Michelle Ward was an actress who gave up her Broadway dreams to become a business coach. How did that happen? We discuss the many ups and downs, how she created her intentional career as the CEO of the 90 Day Business Launch and how she helps creative women launch businesses.

I’m your host, Karen Styles, Career + Life Coach and owner of Flow + Fire Coaching. Ready to create your Intentional Career? Schedule a call with me.

My guest is Michelle Ward is CEO of the 90 Day Business Launch. She is a business coach who guides creative, multi-passionate women to become entrepreneurs. Since 2008, she’s helped hundreds of these women launch their dream businesses.

Interview Highlights:

[3:00 ] Michelle talks about a few of the 20 jobs she had in 7 years of being an actor in New York City.

[7:13 ] Michelle starts to realize she doesn’t want this kind of work anymore, and that she needs to be an entrepreneur.

[14:04 ] Michelle’s breaking point. An embarrassing moment on a busy subway platform that proved to her she really HAD to make a change in her career. 

[19:40 ] The problem with jobs that are good “on paper,” why you shouldn’t talk yourself into those jobs, and how to listen to that little voice that tells you you need something different. We discuss how we’re getting better at listening to intuition.

[34:07 ] The advice Michelle ignored - to her benefit - both as an actor and as a coach, and how she knew she was doing the right thing. Why it’s good to be a gatekeeper in your business.

[43:35 ]  Michelle discusses her business-launching clients, how making big shifts is equal parts scary and exciting, and how the emotional shit is holds people back.

[45:27 ] We discuss the mythology that successful people “Leap and the net will appear,” why baby steps actually work, and how to define your own safety net.

[48:52 ] Michelle’s Career Crushes:

• VP Wright - Website | Instagram
• Trudi Lebron - Website | Instagram
• Rebekah Boruki - Instagram
• RowHouse Publishing - Patreon | Instagram
• Austin Channing Brown - Website | Instagram
• Nicole Cordoza - Website | Instagram
• Anti-Racism Daily - Website | Instagram

Resources:

• Michelle’s 90 Day Business Launch - Website [affiliate link] | Instagram
• Follow Karen on Instagram
• Wayfinder Life Coach Training - Website
• Kristine Miguel of Caritas Company - Website | Instagram 

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Transcription - Broadway Dreams to Business Coach with Michelle Ward

[00:00:00 ] Karen: I'm Karen Styles and this is the Intentional Career Podcast. I talk to all kinds of people who take all kinds of paths to work they love. I'm a career and life coach and owner of Flow and Fire coaching. If you're ready to create your intentional career with the support of a coach, schedule a call with me.

There's a link in the show notes, or you can go to intentionalcareer.co and click the blue "Schedule a Call button".

Today on the show, my guest is Michelle Ward, CEO of the 90 Day Business Launch. Michelle is a business coach who guides creative multi-passionate women to become entrepreneurs since 2008. She's helped hundreds of women to launch their dream businesses so they can get the freedom, authenticity, and fulfillment they're seeking in their day-to-day lives.

Michelle is also my first business coach and she [00:01:00 ] is one of the biggest, maybe main reasons that I even have a business today. So welcome Michelle. I'm so thrilled to have you here today.

Michelle: You know, right before we started, I was , where am I at tissues? I'm going to need them. I'm already gonna need them. Thank you, that was beautiful and I love that. I get the distinction of being your first coach. First business coach.

Karen: It's exciting. You're.. Were you my first coach? Probably. Probably my first.coach too. Um, yeah, it's funny to think back. And I'm , could I have done this without you? Maybe? But I don't know, you have the way to just , get it done, get the thing done.

Michelle: Yay!  Yes, totally, and there's definitely a way...  We all have capability of doing this, but it's this blessing and a curse of wanting to be a business owner in 2021 or  2019, when we worked together that , Oh my gosh, there's so many different [00:02:00 ] ways I could go about this. And there's so many free resources and whatever, and , yay! And also, Oh my God, because where do I start? And what do I do? And it's so overwhelming. What's actually going to get me there.

Karen:  Right? Yeah, absolutely. And I think, there are  all of these paths that we could take to get to our intentional career. And for me, a big part of it was working with you, um, to get to a place where I'm , Oh, I know I'm now in the right place, because for many, many years before that I was questioning things all the time.

And so I wanted to talk to you about, you know, how you create it, your intentional career. And then, and then of course, how you help creative women do that as well in the form of creating a business.

Michelle: Yes!

Karen: So I know that  you've mentioned in a number of places that you had a bunch of jobs before a bunch of different jobs before you became a business coach. Can you  off the top of your head , what are some of the different things that you've done kind of before you got [00:03:00 ] to where you are?

Michelle: Yeah. I mean, well, I counted Karen, right?  I counted at one point. Yeah and because I was pursuing acting as career, I was definitely a stereotypical actor of, let's have a million different day jobs to, you know, pay my New York City rent and, and try to have a life when I wa...