Sue Ryan and How High-Achieving Women Manage Caregiving and Business—Without Sacrificing One for the Other

GGGR with Sue Ryan – Final
Sat, Aug 24, 2024 12:46PM 41:53
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
conversation, support, family caregiver, journey, caregiver, caregiving, part, roles, sue, lives, women,
business, share, recognize, parents, feel, leader, creating, audits, love
SPEAKERS
Karen Yankovich
00:00
Karen
Karen Yankovich 00:09
yankovich, hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of The Good girls get rich podcast. I’m
your host. Karen yankovich, and I am really excited for you to meet our guest today. Sue Ryan
and I met, and when we got into conversation about something, I was like, Oh my gosh, this is
such a hot topic. The topic we’re going to talk about today on our show, which I’m going to
introduce to you in a minute, is something that comes up almost every single time. I have a
group, coaching, meeting with my with the people in my she’s linked up accelerator program.
Somebody’s talking about this. Okay, so it’s not and it’s not talked a lot about a lot in the
entrepreneur in the training world, but it’s talked about, when we get talking about real life and
how that impacts what we’re doing with our businesses. So I am going to introduce you now to
sue Ryan, and I’m going to bring her on. It’s so good to have you with us here today. Sue.
Thanks so much for being here. I’m great. I’m great. Good, good. Yeah. Yeah. So you and I
talked, and I was like, Oh my gosh, we need to talk about this, because it is such a big part, it’s
a big part of my life, which, of course, impacts my business and and it’s such a big part of so
many of my my clients lives, and some of my entrepreneur friends lives. And it’s not talked
about enough, so I want to talk about it. So before we get into the conversation, let me I’m
going to re I’m going to paraphrase Sue’s bio here. She’s done a lot of things, but I want you to
know every all the good things about her. Sue’s mission is to empower and embolden
individuals to maximize the opportunities and potential change that potential change will bring.
As a speaker, a change strategist, an author, an executive coach, caregiving coach, a mentor.
There’s a little hint about we’re gonna talk about she lives through two passions of her purpose.
She guides and inspires leaders and emerging leaders committed to business growth and next
level leadership to be great leaders of themselves and others. She guides non professional
caregivers to become confident, balanced and supported in all phases of their caregiving
journey. Sue specializes in helping individuals and teams thrive during times of change,
working with them to clarify, align, develop and implement solutions in highly competitive
markets, while creating their culture poised to face the challenges of change with resilience
K
and right action in the direction of their goals, they successfully deliver long term brand growth
and value, whether change is due to external factors, such as market shifts, technology
innovation, economic changes, or study their sites on growth and expansion, understanding the
dynamics and psychology of change enhances their ability for success. And that’s what we’re
looking to do here, where we want to talk about our topic today, so that we’re enhancing your
ability for success. So you know, there’s a lot more I can tell you here and Sue I’m going to let
you introduce yourself and tell and but I’m going to just finish this with Sue’s life motto, which
is, go confidently in the direction of your dreams, live the life you’ve imagined. By Henry David
Thoreau, absolutely, Sue, that’s a lot. You’ve done a lot of stuff, right? Thank you so much for
being here with us today.
02:59
Thank you for inviting me. I’m really grateful for the opportunity to share the messages and to
touch people’s lives.
