've got three. And now I can't run my business, like I used to run it. What am I going to do? How is this going to work? Because suddenly, I'm like, if I run my business like this, I'm going to miss everything with my little girl. And I was so excited to be able to have a daughter and build a business. It's all about empowering women. Obviously, I thought, Oh, she's gonna look at this. And my dream is that she's gonna go wow, look what mommy built. And I thought she is going to look at this and go, that's the thing that took me away. And that was just awful. That realisation and I thought she's not going to why would she care about all these women I'd empowered when her experience of my company was my absence. So I was like, okay, things have got to change. This is really hard. So I think it was number one about being really honest with myself about Yes, I want to be this like empowering co boss woman. But my heart wants to be with my baby girl. So how am I going to work more flexibly? How am I going to make sure that when I am working, I am delivering the absolute most value for the time I'm there? How is my business going to deliver what I said it was going to deliver to my investors. So it was hard. It was really really, really like gut wrenchingly hard if like, I can't do both, how I want to be able to do it. So I have to find a new way. And it was like, trying to look for role models and different CEOs that have done it. But that was hard because the you know, like Whitney Wolfe, who founded Bumble, for example, she's like, holding her baby, she's IPO going. And it looks so glamorous. But the reality of that I it's not for me. I want to be with my, my baby breastfeeding at home on a pillow. I don't know. That's that's me. So it was a case of like, how am I going to where my role models who have like, if you're thinking and drowning, you're trying to like reach out to for something to grab. And I was trying to find that role model. And I have to say it was very hard to find that woman who had built a high growth, powerful, successful business with children, and had taken the time to be with their children. So it's ongoing. It's an ongoing process, but right now I feel it feels really good because we're not hustling for that massive, massive VC growth. I don't have a venture capitalist at my heels. So I'm just taking the time to build a very, very solid company that has independence so I can do things My time. So I think that's really the most important thing.

Ollie Collard: 55:02

Yeah, I agree. I mean, me and my wife both work four days a week, and we've given us some time to spend with our kids every week, obviously. But also, that means when you are working, that you're more focused, you've got less time, right? What is the biggest impact I can have right now, as you say that, but only comes from that privatisation of making sure that you make good use of your time with limited resources.

Unknown: 55:26

Yeah, and I, and I do, I also think, that feeling of oh, if I didn't have a baby, and if I was a single person, I could do so much more. And I was doing an entrepreneur circle last night that I was part of, and one of the entrepreneurs who had that fear. But I disagreed, because I thought, when I was that single person in my 20s, building seen on screen, I was building a business that did not scale had shit margins. And I was just figuring it out as I went along. Now I come to the business 10 years later, with a family, and I am a shithole entrepreneur that knows what I'm doing. So of course, I'm going to bring so much more value to that time than I would have done if I had been that single person. So I think it's also about trusting the experience that you've built up in that time,

Ollie Collard: 56:11

Couldn't have said it better. Bali, Polly, as you know, building a business can be all consuming. If you let it be. What's the sacrifice that you've made, either consciously or subconsciously,

