The Importance of Community and Support Networks. Find out how building a robust support network can enhance your business and personal life.

Have you ever felt unsupported or isolated in your business? So many women consultants are forging their paths alone, trying to figure it out on their own, and that can take forever. There’s a way to go farther, faster - and that’s together.

I’m Samantha Hartley of Profitable Joyful Consulting. This is part six of my six-part series, The Feminine Advantage - the thrilling conclusion.We've talked about leaning into our feminine qualities, balancing them with healthy masculine structure and boundaries, communicating effectively in high-stress situations, feminine leadership styles, and defeating imposter syndrome. I'll link to all those in the show notes.

In today’s final episode of the series, I’m sharing the stories and experiences of my clients and colleagues who have successful high six and seven-figure businesses and still growing. But they didn't do it alone. Today, we explore how to build a strong support network that transform your business and personal life. You'll get inspiration and ideas you can turn into action. To help with that, I'll share a coaching question, a journal prompt, and an affirmation at the end to get you started, so stick around for practical tips you can use today.

Before we dive in, please take a second to hit subscribe, favorite, or follow the show. And if you love what you hear today, leave us a review.

The Power of a Support Network:

Let’s kick this off with a reflection from my colleague Jennifer Frye, Founder of Appreciated Asset Business Solutions. I asked how building a strong support network benefited her business?

Jennifer: It has meant everything. I have people around me now that I don't have to apologize for my successes, that I don't have to apologize for my ambitions. I think for women especially talking about ambitions and goals and like those big like dreams, can be a little bit taboo in certain circles and had been my experience for a long time where I wasn't safe to really be who I was. So finding your community people where you can have those dreams and people are like, “Yes, yes girl, you've got this. You can do this!” And not in like a cheesy, superficial rah rah way, but women specifically, I'll say, who will speak your name when you are not in the room. Those are the people. When things are going bad, there are so many people who want to know about it. It's when you have something really special to share, who are you calling? Who are you thinking “Oh my God, they're gonna be just as excited about this as I am”? That's how you identify who your people are.

This is something I've long observed. It's easier to find people to commiserate with than to celebrate with. I talked about it a lot on previous shows because celebration is an unexpected hack to see more success. And how key it is to be around those who can receive you when you’re big without feeling threatened or diminished. You need to be in the right rooms. Just yesterday I spoke with a young business owner who was new to a group of women who’d embraced her and showered her with offers of help and introductions. She was so moved by their sincere generosity!

My client Leslie, an agency founder, described her support network:

Leslie: I have a group of friends who are either like entrepreneurs or freelancers, anyone who is sort of outside of this like corporate structure. And we have a lot of shared experience, a lot of things that we can relate on. We share that and we offer each other a lot of support, I would say, and I think just like the feeling of being understood is great.

A desire to feel understood and to have shared experiences within your support network - that’s a common theme among successful entrepreneurs. But what about in the corporate world, where support systems often came with a stigma?

I asked my client Kara Levy, an Executive Communication and Leadership coach who works with leaders from some of the biggest names in tech, about her experience with that:

Kara: I think that that point of view that you just discussed about corporate is the idea that help or community is remedial rather than a gift that you give to yourself to be able to get the most out of you. That said, when I started this business, I too was working alone. And I think that that value, that doing it alone is somehow heroic or that you're better if you're do it alone is deeply rooted in a lot of the messages that we get in youth and they're just not true. We know from copious data that when people work together, they get better outcomes and they feel better.

Where’s my highlighter pen? “Community is a gift that you give to yourself to be able to get the most out of you.” Doing it alone isn’t heroic—it’s self-sabotage. There’s an epidemic of loneliness in the US, but it doesn’t have to be that way in your business. Now don’t get me wrong, I love my alone time and uninterrupted marathon work sessions. I’m not taking that away from you. But what I see in women who are building alone:

They try to reinvent the wheel and end up doing things the hard way.

They try to save money by figuring it out on their own until they feel they can afford help—which ends up taking longer, costing more, and sometimes leading to burnout.

The big thing: they lack perspective. Without a peer group to provide benchmarks, they undercharge and tolerate situations and clients no one else would put up with.

I did a listening tour one year and met with about 50 women consultants—nearly all of them were earning under $100K/year despite solid backgrounds and credentials. Several were working over 40 hours a week, stuck in the job paradigm, with no one to tell them: STOP! That’s unsustainable. You’re not being paid enough to work that much. My clients have benefited from my experience inside hundreds of businesses, allowing me to say: there’s an easier way, you could be charging more, and here’s how others handle that. And a peer community can often do that for you.