Karen Yankovich 03:06
Well, I’m happy that you’re here. So if you haven’t guessed yet, the topic that Sue and I were
talking about that, I said, Oh, I want to have this conversation on my show. Is caregiving. I am
so blessed that my parents are so healthy and they’re at the time that we’re recording this,
they are 86 and 88 No, 87 and 8987 and 89 my mom’s gonna be 88 in a couple of months, and
my dad’s gonna be 90 in January. And they’re healthy, generally healthy and and I come from a
very long line of long, living, healthy people, which is amazing, right? I grew up with seven
grandparents, four grandparents and three great grandparents, so I was the oldest on both
sides of my family. So I have spent a lot of years getting to know which is so I’m so
unbelievably blessed to have known all seven of these great, beautiful people, but I also
watched the end of their lives, right? And I want and I was there for all of that. I was probably in
high school when I lost my first grandparent. So I grew up with all seven of these amazing
people in my life. I have a picture, actually, maybe I’ll find it and put it in this show notes for
this of five generations. When I had my son, my great grandmother, my dad, because it was my
dad. No, my great grandmother, my grandmother my dad because it was my dad’s mother and
grandmother, me and my and my son. So I actually have a five generation picture, but now, as
I’m building my business and my life and my parents are needing more care in their lives. It’s, a
challenge, right? It’s a challenge, and it’s something that so many of the people that I speak to,
so many of the entrepreneurs that I know, many of the people in our in our programs, are
dealing with, and it does affect how we run our businesses, right? So tell us a little bit about
from your perspective, Sue, how did, how did this come to be a big. Part of what you support
people with,
05:03
yes, thank you so much. The the background from for my life experiences is, for the last 40
years, I was in roles of enterprise application software, either sales or support, and also in
parallel with that, navigating roles of family, caregiving, support, it kept coming into my life
from the time I was in my my 20s, and while I was in during my professional career, I couldn’t
share it. So I’m doing that on the side, while being in sales and traveling in a variety of other
K
things. And so I’m it was also before the internet started. So in my very early journeys, it was
like being on an emotional roller coaster, often blindfolded. We didn’t know what to do. There
weren’t places to go get information. People culturally didn’t share about things. We would try
things that worked. One day didn’t work the next. Doctors weren’t very helpful. And so I kept
being on that journey, and over the years, I learned a lot, and I wanted to share with other
people so that they could learn faster and more easily than I did a few years ago. I said, it’s
time for me to share this message more. I created a program called the caregiver’s journey,
and because I would get so many questions from people about, well, how do you do this, and
how do you do this, and how did you do this, and it was different phases of it. So I created a
journey, and I’ll get share information with you about it, but none of what it was is that I wanted
to teach family caregivers how to navigate their journey and get insights from it, from all the
phases of their journey, and also to be able to embrace their caregiving journey while
navigating other roles in their lives, because we don’t quit when that part of it starts right. The
other thing then that came up is that because I had so much experience in business and
business leadership, that I had the experience of what it was like with the conversation not
being normalized in business, by the year 2030 more of us are going to be over the age of 65
than under the age of 65 so the number of cow is increasing exponentially, while the number of
care receivers is increasing exponentially, while that available pool of caregivers is diminishing. Wow. And yes, medicine is keeping us alive longer, but not necessarily healthy longer. So we
have loved ones who are in need of care, and often who don’t have enough money to support
the extension of their lives. So it’s, it’s, it’s raising several different kinds of burdens. So I said
it’s appropriate for me with my background, to now help leaders become aware of it, normalize
the conversation, implement solutions to help and help the people who are family caregivers
but stay in the business, but also help the businesses benefit from keeping them right,
Karen Yankovich 07:55
right? It’s so it’s so important, and it is. You know, one of the reasons I went into this business is
to support my family thinking more around when my kids start having kids, I want to be able to
help, you know? I want to be able to spend time with my grandkids. But, you know, we hear
things like the sandwich generation, right? And I don’t think there is a sandwich generation. I
think the sandwich generation changes every year as people get older, right? It’s not like this
is, but I think there’s a, maybe there’s a chapter in your life, right? Maybe it’s the sandwich
chapter in your life where you’re supporting your kids and your grandkids, which also
supporting your parents, right? And that’s kind of where I am
08:27
at right now, and yourself. So that’s kind of like year ago. There you go, no, because, like you,
you’re taking care of your own current and future needs. You still have children’s needs you’re
taking care of, and now you’ve got parents and loved ones you’re taking care of. So you really
are whatever age bracket you’re in your sandwich in the middle, right? Right?
Karen Yankovich 08:48
And it’s not just me, right? Because as the CEO of my business, I have people that work for me
who are also dealing with this, right? I remember one time I a couple I had a month or two ago, my my parents had a couple doctor’s appointments or whatever. My dad had something put in
K
K
my my parents had a couple doctor’s appointments or whatever. My dad had something put in
his eye. Something put in his eyes so he couldn’t drive. And driving in 89 is another whole
conversation, right? But he couldn’t drive, so my sister called me and she’s like, I had the
morning, you get the afternoon. Dad’s got an appointment. You can’t, he can’t drive. And I’m
like, I have a full day. Like, I can’t just, like, I can do it if I have advanced notice, right? But it’s
hard for me to just drop everything. And I was able to do it that day, but I was like, Okay, I need
to start to manage some expectations here. And maybe, maybe I should have been the one to
do the morning, because that was planned, right? Maybe I should be doing the planned ones,
because I can build that into my calendar. And my sister, who is, who is retired, can and has a
little bit more flexibility in her day at the last minute than I have. Maybe she does more of the
last minute kind of things, right because, but it’s things that we have to think. Like, it just didn’t
occur to me, I’m happy, but I was like,
09:52
part of it, that’s part of the reason I’m doing what I’m doing, is because, exactly to your point,
it’s like, start thinking about the. Things and some of the challenges, though, you don’t know
what it is. You don’t know to think about so until that happened, you didn’t know to think, well,
we should be talking about this and planning this, and that’s reasonable, because you didn’t go
to school for it, and it’s not something you’re you know, you’re not doing the audible book on it.
