759 Jateya Jones:

Does this sound like you? Someone with multiple passions struggling to find clarity of purpose and narrow down all those passions into one business idea? Perhaps your vision fuses all your passions together in one potential opportunity, and no one else can see it. My guest today – Jeteya Jones – calls this “multi-passionate entrepreneurship” and today she shares her system to help you clearly articulate and embrace your uniqueness in a workable business model.

MELINDA

Hi, I’m Melinda Wittstock, and welcome to Wings of Inspired Business, where we share inspiring entrepreneurial journeys, epiphanies, and practical advice from successful female founders … so you have everything you need at your fingertips to build the business and life of your dreams. I’m a 5-time serial entrepreneur who has lived and breathed the ups and downs of starting and growing businesses, currently the game-changing social podcast app Podopolo. Wherever you are listening to this, take a moment and join the Wings community over on Podopolo, where we can take the conversation further with your questions, perspectives, experiences, and advice for other female founders at whatever stage of the journey you’re at! Because together we’re stronger, and we soar higher when we fly together.

Today we meet an inspiring entrepreneur who describes herself as a conduit for clarity and an alchemist with authenticity. Jateya Jones is a business consultant who helps multi-skilled people with multiple passions gain the confidence and courage to fully embrace their uniqueness so you can create and grow a business with an untraditional approach.

Launching and building a successful business demands two things that may seem contradictory. On one hand, it demands that you have a clear and unshakeable vision with the determined resilience and singlemindedness to realize it. On the other, a flexibility of mind and spirit to allow you to “fail forward” with many pivots towards your destination.

Getting clear on your unique abilities and authenticity is the first step, and if you have many passions and can’t quite decide how to put it all together in a business opportunity, Jateya Jones may be your answer.

Jateya is on a mission to empower visionaries with the clarity they need to find profitable business niches aligned to who they are, and her unique focus is on what she calls the “multi passionate” entrepreneur.

As a Strategy and Communication consultant, Jateya helps would-be business owners articulate WHO they are and WHAT they do, so that they can gain the confidence and courage needed to embrace their uniqueness and purpose. She says she helps people connect the dots to help create what she describes as a rippling effect for healing and prosperity. Today we talk about how to design a Plan to Win, and much more.

So let’s put on our wings with the inspiring Jateya Jonesand be sure to download the podcast app Podopolo so we can keep the conversation going after the episode.

Melinda Wittstock:

Welcome to Wings.

Jateya Jones:

Thank you for having me.

Melinda Wittstock:

I’m excited to talk to you about multi-passionate entrepreneurs. These are the people you help and these are the people who have a lot of different passions that they’re trying to kind of get into a holistic hole, right? Is that a fair characterization?

Jateya Jones:

Definitely, exactly. They normally are on this journey to find the thing that fuels them, but also actually helps them prosper and live financially. And normally that’s the hardest thing for them to do, because they feel like none of their passions connect and they can’t communicate that, so others really don’t see the vision or understand them to even be able to help them at times.

Melinda Wittstock:

So they look kind of ADD, like they can’t quite decide on something?

Jateya Jones:

Very. Very. They’re definitely looked at as flakes and those that can’t commit, but they definitely have an underlying common thread. They just are on that journey most of the time to find it.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right. And so, what do you often find when your clients come to you? Do you think they feel a pressure? I guess everyone does really, to specialize in one thing. And but they’re like, “I don’t know. I’m not happy if I’m only doing that one thing.” So, take me through in practice how you help them tie it together.

Say, if I say I’m really passionate about dogs, but I’m also really passionate about storytelling, but I’m also really passionate about, I don’t know, solving disinformation, but I’m also really passionate about climate and I love fashion. What do you do with a person like that? Like a dog fashion business that combats climate? Well, how does that work in practice?

