Women must keep imposter syndrome at bay: Kate Hancock
A few handy tips for women entrepreneurs
I am a new entrepreneur. My first ever venture of an online Hindi Language Course went live last month, and I recently got my first buyer.
In a pandemic-hit world, this felt like the best thing ever. But I need guidance. I like listening to podcasts while walking or working out, so I hit upon Kate Hancock’s podcast.
She is a serial entrepreneur, investor, and international speaker who was born and raised on the small island of Camiguin, Philippines. She started her first company with $20 and she made it to Inc’s 5000 list of Fastest Growing Private Companies in America twice. She has been featured in over 40+ publications including Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Business Rockstars, Forbes, Inc, and Asian Journal.
She currently is running a massively successful podcast called Inspired By Her and dedicates her life in helping out women around the world. This podcast, as I found out later, has been rated as Top #146 Entrepreneurship Podcast in the US, #54 in Australia, #12 in Taiwan, #22 in Austria and #36 in the Philippines.
I was really intrigued by her podcast, so I found a way to DM her. I really wanted her to share some hands-on tips with women entrepreneurs. In her podcast, she interviews many women who have established some seriously good businesses.
She readily agreed and gave me permission to publish some of her tips here.
Here are some practical tips by Kate Hancock for women entrepreneurs -
1] Have serious work ethics
Kate grew up poor in the Philippines on a very small island. She had to work at a very early age in the family business because it was the only way her family could survive. She did not have access to much but reading magazines of what else was in the world inspired her to want more. This all helped shape her work ethic and desire to succeed. Work ethics help your business become believable and authentic for your customers.
2] Learn to delegate tasks
In the beginning of her business, Kate kept her cost extremely low and made sure to not overspend. However, she realized in order to grow you need to hire and give some of your responsibility to others where many other founders have a hard time with. Being able to delegate tasks is important as your time is very limited. You will make mistakes and have many failures but you need to take that and learn. One of the most impactful steps was getting mentors and surrounding herself with people that are smarter and more successful than she was.
3] Keep the imposter syndrome at bay
Imposter syndrome is very common among women. We are preprogrammed to doubt ourselves or be cautious about sounding braggy. We need to smash this glass ceiling and accept it is ok to talk about your success. It is ok to want to grow your business or want to have revenue in the millions or billions. We as women can make the most amazing leaders. Many women think people first and want to make sure they are happy more so than men. We hear this a lot from some of the most successful female entrepreneurs we interview where they thought about their people and business growth vs business growth and your people last. A very crucial factor is — don’t quit your day job. Kate kept working while building her business until it supplemented her income. Plus her corporate job taught me about leadership, training and sales that benefited from her own business.
Do check out Kate’s awesome podcast girls!