So it’s not part of your when it becomes part of your lens. Like when there’s a diagnosis, you all
of a sudden want the PhD and the diagnosis and a PhD in being a caregiver. And it’s like
everything is not just obvious, right,
Karen Yankovich 10:32
right? And it is. It does become, at least for me, it does become a part of my identity, right? So I
have an identity as a mom and a grandmother, and I have an identity, you know, lots of
identities, right? Sister, partner, blah, blah, blah, and but caregivers becoming a bigger and
bigger part of of my identity because, because there are things like, you know, I want my
parents to be as independent as they can for as long as they can, right? So I’m not looking to
micromanage it, but I also feel like I have a responsibility to keep an eye on it. You know what I
mean to say? Maybe see things that maybe they’re not able to see so clearly and and just
understanding what that line is, and fitting that in, you know, kind of with my business and and
understanding that my employees are going through the same thing
11:20
well. And so here’s another thing. So it’s great to say you want your parents to be independent
for as long as they can be. And I hear this so often. Well, you say that, I’m not knocking you. I’m
saying, what? So, yeah, yeah, no, please, yeah,
Karen Yankovich 11:35
I’m here for the conversation. You put
K
K
11:37
a period at the end of that, and you move forward. However, what you don’t know is, what does
that actually look like, and what does independent mean, and in the course of their lives, what
does maintaining their independence look like? And how do you check to see, are there areas
where it’s great for them to remain independent, and areas where they would benefit from
some support where they haven’t asked for do they haven’t realized they needed. And you
there are things that you can be doing to help clearly define with them what that looks like, so
that, for example, you can start planning like, okay, when we’ve got appointments with Mom
and Dad, let’s figure out how to structure them, and let’s figure out how to schedule them, and
let’s go with them. Because are they being their own best advocate? One of them goes to the
doctor. Do we know what it is that that they’re being treated for, so that they’re taking their
medicine and things like that? So it’s, it’s shifting into all of those things. And when you say
independent, it’s continuously, then auditing it and looking at what it is and evolving it and
checking in so that they maintain the appropriate independence as long as possible. And
gradually, sometimes it’s immediate, but gradually start having support in the areas that bring
the most value to them and to you,
Karen Yankovich 12:54
right, right? And you know as as, and again, I’ll speak for myself, but I know that I’m speaking
for many of the people listening, and certainly for many of my clients, there’s also the factor of
people don’t really understand what I do, right? I don’t get up in the morning, take a shower,
get my car and drive to an office, right? So Karen’s home, right? So Karen can do it. Karen can
do this. Like so many of us that are entrepreneurs, that maybe work from home or work for
ourselves, we have these kind of invisible businesses to some of the people in our family, right?
They don’t really understand we do, and they don’t really necessarily need to. But it doesn’t
mean we’re not working, right? It doesn’t mean we’re not working and and there’s that piece of
it too. So how do you where do you know, for me, creating those boundaries around work hours
and non work hours and communicating that to the people around me, that’s
13:43
exactly what it is. So part of it is when you’re thinking about it, and especially if you know, let’s
pull up back the sandwich generation, when you’ve got children whose schedules you’re
responsible for, and then you’ve got your parents, and they’ve got schedules that periodically
you’re starting to become responsible for, and then you’ve got your own what you want to be
doing is proactively having as many conversations as possible, so that you’re looking at what
does this look like, and let’s talk about it, and having them understand, okay, during this these
blocks of time, if you need something in any one of these blocks of time, I’m normally not
available. My work is this and things like that. My the physical location of my office may be in
the home, but I am still working doing these things, but then also get from them, because so
talk with everybody, and have everybody be part of the conversation and figure out where
they’re then you also recognize, okay, we’ve got fam this amount of family support. You
recognize where there are gaps. Fortunately, now we have things where food can be delivered
and other people can be helping or supporting other things, but before you need something in
it for urgently and there’s a problem, proactively, start having these conversations and look
around and say, hey, when do you normally do this? And what are the things that are going on?
And do the audits so that you’re developing a team, and then you’ll. Want to make sure you’re
K
developing the team that’s the in the emergency team if something were to happen to you and
you’re not available if something were to happen to one of your parents, and you need to be
there with them, right call on in case of an emergency. So it’s putting those things together so
that you’ve got the proactive plan.