Unknown: 56:23

I would just always put myself in the back of the queue put myself last and not tell anybody that I was doing that either. Because the the cause was always bigger than anything else was bigger than, than me or what I needed personally. So just doing ever it took. And it's frustrating, it comes back to funding for me, because I think you've got like the shop window, and then you've got the factory working behind the scenes. And I'm building something that really, really makes a difference. And it's an amazing thing that I really know exactly how to do. Behind the scenes, I've had so many struggles, raising capital for that business that I have built, designed, raise money, lose a certain amount get to profitability, grow quicker, as a result, it was built for that. So not being able to secure we've been able to secure a good amount of capital, but not anywhere near as much as I wanted to not in the millions, I've always wanted to raise a million and then go up and do the traditional trajectory of you know, that high growth business, we've never been able to secure that VC level funding or that even from angels, you know, to be able to close the million from angels, that's a, that's a lot of checks, or that's some big ones. So, in order to be able to keep the business alive, what I fought because I believe in it's so strongly the stress that's been on my shoulders, no jobs are on the line, invoices need to be paid, and you just put one foot in front of the other every day, you just pay one invoice at a time to be able just to keep us going to get to that breakeven point, you know, or that's why I've kind of let go of the being dependent on investment. Because you can't depend on it as much as I wish that you could. But again, being from my background being I hate saying because I'm a woman, but if you were living the statistics, it's just so stressful. So I've absorbed all of that stress and taken on taking that stress on my shoulders. And it's not something I would recommend. It's not something I intend on doing in the you know, going into the future ever, ever again. But that's that's the sacrifices is living with the, you know, the manifestation of that stress that I've taken on for for years, years and years and years to be able to make it to bring this vision to life that I live in a world where this is real, you know, and just every day making it more and more real in the real world. Sounds crazy. But yeah, yeah.

Ollie Collard: 59:18

And how do you take some of that weight off your shoulders to ensure that you don't fall over completely.

Unknown: 59:25

I'm sharing the problem or sometimes you fall over completely. And that's where having a dancers background helps. Because as a dancer, you literally fall over completely many times. And you hurt yourself and you're bruised and you're injured and you get back up and you whip your hair one more time to you know, book that job. So having that dancers background, I'm so grateful and I actually went through a funding process with an American network that was for women that were so against bias like we went through different rounds of pitching You're not allowed to have a video on. And then because it was so like anti bias, they then give you all of this feedback completely transparently. But they don't tell you the names of the people giving it. And one of the pieces of feedback was given her dance background, she doesn't have the emotional mindset to be able to build 100 million plus business. And I was like, it is because of my dance background. So I think it's a case of just sharing the stress and opening up, and learning to be vulnerable. And learning to say, I don't have it all figured out, which is very, very hard. When you're, again, you're raising money as a founder, your job is to have it all figured out. But then when I talk to other CEOs and female CEOs, they have a very inbuilt process for problems. And they don't what I've picked up on is they don't see problems as a personal reflection of their fail failing. It's just businesses have problems. Expect them put processes in place to minimise them. So kind of learning to let that dancers guard guard down a little bit. And learning to share the problems with the people that are there to help rather than trying to be this powerhouse machine all the time. So there's a little bit of um, conditioning.

Ollie Collard: 1:01:26

Yeah, I think that's pretty important. And like, say sharing a problem with your network of people and also your husband, who's a fellow founder as well. Yeah. Yeah, he both running a business, then that can be quite stressful in itself as well.

Unknown: 1:01:41

I think it would no, no, I think he has a very different. He has the similar experiences and different experiences. So we founded six companies between us. And he really made me laugh the other day, because it's like, you know, it's been five businesses, you start actually a six. What is the sixth one was like, leads music.co.uk. I sold it for two entrepreneurs. I mean, we laugh. But he hasn't had the set. He's had different kinds of stresses, he has built a really, really big FinTech, that. So he's building the technology that hundreds of 1000s of people use every day. That's a different kind of stress to essentially bootstrapping a startup, both are stressful, both is valid. But I think because he has that founder background, it's been a lot less stressful, because I can come to him with problems. And he's not like, whoa, what he's like, yep. And so that is very, very therapeutic. And, you know, for the best part of what we've been together like 16 years. And for 14 of those, we've been building companies together at the same time. So that is a massive rock and source of support has been for sure.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:03:05

Why Barney is clearly very passionate about the inequities in the investment ecosystem. And I know that's a passion that we share. We talked about it previously, on the podcast, I think just in the last episode, we actually spent quite a lot of time talking about the inequities in the investment equals ecosystem. And she actually inspired me when she said, I bet if a bunch of women were designing investment and investment processes, it would be very different. And this is something that has gone through my head for years, and I have actually got investor friends. And often we have conversations that sort of end with, well, that's just how it's done. And I get very frustrated in those conversations, because well, that's just how it's done is what's led to the inequities. And it actually does take people standing up and saying, No, we're going to do something different. And there's a little part of me in the back of my mind now going, can we be designing this different investment ecosystem, which I know several people are thinking about are doing, there's lots of different pockets of people who are really trying to solve this problem. So let's Shall we pick up pick up on some of the barriers that Barney raised?