Bofta Yimam - Visibility Expert, Keynote Speaker, and Founder of the agency StoryLede, offers an unconventional approach to building networks:

Bofta: I believe in paying for access to networks more than most people around me. I am willing to pay to be part of a network, to be part of a mastermind, to be part of a business community, because I want to be surrounded around the top notch people who I feel like would also invest in themselves. And so I have friends, some of them business owners, some of them not. But I found that I found a lot of community outside of my circle, which can get insular, you know, by paying to play. And I think that's vastly under the radar, you know, not talked about as women business owners, how many pay to be part of a network. And the ones that I see that are doing extremely well have at some point or another, or consistently, you know, every year are paying to be in some type of network.

I could not agree more. Bofta and I met in one of those networks, a high-priced mastermind group. A few years later, she became my client, and from that same group, I’ve worked with a handful of others. I’ve also been their clients. You’ll find that you have more in common with women who invest in themselves and their businesses than with those who don’t. We’ll talk more about investing later on.

I often see a deep thirst for connection when people gather, but it’s especially strong in groups of women. Maybe it’s because many of us have been the only woman in the room in business settings for so long. The bonding and cathartic processing that happens in those spaces is special. Women often seek a deeper level of intimacy and connection that can only be found in those environments.

But there are some key challenges we meet from time to time.

Breaking Free from sexism (external and internal):

Historically, women have been pitted against each other in the workplace - pretty intentionally - due to systemic sexism. But that’s changing—we’ve caught on, and more and more, and choosing to support and lift each other up instead. Here’s me and Jennifer again:

Samantha: Have you noticed that it's changing because I find that the younger generation is so much better at this than the previous generations. I came out of an environment where women could not celebrate each other. And that was just internalized misogyny. Like we were just pitted against each other, I think, 'cause they knew if we ever got together that we would be too powerful. I think that has changed so dramatically. so I love hearing you say like, what are my communities of women that I can celebrate in.

Jennifer: We were always set up to compete against each other. I went to a very competitive all girls private school outside of Boston.We got very mixed messages about women power and go women and women can do everything. And then there was also an enormous amount of mean girl behavior that was tolerated. And because of that you get these mixed messages. And then look at media. Find me one uber successful woman in a movie or tv who's also got a great home life, great family, lovely relationship. Super happy. No, they don't do that. It's all of the Devil Wears Prada, archetype, right? The woman who is super successful, but she's really miserable. The woman who's super successful, but no one loves her or she's a bitch. We have all been taught this forever. Cruella Deville, ultimate, right? You can't have both is what they told us for a really long time.

It's the same thing with working moms. It was never set up to be successful for women to succeed in a working environment because there's children. What man gets asked how do you balance it all? How do you do it all? My fiance, he has three children. No one ever asks him, how does he do it all? I have one and I get asked that all the time. and the answer is, you just can't have it all today. Balance isn't about every single day, this and this and this. That's ridiculous. I can look back at the week and go, okay, I got some me time. Got great family time, got a lot of good work done… sometimes I get some exercise in. But were never taught about balance. It was always like, you have to do all of it and you have to do all of it well without complaining. you have to make it look easy.

That’s how we set ourselves up to fail—by falling for negative stereoytpes and perpetuating unattainable standards. Maybe the women around you still do. But I’ve never felt more empathy for other women than when we come together, share stories, and realize: those divides were placed between us by someone else in an attempt to weaken us. But if you’re willing to embrace new beliefs, you’ll experience something amazing.

Here’s two questions for you: Are you holding yourself or other women to unrealistic expectations? Are you competing when you could be collaborating?

Vulnerability in Business

Back in Episode 1 of this series, Balancing Masculine & Feminine Energy in Business, I talked about how a lot of us in business were taught to leave vulnerability behind—like it’s a weakness or a risk. We’ve been conditioned to think that strength means being stoic and in control. But the truth is, vulnerability is one of our superpowers. It helps us to build trust, connect on a deeper level, and create real collaboration. When we lean into it, we unlock a more genuine and powerful way to lead and grow our businesses.

But it ain’t easy. Let’s hear again from Leslie:

Leslie: I think also having, you know, a therapist, I work with you, I focus on my mental health as well, which is like really, really, really key. So I have a good, strong community of people and I would say just like sharing and being open about any struggle has always been like the cornerstone for me. Like, just not like keeping things bottled up. I like to do that. It's very comfortable, but I think it's like it doesn't serve me.