Karen Yankovich 15:19
Yeah, that’s so important. That’s so important knowing that still there’s you know, there’s you
there’s always going to be flexibility. And honestly, I think back to when I first started working,
when I first started like, my first real job was working for the phone company. There would have
been no way I could leave in the middle of the day. And I say that, I don’t say that like, I work
for union, and we had all these rules, so unions gave us all these benefits. But also, with those
benefits came, okay, what you get this much time, and if I left in the middle of the day, it
counted as an absence. It only allowed a certain number of absences, and, you know, and and
and absences were definitely, you know, something that were black marks against what you
did, and I wouldn’t have been able to do it, right? So, so thankfully, we’re having these
conversations. I don’t think we’re having them enough, but we’re having these conversations at
least, right? And so
16:07
this is a huge part of that, Karen, what you just brought up to compliment what we talked about
before, the part of the reason that I’m so passionate about normalizing the conversation in
business through my professional career, first of all, for 40 years, I’ve never touched a box that
said, Are you a family caregiver? So in any role I ever had, that was never something that was
asked, right, right? There’s that part of it. Then when we talk about wanting to be proactive and
supporting, and
Karen Yankovich 16:35
can I just not be there for a second? And I wonder if you would check it, if a box was there,
because I wonder if you would think that it would impact your ability, your your your ability to
land that position.
16:45
I’m getting right. That’s exactly the first bleed into what I’m that’s the perfect bleed into this.
So, so you’re, you are a family caregiver, and you are in business. And one of the things that
happens when we talk about wanting, like on the family side, to have that you also want to
have that at work. For example, if you’ve got someone who is going to be out on maternity
leave, you work together as a team and say, Okay, I anticipate I’m going to be gone here. So
the team works around it. When you are an unidentified family caregiver in business, and mom
needs to go to the doctor and you have to take that leave, you know, go out for a couple of
hours or things like that. You’re, you’re it’s, it’s impacting your team. People don’t know why
you’re gone because in an organization, and to your point, I watched other people who had
identified as caregivers not get promotions, get laid off, not be felt they couldn’t be relied on,
K
K
not be given as much salary increase, and I wouldn’t have been given the professional
opportunities I was if they knew that in parallel to what I was doing, I was doing that because I
was in a role. And this is going away quite a bit, but I’m going to raise it in my in the season of
life when this was an impact. Women were not recognized in the roles I was in. They were
traditional roles for men. So anything that I would have done that would have said, well, I need
to be able to take my dad to the doctor with like, well, she can’t be relied on here, like,
whatever. So what we want to do, then is, to your point, is we want to have companies, starting
at the executive level, open the door to say we recognize the fact that there are these
wonderful family caregivers who are supporting their family in this season, and they’re also
valuable assets. We don’t want to leave, because about 40% of them leave the workforce and
leave it early, which is has got financial impacts and all different kinds of things, we want to
support them staying and so organizations have already recognized there are other people who
have seasons in their lives and identity, special identity groups to be recognized to have a
better working environment. And so all that needs to be done is to flip the switch, put the box
and say, We want to embrace and support you as we are with other groups, so that you can
take that so if you had to take mom to the doctor, okay, you can share with your team
members. Hey, I’ll be available by phone. I’m taking mom to the doctor. This is what it is, and
you’ve normalized it, and people recognize it.
Karen Yankovich 19:05
And, you know, as you’re talking, I’m kind of running through my head, this is still often women
taken on this role. Oh, absolutely.
19:13
The vast majority are women. Yeah, there are, there more and more men because, you know,
and that’s really why
Karen Yankovich 19:18
I almost didn’t bring it up, because I’m not here, even though this practice called Good girls get
rich, I’m not called Good girls get rich. I’m not here to bash men. I love that men are stepping
into a bigger role with some of these things. But I do think that’s still the best. It’s another place
that women are losing opportunities. Maybe
19:33
they are. Yeah, they are. And part of the part of the thing is because, with that pool of available
caregivers shrinking. You know, more women are traditionally and currently still stepping into
that role of absorbing the responsibilities of family caregiving on top of all of the other
responsibilities. So there, while more and more men are coming in because the exponential
growth of it, it’s predominantly still. Women, and it’s a big burden,
Karen Yankovich 20:01
K
K
K
Karen Yankovich 20:01
yeah, yeah. So what do we do? I mean, what do we you know, how do we lessen the impacts to
our businesses and and build in the support to our teams and our employees? Such a
20:17
powerful, powerful question, and for many companies, it’s a very straightforward answer if an
organization already has benefits and already has employee assistance programs, so they’ve
recognized the value of that in their business, it’s taking and I’ve got all kinds of statistics and
numbers. There’s all kinds of foundational information about it, but it’s having the business
executive, the leaders of the organization, who often who are also in roles of caregiving
themselves or their their spouses or their they’ve they’ve got a loved one who is and saying, We embrace it, we recognize it, we acknowledge it. We want you. We’re going to ask how many
of you there are here in our business. We’re going to do a survey. We want you to feel safe
identifying that you are a family caregiver, so that we can explore ways that we can be
providing you support. And they all exist. This is the great thing, the legal process, the
organizational process in most companies for different benefits, offerings for EAP already exist.