Ollie Collard: 1:04:23

And firstly, I think that's one of the most dangerous things that you can say in business that it's always been done this way. Because that means you're accepting the status quo and the way that things happen. And I think because it's been designed like this the system, there is obviously a clearly a deeply embedded vested interest to keep it the same way that it operates. And so we won't see change until, unfortunately, people are challenging the status quo, and actually coming up with alternatives. And

Dr Becky Sage: 1:04:58

it's quite a clash of cultures. She isn't it when we think about it that way of like, what this is just how it's done. That's not an entrepreneurial mindset. But often we are talking, I can understand why where like, particularly people who work in VCs are coming from because they are sort of coming from that same place. They're, they're pressured from the above and below, they've got other people's money that they're putting into something, how much can they play? You know, how much can other people's money be a guinea pig for new ways of doing things. But I think just like everything, we've seen that when things are made more equitable, then overall, the systems tend to flourish more. So there is perhaps a fear there for people but also recognising that just look at the data, right? there anything to do with business, the more diversity you have on the teams, the better your outcomes ultimately are. And so, you know, and I know for those funds, and individuals who really are looking to invest in, you know, in more diverse range of founders, and who are doing their best to break down the barriers that exist, that they are, they are opening up new opportunities for themselves. So I think it's something that there is a benefit to this. And it shouldn't just have to be a business benefit, of course, but I kind of don't understand why people can't see that. Like, inherently, if you are putting money into something that is likely to appeal to a wider range of people and tap into perhaps pockets that haven't been tapped into before that you're actually going to be in a better place as an investor than if you're just going down the same route as everybody has gone down before. So one of the things that really got me feeling something in this conversation, was the talk about family and friends rounds. And I think that this kind of hit hard in some ways, and I realised I have like a little green monster sitting on me, because there have been I've watched in my peer group. And and some of the entrepreneurs that I work with, I do get that like little bit of jealousy when people come in, and you're like, oh, yeah, we just did a family and friends round. And I know some of the really kind of bigger exits, or bit, you know, bigger investments in the businesses that I know very well, a lot of those have come from those businesses that were able to get those big family and friends rains early on. And to me, I was always like, what is this? I just thought when Bonnie said like, it'd be 25 quid, and I was saying, Yeah, I mean, we wouldn't. Where are these networks of families and friends? And we know where they are. They're in like, yeah, these very elite communities that so many people cannot access, and don't have those networks.

Ollie Collard: 1:07:52

I love bodies honesty here as well. Because other people will afford this like, like yourself and other people in the investment ecosystem going through it for the first time. It's like, taking it very literally, you're saying right, family and friends round, like what can I raise? But if you don't have that network, and you're not from particular circles, then it's not an option for you? Is it quite frankly, no.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:08:17