The awareness that it doesn't serve her overrides the comfort of keeping things bottled up. I think that's so important.

Also, we need to feel safe to be vulnerable. Brand photographer, Marcy Browe explains how she shows up differently in women-only settings.

Marcy: I think that women are now creating spaces for themselves where they feel comfortable. So for example, what I really appreciate about going to events that are catered towards women is that I actually show up in that space differently because I can be more vulnerable. I can talk about things like women's health and hot flashes and menopause and things like that, that I would never, ever say in mixed company. So there are ways that women, I think, are much more vulnerable, And we interact face to face as opposed to shoulder to shoulder. And yesterday I was at a networking event and this woman came up to me, she just put her business card in my hand and I was like, how about a hello? And you know, she came at it with a very, what you would think of as masculine energy. And You know, if she's gonna be continuing to network in that space, I think I would have the confidence to say to her something to the effect of, Hey, next time, before you hand me your business card, I'd love to just get to know you. Give her a little coaching in, in a nice way. But I think women give themselves permission to be vulnerable when there's only women in the room.

I love how Marcy plans to coach that woman on how to approach people in a more genuine way—it’s a perfect example of lifting each other up with honesty and kindness.

Building the Team and Delegating for Growth

This kind of community is not just about making business connections; it’s about creating a space where we can be both our best selves - our real selves.

And we can do the same when we build and structure our teams. Here’s Marcy again:

Marcy: I hire all women – from top to bottom. I have a female, CPA, a, female bookkeeper, female assistants. And you know, sometimes those choices are conscious and sometimes they're not but I feel like personally I am more gravitating towards the female energy and when I do wanna talk to my CPA and we are talking numbers and things that might fall in that category of more masculine, I know in the back of my head that she's a woman business owner 'cause she's running her own business too. So there's just something about when I talk with her about my money, I don't feel the shame that I might feel if I was talking to a male CPA. And I don't, I've never received shame or judgment from a man in that area, but I just personally feel so much more comfortable talking with her and just saying numbers and just not feeling ashamed about it. Whereas if I was talking with a high powered man, I might be meek, I might be like, well, I didn't make as much this quarter as last quarter. You know, I just find myself being more comfortable working with other women and, and I think that other women might feel the same.

Sounds like Marcy’s found her groove with her team! I can tell you from having worked with her twice on photo shoots. The first time, about 5 years ago, her support team were guys. And they were perfectly professional and unintrusive, absolutely supportive, but almost invisible. The second time, a few months ago, we were all women and in the first five seconds her assistant paid me the sweetest compliment. We were all chatting and bonding, with gentle pets on the arm, and putting hair back in place. There was all the physical and social intimacy of women who trust each other immensely. I think that difference is reflected in the photos oh so subtly.

While we’re on the topic of support teams…

One thing I teach my clients early on is to work in what I call their Joy and Genius Zone™️. The genius zone is obvious, it’s the thing you’re amazing at. But the joy zone is what gives you energy. So only do things that are both of those, things that you're amazing at best at in all the land that give you energy.

I love how Kara took this and ran with it in her hiring:

Kara: So the first person that I brought onto my team was my phenomenal EA Gretchen who does so much important work for me that would be difficult for me to do on my own, things like scheduling and contracting and things of that nature. I also have a CFO who works on all of my financial things, which is phenomenal because I am absolutely terrible with numbers. It's always good to know what your gaps are. I have an amazing coach, her name is Samantha Hartley. You might have heard of her before. Who has pushed me beyond what I thought I was capable of to build my business and give more value to my clients, but also to think about myself in a different way. And I think, you know, I play the role of consigliere to a lot of my clients, but having my own consigliere has been enormously helpful.

I also have a financial advisor. I have a couple of coaches that work on my team, so work that either is uniquely suited to them or that I'm unable to take on because of larger scope projects I offer to them. I have someone who has helped me with video testimonials for my website which is incredibly wonderful. Shout out to Jackie. And, hopefully I'll be bringing on more people to help me as well. I really think that outsourcing the things that, as you would put it, are not in your zone of joy and genius is eye-opening for me.

It was uncanny when Kara first referred to me as her consigliere, because I’ve always thought of that as the best descriptor for my role with my clients – consigliere, counselor, a trusted advisor.

I want us to hear from my longtime client, Patty Lawrence, founder of TurboExecs. Like many women, Patty was alone in an all male manufacturing plant, unsupported, with zero community. Here’s what it was like and how that deficit has motivated her to improve the lives of those around her.