You’re just adding one more identity group, which is family caregiver to it, so solutions can be
implemented very quickly once the executives from the top down, the executives open the
door to normalizing the conversation, embracing the fact that people are navigating in this
season of their lives, roles of family caregiving, support,
Karen Yankovich 21:42
and I bet if you were incorporating that even into your your hiring process, you know that this is
a part of what we support. We want to support this in your life. That would be, that would be
amazing if you were actually talking about that in the hiring process. I but I think that, and I you
know, you mentioned this before we hit record on this, that it almost fits right into, like, their de
and I initiatives, right? Like it’s their initiatives to support this, and I think about that. And, you
know, I’m trying to, I’m trying to be positive about the positive, the possibilities that that’s
happening, but also feeling a little bit like, and then just just, it’s gotta then, like you said, it’s
got to come from the top, but then it’s got then it’s got to infiltrate, right? It’s got to infiltrate
because there’s going to still be that manager level, or somebody right, that that can struggle
with that. But I want to kind of refocus this a little bit. Then for the entrepreneurs, right? You’re
an entrepreneur, you’ve got a couple of contractors, maybe one or two payroll people, right? I
think that’s a bigger the our audience is probably more of those people, or even just women,
looking to that are in corporate and they’re looking to get those raises and and get those big
positions right, and maybe they can make the impact to the corp, to the companies with these
kinds of initiatives. How do we support them?
23:04
So this, that’s really two different kinds of right? So let’s, let’s, let’s take pick one of those. Do
you want to start with the entrepreneur? Start with the entrepreneurs. Yeah, let’s, let’s, let’s
Karen Yankovich 23:14
K
K
K
keep focused on that for now.
23:15
Let’s stay focused on the entrepreneur for now. So so often as an entrepreneur, we may be a
solopreneur, so it’s on us. So the roles of family, caregiving, support get added to everything
else. And on top of that, they’re, they’re often because we’re, and again, we’re talking on the
sandwich generation. We often are also incurring financial considerations because they they’re,
outliving this, their savings, their medical expenses, are out there. The way that they budgeted
for their lives didn’t include others. So so you’ve got the demands of the time, and you also got
the financial demands. And so again, when you look at this, you want to be creative and start
getting thinking outside the box, and start creating teams of people, and I know a variety of
solopreneurs who have created a support group of their own where they support each other
navigating the responsibilities of mom’s got to go to the doctor, Dad’s Got to exist. They they
work with each other to support each other. They can be different industries. They can be all
different things, but their commonality, they have is that each of them is a family caregiver.
Then on the financial side of it, there’s also the creativity of, you know, they’ve got, like, a
daycare kind of situation. Or you’ve got a way where one family has somebody, they find
somebody who could could share time with multiple people, then another per another
opportunity, and this is really excellent, is you leverage technology. There are many times
when the kinds of things where. We would be stepping in to support our loved one, especially if
we’re doing these really valuable audits. The technology helps them maintain their
independence longer, while giving us peace of mind. So, for example, their medication is a big
one. There is wonderful technology that helps with getting the medication administered, making sure that it is being taken alerts to remind them. You can have cameras installed so
that you can be observing it. You can have like on the on Monday, somebody’s going to be
calling everybody, somebody else is going to be calling on Tuesday. So you’ve got ways of
doing that. You do audits of the pantry to see how healthy the food and how fresh the food is,
and audits the hub, the home, what are they able to be keeping up with and then in the areas.
So you can have a group of people go shopping. Here’s my grocery list, and one person goes
grocery shopping one week, and they get the groceries and bring them around. So they come
Karen Yankovich 25:56
so they’re supporting each other, kind of like we supported our when our kids were in daycare. Whose turn is it to pick up all the kids today, right?
26:01
Who’s trying to So, many of the things in caregiving are similar to, if you raise children, the
different kinds of considerations you had and and the creativity that you get for that. The other
thing, and this is So, huge, huge, huge, huge, huge, and I emphasize huge, because in the
beginning, when I would have benefited from it and didn’t know what I was I didn’t know I didn’t
have it. So I know what it’s like not to have it. You never need to be alone. You never need to
struggle to not know what to do. There are resources out there. You can do searches there, in
whatever the diagnosis is. There are communities of people. They’ve got creative ideas. You
can get you can create Facebook groups. You can join Facebook groups that already exist. So
K
there are people out there that can help you navigate the complexities of the journey and and
and reduce some of the impacts in different ways you can the other thing is, when we talk
about leveraging family members, the finance, the family dynamics are, are unique for
everybody’s family. But when you bring everyone together for a common goal and say, How do
what does this look like when we’re all doing this together, even if, as a family, relationally,
you’re not in the best shape with each other, this is bigger than you, right? Right?