And I was reflecting a lot. I mean, again, this all hit very personally for me, I think, because Bonnie also said, you know, she's built a network now. But she This is a decade later. And I suddenly was thinking, oh, yeah, I'm in the position now where I do have people I can go to when I'm like, Okay, I've got a deck. Could you socialise this with some people? Let's see, you know, or, and I'm working with several founders, where I can do the same thing for them. And then I thought, that's built on a decade of building that network. I think I've my first business was 2014. It's now 2024. So yeah, it was hitting very close to home for me and just thinking about how challenging it was to continue to just not know where to look like I literally was, like, I don't get what you're saying to me when you say like, I need to go out and get investment, like where where do you Where are you even going? Like how do you even get access because if you just email somebody from, you know, an angel group, or you often don't get seen if it's a cold email upload, etc, of your deck, often that's going to get missed compared to the ones where there's a warm introduction. And, you know, I sort of hate to say that I can now make the most of those warm introductions. I've now got those networks, but again, it's taken a decade and as Bonnie was describing, something else that Bonnie alluded to, which was related to this and and really hit home for me is also we talk a lot about resilience with founders and of course, every founder is going to have those noes as well as the yeses and going to have to go through those challenges. But I think When we talk about barriers, we talk about inequities. And these very common situations that you find yourself in when you, you know, and being a woman in the investment ecosystem is, is an example of this, where, because every single time you go into something, you're just so used to being treated in a certain way. And it does go beyond it's not just getting the No, it's one thing to get a No, but it's another thing to get a no when like, you walk into a room, and people turn that back on you because they don't think you're an important person to shake the hand of you know, which is what happens. And is when you kind of go in, and people just don't even get your perspective, because it's not their area of interest, or, or the kind of it always happens in the pre conversations is what I find you go in and what they're talking if people start talking about mutual friends that they've got as part of the network, or like a mutual interest, that is something where you feel that you just can't tap into and it's, it's sort of these little things that just make you feel like an outsider. So for me, like building a culture of belonging in the investment ecosystem is what's really important, because again, we're all ready to get the know. And I want you to pick up on a piece, this piece of bait resilience, which is that every time you come up against a barrier, perhaps you're getting a thicker skin, perhaps you're learning a lesson. I mean, not always because I think again, in situations where things are inequitable, you're not necessarily able to learn anything, you're learning something about the environment, but you're not necessarily learning something that's going to help you the next time. But actually, every time you go through this, this is time wasted. This is energy that is getting put into trying to overcome these invisible barriers, instead of energy getting put into building your business or working on any of your other priorities. And I think that the people forget, like, that's the sort of thing that means that people really get left behind.

Ollie Collard: 1:12:03

Yeah, ultimately, if you're putting all of your time and energy into one strategy of raising investment, and you're not building your business, obviously, the opportunity costs could prove to be very significant, in terms of you don't ultimately go out and get investment. And I think it's really difficult. I love what you're saying there, Becky about, you know, turning up at events and people turning their backs and not shaking your hands. And, you know, you're not having these mutual connections and all of these invisible barriers that ultimately you're going to essentially make you feel really small. Like how do you overcome that?

Dr Becky Sage: 1:12:37

It's really hard. And I mean, when I look back, now, I'm like, the self esteem, like, that just drips out of you every time you go through something like that. And you kind of just keep pushing on and you keep pushing on. But I mean, in reality, though, for me, what happened was I burnt out, and then sort of had to very much go inward, strengthen myself, I mean, ultimately, and I, I feel like I'm stronger for it. I understand myself better. But it didn't mean that that business was more likely to be a success in that but you know, and it shouldn't be Yeah, I think it was ultimately that kind of burning out and, and going inward and doing some work with kind of coaches and things like that as well. And definitely having the right people in my network and going to them. But of course you even have to recognise it's happening. And when these they are when we see it's invisible barriers, a lot of the time it comes down to somebody's perception of you, and then how they interact with you. So it's very hard not to just think, well, I guess I'm not good enough. I guess the business isn't good enough. I guess everyone kind of gets gets knows that. Oh, you know, and we've got to keep pushing. But that's why the self esteem gets gets so kind of battered. And yeah, it's huge. For me, it was just like, I need to, I need to take time, I need to reset, I need to have lots of time off. And so again, it's like, my energy is not going into doing the things I want to do is like it's not fun to be burnt out. It's not fun to have to take time out and, and reset and, and everything else. Important sometimes, but you don't want to be doing that. Like I want to be building businesses that make a big impact. So it's it's definitely very challenging.

