Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Cindy Montgenie, CEO of New Skies Nation, located in Doral, FL, USA.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

New Skies Nation is a leadership development firm where we partner with smart executives and future-focused organizations to help them build and sustain inclusive and high-performance teams without burning out employees. Our clients include multinationals, small and mid-size corporations, non-profit organizations, and government entities.

The end goal is to help them keep winning in the marketplace and create a better tomorrow where everyone thrives. I am also an international keynote speaker. My topics of expertise are inclusive leadership, the future of work, and impostor syndrome.

Tell us about yourself

Before I started my company in 2017, I enjoyed a 20-year international career in the fast-paced tech industry. At the same time, I was in the corporate world. I had the privilege and blessing to lead multicultural and remote teams throughout the USA and Latin America and to have responsibilities over billion-dollar businesses. I am from French Guiana. I have lived in 5 countries and 3 continents.

When I started my company, I wanted to combine my passion for talent development with critical keys from the tech icons' playbook to help more companies and executives play to win and enjoy fulfilling careers. So, I decided to work at the intersection of the future of work, leadership, and DEI because it was clear that those trends were going to transform how we work, how we lead, and live.

The Covid-19 pandemic and the social unrest in 2020 accelerated those trends and the imperative to upgrade our leadership strategies. What motivates and excites me every single day is knowing that my work contributes to enabling purpose-driven, inclusive, winning corporate cultures so everyone can thrive at work.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

My biggest accomplishment is the thousands of leaders we have equipped across the globe.

What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?

Identify the 20% of the activities that will bring you 80% of the revenue. As a business owner, you have so many things on your plate that it is easy to get caught in activities and projects that will not have an impact on your bottom line and to lose track of what will move the needle and position you more decades to come.
As a business owner, it is challenging but critical to protect your strategic thinking time, so you avoid being drowned by the execution and avoid chasing the latest shiny objects.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

  1. Get clear on your business model and on your value proposition to the marketplace.
  2. Surround yourself with talented people: invest in coaches and mentors, be part of uplifting communities and hire talent. No one can achieve success alone. The people you are surrounding yourself matter.
  3. Develop a resilient mindset: setbacks and rejections are part of the journey. So, it is important to learn to reframe failure and to be patient and persistent. When one door closes, learn from this experience and keep moving until you find an open door.

Is there anything else you'd like to share?

Change is faster than ever, so as business owners, we need to stay ready to let go of old successful playbooks and be flexible in adopting new strategies to position our companies strongly for the future.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: https://newskiesnation.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NewSkiesNation/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cindymontgenie/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CindyMontgenie
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cindymontgenie/

If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

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