Karen Yankovich 27:22
Yeah, because it is that dual role, right, of business, professional and caregiver and everything
27:28
else. So it’s not like, right? It’s not like you when you go to work, you don’t leave caregiver at
home, and when you’re you don’t leave business, and you don’t leave being a mom, you don’t
leave anything else. It’s not like, which,
Karen Yankovich 27:39
right, right? Yeah. So important. So important. I think about like, you know, because I have a
little bit of a geek brain, and I think about, like, the tech available in all of this. And I have, like,
you know, hopefully my parents aren’t listening, or nobody’s going to share this with them. But
I have, like, Google Docs and or documents like that. Like, when I when they’re like, Oh, I can’t
log on. Help me get on. I’m like, I like, write that password down somewhere, because someday
I’m going to need all this, because they are so determined to hang on to their independence.
But then sometimes they, you know, they’re going to they need the help, but they they’re in
that in between stage right, where they don’t want the help, but they sometimes need the help.
And you can do it like for they know. So every everywhere I can that I can leverage some
technology, I do screenshots or whatever right piece
28:25
of mind thing. You sit down and do an audit with them. Not a lot of our parents have got the
really organized thing with passwords. But you do it, you say peace of mind. Anything
happened to you, we’d want to make sure that we could get into Can
Karen Yankovich 28:39
I just tell you I could stop here, there, there’s my there’s no way my parents would be open to
that conversation. I there, there’s no way. And I’m saying this not I’m because maybe there’s
somebody listening. They’re not ready for these conversations, because they are. They’re they
have each other for one thing. So that’s a little bit unique in their generation. They still have
each other, and they’re like, no, if something happens to me, Dad knows. Something happens
to dad. Mom knows, but they don’t know, you know, and and so it’s, it’s a struggle to be able to
K
K
K
support them when they know they need the support, they don’t want the support, and they’re
struggling to hold on to their independence, right? So it’s, it’s, yes, I would like the
communication to be there, but they’re not ready for that
29:19
communication. So I would encourage you to shift the way that you have the conversation,
okay, shift the language of it. For, for example, you know, if, if they want to maintain their
independence longer, if, for any reason, they needed to go into the hospital and you needed to
access to what their medications, or something like that, was you’d be able to support them
better. You come up with a thing that helps them and shift that conversation and say, Listen,
you might be healthy forever. You’re still supposed to have it. I’m supposed to have it. I’m
making sure you’ve got it. So if one of you has it, then you both have it, and it’s current. So
however you do it, get creative. About ways to approach it, and the sooner you approach it,
way before they need it. But be talking about and say, Hey you guys, you know, hopefully this
isn’t for 10 more years, however, right for us, so to be good for you, let’s just all, we’re all as a
family, going to do it so we can help each other, just in case there’s anything that happens,
right?
Karen Yankovich 30:16
Right? Because it is, it is, you know, managing, that is a little bit like managing my business,
right? Like, what are the strategies? What are the, you know, I often talk when I talk, when I
teach sales, I’m like, you know, you’re selling when you’re trying to get your partner to load the
dishwasher, you know, like, it’s not just about getting in. And part of that kind of goes into, you
know, into how you handle it with, how do you deal with your family, right? You’re the you’re
the leader of your business, you’re the leader of your family, and they may be co leaders, right?
Doesn’t mean you’re the the king or the matriarch, right? They’re made. But there is a leading,
leading. Being a leader is a is an important, I think, an important piece of that identity, the
identity of being a caregiver
30:57
and as a leader, what you do is you figure out how to lead your team, and also, as a leader, you
recognize you can’t say and make one message that everybody’s going to hear. In the same
way that as a leader, you you you figure out how to communicate the message, you figure out
the ways of communicating, and you also recognize you don’t communicate at one time. You
communicate it over and over and over. And so when you’re working with a family dynamic, it’s
the same kind of thing. The conversations are going to be different, the approaches are going
to be different. And and yet, you keep talking about it, you bring stories up, you keep sharing
about things. But part of the another piece of it is the more that you think of the things that are
proactive to help be doing ahead of time that you’ve at least had conversations with, like you
can be having conversations with the rest of your family about, well, what do we do in case of
this? What are some of the kinds of things so other kinds of things you can be doing to prepare
and then not having the conversation surrounding the passwords at all be anything about
independence. It’s about security is that, you know, Mom and Dad, here are the things we’re
doing. We want to make sure that you’re as current with what you’re doing with security as we
K
are. For example, we’ve put on that we’ve changed our passwords, we’ve got two factor
authentication. We’re doing these things so that there’s no one who could accidentally get into
our financial information. We want to make sure that you’ve got access to all of those things as
well. Could we sit together and do something like that to support you so that you don’t ever
have to worry about it, just different ways of approaching it? Yeah,
Karen Yankovich 32:30
for sure, for sure. For sure. Well, it sounds like you are a wealth of resources. So tell us a little
bit about what kinds of ways do you work with people on this?