Ollie Collard: 1:14:33

I mean, hats off to you, Becky, because I think a lot of people would have given up and that's what is the demoralising thing here. It's like you know, all of the people that may actually give up, you've come back obviously stronger due to your character and seeking that support. But not everybody is like that. And like you say it's a massive it's a massive drainer of your energy and time. It's not energising you it's not making you focus on the right things So these invisible barriers are incredibly difficult. And then, you know, feedback like Bonnie's got in terms of Right, no, you're too early. And she's like, Well, wait a second. I'm not too early here.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:15:12

Yeah, I can be very literal with that kind of feedback. And I've kind of been able to look back over the years now and realise, like, oh, when you get that feedback, it's so like, coded. It's so yeah. And you will look around, I used to get so confused about that kind of thing, because I'd look at other people. And exactly the same as you described is certainly was a lot of Yeah, it took me aback a lot listening to this for sure. So and then the other weird kind of paradox contradiction, or whatever you want to call it in all of this is, is something that again, Bonnie just sort of said in passing, but she said she talked about taking on the stress of the statistics. And something else that started to happen. Of course, it was kind of great for me when I first heard about the inequities, because it helps you to understand actually, it helps you to be like, Oh, this is what I'm facing. Therefore, I now know, kind of the journey I have to go on to go through there. So it kind of gives you that better understanding. So you can manage things. And also it means you're not taking it all on yourself. So it's not such a like that, that steam drain. But you do then go, oh, hang on a second, I know that it's harder for women to get money. And if I know that it's harder for women, that it can be feel very stressful. And not only that, I found that I then would gravitate choking back kind of having networks and people around me, I would then start to kind of go to more of the events which were about kind of female founders, female entrepreneurs, women in business. And you'd sit around and you talk about kind of the shared challenges. And that means you spend a lot of time and energy kind of talking about these challenges. And again, this sort of energy, this how this all compounds, it's like it's not one thing, it is lots of different things piling up. And so you then not you not only take on this stress, and and of course if you're entrepreneurial, you're kind of like, well, how do we fix this? How do we get through this? You also find yourself spending a lot of time talking about it and realising that you're talking about it within the communities that all understand it already. And therefore kind of, then how are you having an impact? So I definitely got a lot of fatigue, also talking about this kind of thing and being 10 years down the line talking about this? It's like, why do we still have to be talking about this? But we do because it's still an issue. And so that's also another kind of layer of energy that gets taken up whereby I know other people, and again, like people who are like, well, this is how it's always done? Or why do I need to care about this, because I still get my returns when I go for the kind of you know, when I keep doing what I've always done. So that's also kind of part of the challenge here. And yeah, take me on that stress. And, of course, then when you do get some funding, that's pretty good to know that you've overcome some of those barriers. But it shouldn't be that way.

Ollie Collard: 1:18:13

It must be really difficult. I mean, from an outsider looking in in terms of the inequalities, like how much time and energy do you invest talking about it, and it's good to talk about things and get them off your chest. But I guess there's a fine line there between actually embedding your self too much in that world. Ultimately, if you don't think the game can be changed.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:18:35

Yeah. And I think it's looking at the reasons you're having those conversations as well. Because, again, it's kind of unnecessary in the sense of, there's a safety there, and perhaps where you haven't found safety in other spaces. So that's what I found anyway, talking about, like, when I say that my self esteem, my self worth, like, they were so low. So to be in a runway where people are sort of like, well, this is what's going on, this is why it's going on. It's not just me, it's you know, it's the system. That's that's the issue here. There's something comforting about that. So you gravitate towards it. But it's not necessarily it's not going to be the thing that necessarily is just allowing you to focus and get on with the business. And, and I think this is why often we have all of these conference conversations and of course, International Women's Day is happening. And, like right now this time of year. And again, I wish I didn't have to keep having these conversations, but you bet you're having them. And, of course, International Women's Day is coming up. And this is a time of year when all of a sudden like I'll get asked to talk a lot and go and be a speaker or whatever at different events. And I do get like, bored of having the same conversation over and over again. And I think what I'm trying to say now to the women that maybe are in those audiences, and hopefully the men that are in those are audience's, it's like, we just want to get on with our work, like, we just want to do the job. We don't want to have to have all of these extra conversations, we don't want to put our energy into this. We want to get our head down and get the job done. We want to build the businesses, we want to put our expertise in practice, we want to grow and learn and develop. And we want that to be the focus. And so and then that's really where I'm at now. But I have the privilege of having a lot of experience behind me and having built my networks and everything else. So it's really hard for people who are earlier in their career.