Patty: I would love to have had a mentor. I have never been able to find… I have some pretty awesome people that I've connected with over the years and you are top of the top of the heap, I will say. And you've also had a hand in introducing me as well to other people that have been so in alignment with who I am and where I want to be and my authentic person, where am I going? So I would say some of that is also internalized into me because I desire to be a mentor. So I would say unfortunately, I haven't had that relationship, but I totally desire to be that person to other people because I would have really loved to have had somebody like that when I was in the corporate world. I had nobody. I was pretty much forging my own path, and the universe said that had to happen for me to do the things I am doing now.

I look at that as my path because I needed to go through all those steps to be able to do the things I am doing now. So whether it's clients, whether it's my team, whether it's people in the community, people around me, it doesn't matter. It’s how do I use the path and my journey to set people up to upgrade themselves? So it’s not giving them a fish, it’s teaching them to fish. It’s providing the container for growth, expansion, and all the upgrades they have inside of them already. They just need to unlock them and blossom. So that's how I come at it and that's how I build my company.

I read recently that we ultimately become whoever would have saved us that time when no one did. I feel like Patty has done that.

If you don't have anyone to delegate to, start small. Find a helper for a few hours a week or month. If you rock in this area, take the advice I gave a client today: Write down any tasks you still find yourself doing that someone else could do – or will in the future. One day you’ll let those go as well, till all you’re doing is what ONLY you can do.

Investing in Your Growth

OK, last topic here. We’ve explored the value of community and support, but there’s another critical piece to leveling up your business: investing in your own growth. Whether it’s through mentorship, masterminds, or high-quality networks, successful women know what Bofta advised earlier: that paying for the right resources can open doors to new levels of success. Here she is again:

Bofta: I think it's so so important to have community, to be with people who are like-minded, to hire a coach. Hire someone five steps ahead of you. All of those things I think are really underrated. And of course, there's a level of risk. You have to be willing to deepen the relationships, to go for things, to tell them what you do, to put yourself out there in order to get the reward that you may be seeking from it, if it is in fact, you know, revenue. If you’re seeking for community and friendship, well then also give – give that too. Host something at a restaurant or your home, you know, host. So there's different ways to give and I just think that it's so important that we invest. And if it's not given to you, if you're not finding it, look for a group. You can, a mastermind, you can pay to get into.

Investment always involves some risk, but that’s often where real growth happens. The question is: Is it worth it? Here’s Kara with her take:

Kara: I worried a lot about the overhead of this type of thing, but I think as an investment in the business, it's incredibly valuable. But there's a lot of support I get from people for whom there is no overhead. And I think about the other female friends that I have that are a tremendous source of support for me, many of whom listen to this podcast. So, hello. And having sort of a peer group of really close friends whose intellect and worldview and compassion and creativity I really admire to bounce ideas off of, you can't put a price on that. It's the thing I think that I value most in terms of growing myself in my business.

That multi-faceted support is what I wanted to highlight most today: multiple communities that lift you up—whether it’s a partner who believes in you, family and friends, or other women in business. Coaches, confidants, consiglieres, mastermind members—they all play essential roles. The financial and emotional ROI on these investments cannnot be overstated, becasue they help you stay grounded, focused, and constantly growing.

Coaching Question:

What prevents you from seeking more community or support in your business and life?

Journal Prompt:

Think about the times you’ve felt supported and unsupported. What actions or behaviors were different for you? How did these experiences shape your outcomes?

Affirmation:

I am deserving of support, and I attract the people and resources that help me grow.

This ends our series, The Feminine Advantage. I hope you believe more than ever in the distinct ways your being a woman in business can transform the experiences and lives of everyone you meet: from your clients, to your team, community, family and friends, and all those who never meet you personally but are affected by who you are, the gifts you’ve brought to the world, and all that is special about you.

I hope you’ve discovered actions you can take - from journal prompts to strategies for leading differently. When you feel like it’s all a bit much, I encourage you to come back and listen again. I have encoded each episode with love and respect for your path. Each time you listen, you’ll take away something new. And of course, reach out! Send me a message at SamanthaHartley.com/Super

Finally if you’ve enjoyed the show today and this series, please hit the button in your app and share us with someone. I’ll be back next season with new episodes. ‘til then, find tools for growing your consulting business, visit SamanthaHartley.com/Super. And with that, I’m wishing you a profitable and joyful consulting business.