32:40
I work with people in in several different ways. One of the things that I do is I have a program
that helps family caregivers navigate their caregiving journey, called the caregivers journey,
and I coach and I speak and I mentor individuals navigating their journey. The other thing I do
now is I take these messages into businesses to talk with business leader, so important, go to
business conferences and raise this to their level of awareness. I’ve got tons of statistics and
numbers and things, but also solutions. I’m not I’m not bringing the problem. I’m making aware
that there’s an issue and bringing solutions because they exist, whether you’re a solopreneur or
whether you’re a fortune one company. So it’s that so I’m a passionate communicator, as you
can tell. So speaking is something I love to do. I want to come in and and speak to everyone’s
businesses. Then I can also bring in and help get started in in businesses, help them raise their
level of awareness. I have access to a number of resources they can use, not mine. I know
there’s no one of us who’s all the solution, but get them started and have them know different
places they can explore to become part of the solution. The big thing is a variety of different
ways to help normalize the conversation and have that so whether it’s speaking or coaching or
solutions, and I’m also in the process of writing another book and launching a podcast,
Karen Yankovich 34:00
awesome, awesome. And you have a complimentary like, you have a seven day do version of
your character. Tell us a little bit about that. How can we access that? I would all the links to
everything, obviously, in the notes for this episode. One of the things
34:12
I did because I really care about getting this out, this is not, I’m not doing this to become
wealthy with the program. I created the program, and I’m I’m giving you a seven day
complimentary copy of the entire program. Now, lesson of it, it’s the entire program, so
everything in the program and you can use it for seven days.
Karen Yankovich 34:32
Wow, that’s amazing. That’s amazing. We’ll put a link in the in the notes to show how to do
that. So what’s next for you? Your book is next, right? What’s what else is on deck for you in
K
K
K
that. So what’s next for you? Your book is next, right? What’s what else is on deck for you in
your in your journey? What should we be looking out for? Several
34:45
things that are coming out. I am part of the book called the caregivers advocate that’s going to
be launching early in July, who we work together, and we’ve been friends for a number of years. We’re creating a podcast called the caregiver. Journey, practical tips and candid conversations
where we talk about just these same kinds of things. She’s been navigating the journey with
her husband for a number of years. And then I’m also creating a book series called the
caregiver’s journey. So it’s a book, it’s there’s so each one of them smaller on each of the
phases of the journey.
Karen Yankovich 35:20
Amazing, amazing. Well, you know what, Sue, I think this is a big part. Like I said when we
started having this conversation, it is. It was remarkable to me when I realized a couple years
ago that almost every call that I have with my students, somebody is is in some stage of I’m at
my parents, or I’m dealing with this, or I’m dealing with that, and it is such a big part of what
I’m seeing in the entrepreneur’s journey, or the, you know, the business Woman’s Journey, that
I think I’m so glad we’re talking about it, and I’m so glad you’re doing what you’re doing for it,
so that we can feel we can talk about it more, and we can feel supported around it, instead of
hiding and not checking that box when the box comes up, because we feel like it’s going to
impact our success. And, you know, one of the things that we really stand for here, and she’s
linked up in our good girls get rich podcast, is women supporting other women, right? I mean,
and because, you know that rising tide that lifts all boats, I love when you talked about creating
little coalitions of support, whether it’s shopping support or I was actually thinking like, you
know, maybe you’re in a mastermind and you can kind of just have one conversation that’s like,
Hey, can we just kind of put it out there that if there’s an emergency and I need somebody to
step into to handle like, you know, I have a weekly group call for my program, right? And if I
and I’m on, if I’m not on, it, it’s planned, and there’s an organization around it, right? Like, can
we have a plan that if I have an emergency and have to run out, I can, kind of want you guys to
come in as a guest host for that, and you could bring your own expertise, like I love even just
having that little bit of conversation in there, because I think that it’s it did I never even
occurred to me. And I think it’s so smart, because I think about this as I CR as an entrepreneur,
as I create my plans and programs, I’m sure I am, I am so committed to being visible and being
a big part of my programs and conversations. I want to get to know every single one of my
students, and I want to be a part of it, but also I want to make sure that I am not, you know,
chaining myself to this office, because I do have these other commitments, right? So I’m always
looking to find that balance. And I think what you suggested in supporting each other and
creating these groups of support around these kinds of things is so smart. I love that. And I
highly recommend everybody listening bring that topic up in your next mastermind
conversation, and just kind of put you have to have one conversation about it. Hey, would you
guys be up for you know, just kind of put it out there so that there’s no surprise if, if and when
the time comes that you have to call on one of them for it. That’s so brilliant.