Ollie Collard: 1:20:33

Yeah. And ultimately, like you say, Becky, the numbers don't lie, do they? And ultimately, until we see a shift in those numbers, it's going to be a big reoccurring theme, and rightly so.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:20:43

Yeah. We need to design some kind of big step change. So got my mind mulling on that. Right, well. So despite all those challenges, Bonnie has done an amazing job in terms of growing SOS dance global. So I really want to hear now about what's next.

Unknown: 1:21:06

I think how you measure success? That's such a good question. I think what the future holds for SOS dance global is dance classes all over the world. And reminding women of their backbone all over the world, they've already got it, they just need a reminder. And, you know, the mission is to empower a generation of women to believe in themselves using dance as a source of strength, power and confidence they can take through into every aspect of their lives. And for me, success is giving women strength, power, and confidence they can take into any aspect of their lives on a global level, across the world, reaching millions of people. Three reason why I want to reach millions of people. So that was probably a big one. The reason why I want to reach millions of people is like I said in the beginning, if you can change the life of one woman in such a deep way, why wouldn't you change them? Billions if you have the time, and what else am I going to do with my life. And I think also success for me as the founder, I think, as founders were so as female founders as well, we're so focused on what we give to the world and what our businesses are going to do and the success of our companies. But for me, personally, as a success, success, what that looks like, as a CEO, and a founder, is enjoying my job having a lightness in my job. And being empowered back, because I can't give and give and empower and empower and empower for being on empty because then it just becomes machine like. So it's also everything I give. It's about getting that back. And I think success for me is building a business that gives me as much as I give. If

Ollie Collard: 1:22:55

you were to distil down just one piece of advice to pass on to an early stage founder. What would that be?

Unknown: 1:23:03

Just know why you're doing it. Like, why are you getting up, because I think you might not make any money out of it. Obviously, you want to, you want to do it, because you're going to be able to make a life changing amount of cash. And that's the upside. And that can 100% happen. But the road to getting to that exit is a long one, even for the most successful entrepreneurs in the world. It's ruthless, it's hard fucking graft every single day. And so why would you do that to yourself? If you can work for someone else, then take on all the stress. And, you know, I think you really need to know and, you know, obviously working for someone else comes with its own stresses. And its own risks, but at the same time working as a founder of a business that's going to scale. Just really understand why you're doing it. And yes, understand what your business is going to do and where your business is going to be. But what do you want your life to look like? If you're you know, whether you're a single person, whether you've got a family, what do you want from your life? What do you want your life to look like in five years? When your business does X amount X point, really understand what you want? Because you are the heart that beats that blood and that life source around your company. And no, no, why you're getting up and you're doing this to yourself every day. You have a good reason for it. And don't forget it. So true.

Ollie Collard: 1:24:45

Write it down somewhere. Where can people find out a bit more about you personally and your business?

Unknown: 1:24:51

And they can follow us on Instagram SOS dance global follow me at Bonnie Parsons, spend the majority of time on Instagram. That's where we're at and WWE dot SOS dot dance. So come and find us come and do a class. Don't worry about if you've never danced before. We've got you, you're fine. And that's where you can find us.

