Cait Scudder | Inspiring Thousands of Women to Push through their Definition of What is Possible
Cait Scudder left her life of certainty and routine to pursue her dream of using her strengths to teach, impact, and change the lives of many while creating financial freedom for herself. In this interview read how this trailblazer built and scaled her brand to a global, multiple six figure industry, all from a laptop in Bali.
Cait Scudder - Business Coach and Success Mentor
#BOSSLADY DETAILS:
Name: Cait Scudder
Country: USA, but location independent (mostly based in Bali!)
Industry: Business Coach & Success Mentor
Business Name: Cait Scudder International LLC
Favorite Quote to live by:
“I want people to walk around delusional about how great they can be - and then to fight so hard for it every day that the lie becomes the truth.” - Lady Gaga
1. Please give us a bit of background on who you are and what you do? (what is your backstory/your business)
I’m a business coach and success catalyst for driven women entrepreneurs who are struggling energetically and financially in business and are ready to explode their impact, confidence, and income. My superpower is helping women in business to understand and articulate their unique value proposition, unleash that signature genius in their content and marketing, and to sell with soul and power.
I’m wholeheartedly obsessed with helping my people identify and then break through the barriers that have kept them capped, financially and otherwise, in their business. I built my online coaching business in mid 2017 and scaled my brand to multiple six figures in under a year and a half, all from my laptop in Bali and while traveling the world.
In 2015, I left my comfortable but woefully unfulfilling life in small town New England and promising career in education to pursue my crazy uncertain, at times very scary dream of using my strengths to teach, impact, and change the lives of many while creating financial freedom for myself. I knew it was possible to build a business founded upon my core desire to teach, guide, motivate, and lead others. I knew I was meant to teach and impact more lives than just the students in my classroom, and I set out to find out how.
I traveled to Bali in 2015 to pursue a women’s leadership and advanced yoga teacher training certification. I was opened up to the world of online business and the possibilities that existed in building a personal brand. I spent the next two years investing tens of thousands of dollars in developing myself and my business, taking courses, investing in mentorship, and refining exactly I wanted to bring forward into the world and how to brand myself.
I know a huge factor that has shaped my high-energy, hands-on, no-BS style of coaching comes from growing up as a competitive athlete who was coached year-round for years and years of my life. I have always had and sought out coaches and mentors in every area of life who have pushed me to reach past my definition of what was possible and expand my capacity in ways I couldn’t yet see or believe in yet.
My academic and professional background in the education sector has also played a huge role in shaping my “reversed engineering” approach to coaching. I have all my clients get very clear from the very beginning: Where do you want to go? What results do you want to achieve? What does success actually look like for you? What’s the destination we’re after?
I firmly believe that only by having a clear end destination in mind -- knowing what kind of business you want, what you priorities are, and what goals are most important to you-- can you build out a game plan and strategy that works for you, and reverse engineer the action steps required to get them there. You see one of the biggest mistakes rising entrepreneurs make is the tendency to chase after the silver bullet, the magic pull, the “one strategy” or the “one tactic” or the “one high vibe energy routine” that’s going to give them the instant result they want.
It just doesn’t work that way. You need BOTH strategy and energy. Commitment to the process and detachment from the outcome. Confidence and belief in yourself AND the willingness to examine what isn’t working and where you can improve. A sustainable business model requires moving past the phase of sugar rush quick fixes and into a true commitment to the long game.
2. What are three business & life lessons you have learned throughout your journey?
When you have ambition, you must expect that you will fail along the way. Those are not signs that you should stop, or that you won’t achieve everything and more you set out to achieve. But you will stumble along the way, in ways that will grate your spirit and make you question your path. Use those moments as fuel. Cultivate an attitude of curiosity, rather than react with self judgment, when you experience failure. Learn to see every experience as data, and ask yourself: What worked here? What did not work here? How can I adjust my strategy, tactics, and implementation next time? How can I show up as a better version of myself next time? Where did I allow my beliefs to dictate my behaviors in a way that didn’t serve my highest goal?” These questions open the way for so much self discovery and full power ownership for whatever you create or go after next.
Everything takes longer than you think. Budget double the time you think your website is going to take. Set deadlines that feel realistic while simultaneously lighting a fire under your butt to be in action. I think the biggest momentum killer of all is putting yourself in a self-inflicted state of panic from setting unrealistic timelines and expectations. Those only leave your feeling inadequate and scrambled. Don’t do that. Choose to create conditions for yourself that support your success.
In each and every moment, your results come back to the decisions you make. You can choose to be in overwhelm, or you can seek support to get you back on track. You can choose to believe the fear in your brain that plays out each and every horrible possibility, or you can believe in the fire in your belly and the strength of your vision propelling you forward. You can choose to see other people as competition, or view them as allies, collaborators, and fellow creatives building their empires in tandem. When something feels off or out of your control, bring your focus back to your decisions.
3. What inspires and motivates you? What wakes you up every morning, make you get the work done and do it all over again the next day?
I am motivated to impact the lives of hundreds of thousands of women around the world. I want each little girl who looks at the ways she’s taught to think and act to have a mother who is confident enough to chase her dreams. I want each visionary who questions whether to fully pursue her dream or to stuff it down and take the practical route her parents will feel more comfortable with to have role models who show her that blazing your own trail can be wildly successful when you back yourself and go for it.
I want women to know that no matter where they started, or who they thought they needed to be, or how they were taught to define success, that they can truly achieve anything they set their focus, devotion, and action towards, and that those big crazy dreams in their head get to be real because they said so.
I grew up in a family that didn’t have a lot of money, but nourished and love and supported me in so many other ways that have made me who I am today. When I was a kid, there was a time that my mom bought our milk with food stamps.
Now that I’m married and my husband and I are getting ready to start my own family, I am driven like never before to expand my reach. I’m ready to be the first millionaire in my family and I know I will, in under 2 years. I want my kids to have the role model of a strong, ambitious mother who shows by example that anything is possible.
4. What do you think is the biggest trend we will see in 2019 within the entrepreneur space
Steady and sustainable is the new fast.
Consistency is the new overnight success.
Marketing that is steeped in solid, strong relationship building and community will prevail all day rose over fear-based tactics and scarcity-driven campaigns.
I’ve watched so many women in this industry be made to feel that in order to be worthy, successful, and “make it” in their online business that they have to burn themselves to the ground in the process. Or sacrifice their values. Or become someone they aren’t.
I’ve watched phenomenally gifted women fixate on the public sharing of other women’s success stories to the point of denigrating their own stories, losing momentum, and actually believing they weren’t special/unique enough to make it.
Ladies, the way to build your queendom is not by comparing yourself to anyone else’s branding, journey, offerings, or approach. Bring your focus back to what is in YOUR control. Stay in your lane. Show up each and every day and focus on the actions that move you forward in the direction of your vision. You’ll get there faster and feel so much better as you grow.