37:41
Thank you. It’s getting creative. It’s thinking outside the box, which is what we do, and finding
K
Thank you. It’s getting creative. It’s thinking outside the box, which is what we do, and finding
new ways to apply things we’ve already learned. You know, like you said, well, as moms, we did
that with kids, right, right?
Karen Yankovich 37:53
And, you know, yeah, you know, my goal is for more women to have more money, and if we’re
constantly feeling behind the eight ball because we’re being pulled in so many different
directions. It’s just a more it’s just a more difficult journey for us. And I think having this
conversation simplifies that journey and helps more women become wealthy, Women of
Influence. And I think that that’s I know that’s what the world needs. I know that’s what my
world needs. And I think, you know, I love to surround myself with, you know, women that are
normalizing, what this kind of, the kinds of things that are needed in this conversation, but also
so that I can run a highly successful business and be a highly wealthy, you know, a very
wealthy woman. I think you can do it all. It doesn’t mean, you know, bring home the bacon and
fry it up in the pan, right? It means, it means those boundaries, right? Creating those
boundaries, and knowing that you can get support for some of these things and not do
38:46
all of this yourself, and getting creative about, okay, who is supposed to bring home the bacon
and who does fry it in the pants, because there are different seasons. And how do we
collaborate on that, so that whatever it’s going to look like, we can do it in the best way
possible and not feel that just tremendous, overwhelming burden of you don’t know what to do,
you’re overwhelmed, and it’s just, there’s just just, there’s no clarity, and there’s so many
things coming at you, and there’s
Karen Yankovich 39:15
a sense too, you know when, when you’re raising your kids, there’s a sense of, until they grow
up, right? Or as as they get older, it becomes easier. But when you’re faced with doing this with
your parents, what we’re faced with is this is not going to get easier. This is more likely going to
be more difficult and more stressful and need more of my time, or potentially need more of my
time as time goes on. So there’s a little bit of that unknown too that’s stressful and that could
impact our decision. So. So thank you for being there and helping us navigate these things so
that, so that we can continue to build our careers in a way that feels simple and easy, and also
be there for the people that we want to be there for. Well
39:55
And to your point, one last point I’ll make, and I’m so respectful of all of this, is that. So as we
are taking on additional responsibilities to care for our loved one, what would be preferred is
that we don’t have resentment coming up because of all of the other things. So the more that
we address things ahead of time, more that we create plans, the more that we get created, the
more we recognize it’s reasonable we don’t know the answers and we don’t need to do this
K
K
alone. It helps us not become resentful of this journey, which to your point, for many of us, it
continues to grow and grow and grow because our loved ones are living longer and longer and
longer,
Karen Yankovich 40:34
right, right? Well, thank you so much for being here. Sue. I really appreciate this, and if you are,
if you’ve listened before, or if you love what you’re hearing today, we would love to hear from
you. So make sure that you’re following good girls get rich on Apple podcasts or wherever you
get your podcasts. A review would be great. Tell us what you think about this episode, and of
course, take a quick screenshot right now. Take a quick screenshot of the show. Share it on
your social media. Tag me. Tag Sue. I’ll put all of her links below, and then we’ll be able to
share your posts with our audiences, right? And that’s how we all get more visibility. We can
get more people to hear these messages, and we can collectively be lifting up more women in
the world so that we have a bigger voice, individually and collectively. Right? In the show notes,
there’s also a leak a link for speak pipe, so if you can leave me an audio message there, I love
getting your audio messages because I get to respond personally to every single one of them.
So if you just go to the links below, and you’ll see everything we talked about here today, and
you know, I just, I feel so good to be having another conversation with another woman who’s
really whose goal truly is to just lift more women up and and I’m going to kind of leave us with
that today. So thanks so much sue for having this conversation with me today. Thank
41:50
you for inviting me to share. I appreciate it.
K