Ollie Collard: 1:25:14

Thank you so much for your time. It's been an absolute pleasure having you on the show.

Unknown: 1:25:18

It's been a pleasure to be here. Thanks so much. I'm so glad this popped into my day.

Ollie Collard: 1:25:22

Congrats on seizing the opportunity again.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:25:28

Earlier, we're gonna get to see you dance.

Ollie Collard: 1:25:30

I'd love to say yes to that answer, Becky. But unfortunately, I don't think the world is ready to see my dance moves quite yet. They're very much dad moves. So yeah, we're gonna let leave it to the experts. And Barney is actually put together a routine that you can actually catch on our tick tock.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:25:48

Okay, maybe next time we're recording in a studio rather than online like we are today. I'll have to try and encourage you to, to get those dance moves.

Ollie Collard: 1:25:57

not promising anything?

Dr Becky Sage: 1:25:59

I mean, all I want to say is that if the listeners were to say that they wanted to see that on tick tock, then could you really say no?

Ollie Collard: 1:26:09

Well, it's the people speak back here.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:26:13

So one thing I wanted to pick up on from that last section with Bonnie was something she said about what success means to her. And again, I thought this was very honest, and just kind of cut to the core of what we're all kind of looking for, I think as entrepreneurs, which is, I want to get back as much as I put in, and that goes so much beyond money. It's sort of this energy, this passion, all of these other barriers that we walk through in order to try and make the business success. And I think often we get very stressed as entrepreneurs is when we feel like we're not getting back what we put in or we haven't, you know, we're losing that opportunity to get back what we put in. So really likes this framing of, of success.

Ollie Collard: 1:27:01

And it's really difficult for entrepreneurs, because we're all quite optimistic and ambitious people. So sometimes when you're putting in a lot of time, energy and brainpower into something, and you're not quite seeing the rewards just yet, it can be a bit frustrating. But it's important to maintain those levels of motivation, because building great things does take a lot of time. And we're talking years here, not months and weeks and days, it is talking about the longer term goal. So I think if you're playing the long game, and very focused on your, your long term goal, then that success will come. But you do have to be patient.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:27:43

And something that I love, I just want to pick up on what you just said, which is it's not days, it's not weeks, I honestly think if you want to think about startup success, have a think about what happens in the next decade for you and your life. And sure, like it turns around, I think my first startup journey was seven years. And you know, but of course it then has an impact on what's next as well. And so, and that's seven years, like that's coming up to a decade, right. So when we talk about patience, it really is playing that long game. And I think it helps you in more than just kind of overcoming those frustrations, it actually helps you to be more strategic when you think with that slightly longer term head on. So in terms of like success being more or like getting back what you put in, something I was thinking about was Bonnie is an SOS global and all the bosses. They're giving power, like so they're amplifying power throughout the communities that they work with. And so there's also the idea of kind of getting that power back. And I think that perhaps when we are entrepreneurs, that's kind of what we're looking for, actually. I mean, we use money as a metric, of course. But do you think power is actually the thing and I when I talk about power, I mean in a positive way I talk about kind of positive power and feeling empowered to make a big impact. So you think power kind of plays a role in this?

Ollie Collard: 1:29:18

It most definitely is. And I'm sure Bonnie gets this on a daily basis, like hearing from all these individuals, and these transformations that she's having on people's lives. It ultimately makes her vision and her y a lot stronger. So power is massively important. I think sometimes it's hard because it's intangible, but how do you measure it? But I think if Bonnie is getting all of this positive feedback about the difference that her businesses having, then yeah, this is completely going to be driving her forward and you know, crystallising why she does what she does.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:29:52

And ultimately I feel like this is something that can be a real driving force for founders and if you find yourself in a position where you're I mean, I described Just now like my esteem getting eaten away, like feeling less and less powerful and less and less, like I can show up and just be myself, which, you know, like, ultimately, that's, that's really what what we mean to be kind of in our own power, I guess. And so, that flipside of looking at it and being like, if you're feeling like that, if you're feeling incredibly depleted all of the time, even if other, you know, maybe you are giving other people power, and can you use that as a way to help to inspire you and just look through a slightly different lens and, and realise that you are making this difference? And if you're not feeling that power within yourself, and how can you adjust that? How can you adjust what's what's going on, such that you can get back kind of what you're giving out. So I think power it for me is a it's a very interesting topic. And it doesn't have to be power power can be an incredibly positive thing. And we can use it in good ways. And we more of us need to be using more of our power in positive ways, just in the world that we live in right now. So it's so lovely to be hearing about a founder and a business that are out there. And essentially, like bottling up empowerment and confidence and giving that to people around the world. So if you're interested in knowing more about SOS dance global, maybe you want some of that bottled confidence, as well, then go and check out the links that Bonnie shared with us. And as always, Bonnie has a question for you. So here's the question from Barney.

Unknown: 1:31:35

Yeah, who are the people that you want to have around you that are going to influence you? So who are the people that you want to have that are going to be honest with you that are going to challenge you that are going to answer ask you the right questions I found in my career. The people that have added most value are the people that asked me the smartest questions. So who are those people and who are those who are the people in your life that are going to see you for you. So you can just be yourself unfiltered, stripped back raw, and are going to show up for you and you really, really need them? I've been able to find both taken a while. But I found them. And I've been very proactive about building a network of people because I didn't find myself with it, you know, network, I built them built it proactively. So if you're going to build a business, who are the people that you are going to want around you that are going to have those influences, especially if you're the average of the people you spend, like, what is it you're the average of the people use five people you spend the most time with?

Ollie Collard: 1:32:44

I love that. So if you've got some options that people can vote on, so shows, so

Unknown: 1:32:48

your four options are gonna be your bad bitch friends, who might be your founders, they might be you're just people that you look up to, and you're like, Oh, they're solid. I love what they're doing. I really respect what you're doing. Are they going to be your BFFs for life? You know, the people that you maybe went to school with that you grew up with? That you can't bullshit they just know who you are? Is it going to be investors? Or is it going to be all of the above? Because sometimes there can be all of the above? Who is it? Who are they going to be who are going to be your your people that are going to have that that really big life changing impact on you.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:33:29

Thanks for that, Bonnie. We'll get that question up on socials and see what the listeners have to say. Ali, what are people saying about the last episode the question from Vasily at rare founders.

Ollie Collard: 1:33:41

We had a germ of a question from Vassili. He wanted to know if you had unlimited hindsight, of all the challenges that being a founder would bring about, would you have still launch your business anyway? The options were Hell, yes. No. on the fence, a resounding 87% of people said hell yes. Which completely doesn't surprise me. 13% of people though, did say No, they wouldn't have launched their business if they were fully aware of all the problems that starting a business would bring about to them. And ultimately, you never know where that business is going to take you a failure. As in Vassilis case, took him on to his next business, rare founders. So I think that's the most intriguing thing about being a founder and the entrepreneurial journey.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:34:38

And have we got up next on the podcast?

Ollie Collard: 1:34:40

We've got an incredibly interesting business called a Mr. Bug. And we're speaking to the co founder, Connell Cunningham, who is a serial entrepreneur,

Dr Becky Sage: 1:34:51

and there are some sneak peeks of that over on Tik Tok right now as well.

Ollie Collard: 1:34:56

There are indeed so go and check those out if you want a quick preview. Do about that episode.

Dr Becky Sage: 1:35:01

Thank you for listening to today's episode. If you like what you've heard, please leave us a review on Apple podcasts and don't forget there's a huge selection of previous episodes just search founded and grounded on your favourite podcast player. Thank you for listening to find it in grounded with Ollie collard and Dr. Becky sage. Don't forget to press that follow button to help us to grow the show.