Jateya Jones:

Definitely. One, I get super excited. But two, we really dive a little bit deeper above the surface of just those titles or categories. And I like to ask them why they actually enjoy those things. What do they enjoy doing when they do those things? What feelings come up, as well as the thing that they’re actually working towards or whoever they’re serving in those industries, what fills their cup about actually helping those individuals? And then we take a timeline backwards through history and we think about what are those things that you did as a kid? Because normally… We have a life cycle as I call it, the multi-passion life cycle. And as a kid, all of us are actually in this exploration phase and it’s some age your parents are like, “Well, let’s hone in and focus.” And someone asks you that question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

And so then all of a sudden you take your eyes off of figuring out what that actual thing is that fuels you and you begin to chase the money and we lose sight of purpose or actually never pinpoint it. And so as we take that journey in history, we start to see commonalities in things that you did as a kid. Most of my clients are really upset with me in the beginning because they’re like, “I’ve been doing that my whole entire life.” And I’m like, “Exactly, that’s the thing.” And so we go through the things individually, all of these different passions because they truly do have a common thread that ties them all together to really see what similarities and commonalities we can pick up throughout your life as well as specifically in those passions. And then once we do that, we work through coming up with your sound bite, as I call it, so you can clearly tell people that common thread that you do, and it makes sense to them why you do this thing in this area and this thing in that area. And that’s your purpose.

And people are so hard, they’re trying so hard to make their passion a purpose, but the passion is the actual how you do what you do, it’s not the what you do, what you do. And so we work really hard to dive in deep to find the what you do.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right. So what are you actually passionate about doing? Because those are going to be the things that you do in your business that you’re more likely to excel at because you’re passionate about them, you enjoy doing them. And so aligning them to the purpose of the business mission and the people the business is meant to serve and help while at the same time really figuring out, okay, if you’re really passionate about these things but the business has to run, you need to hire all these other people that are going to do all the things that you’re not very passionate about.

Jateya Jones:

Exactly.

Melinda Wittstock:

Is that how it ultimately pans out?

Jateya Jones:

Yes, definitely. Definitely.

Melinda Wittstock:

I’m reminded of the book, The E-Myth, one of the early entrepreneurial books. And I had an example of a woman who made amazing pies. She was passionate about making pies. She was really, really good at it to the point where everyone said, “Hey, you should create a business around your pies.” But after a while, she was so busy with everything else other than making pies to make her business work, she soon lost her passion for making pies. So this is something that happens to a lot of entrepreneurs because they create a business around what they love to do.

Jateya Jones:

Definitely.

Melinda Wittstock:

And so when your clients come to you Jateya, where are they in this process? Are they kind of confused or are they starting to lose their passion or they just don’t know where to direct it properly? What stage of business, where are they?

Jateya Jones:

They are definitely normally at the stage of having very expensive hobbies as I call them. They’re calling them businesses but they don’t stick with them, basically because of what you said, all of the business side of things and they no longer get to do the fun things. And so they’re jumping from one thing to the next and they know that there’s this something more. They really feel deep down in their gut that they are meant to do this thing. But the last thing and the thing before that and the thing before that was not it, or so they feel. And so they are borderline depleted and defeated mainly because they don’t have the support system around them. They have this vision but no one else can see it. And so therefore they don’t feel they have the support system and they tend to shrink down and conform to the should’ves of the world.

You should get the nine to five, you should get the six figure job, even though they’re miserable and they have this nagging thing that says, “I can’t give up because I’m supposed to do this thing.” And 9 times out of 10, they already know what the thing is, but they feel like everyone around them will look at them like they have two heads. They’re either already made it to the C-suite and they reach all the goals, and now they want to go to a creative side of things. And they feel that all of their colleagues, family and friends will be like, “What are you doing? Why are you leaving this nice cushion job to go do something that probably won’t make money?” And so they’re desperately in need of the assistance to make the thing a reality before actually announcing it to the world. But they are definitely confused, but they’re definitely nagged by this internal feeling that they’re supposed to do something different or something more.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. So it’s partly about getting into alignment personally, really understanding and having awareness or conscious awareness of yourself and your mission, your purpose.  And that’s hard enough for many people. That’s a lot of inner work. a long term practice. But then it’s like how to articulate all that in a way that makes sense. And so how do you help people with that? We’ll start with the practical outer part first of how they sort weave these things together, so when they’re explaining what they do or what they want to do or their aspirations, it’s coming across in a way that a more linear person can understand.

Jateya Jones:

So the soundbite that I mentioned earlier is the key to that. Once we work through identifying your common thread, or as I like to call it, your superpower, then you can clearly articulate that thing. A lot of times when networking or talking to others, investors or clients, we think we need to have the thing that sounds so sexy or the thing that is so clear they don’t have to ask you any other additional questions. And the key that I feel to networking is have that thing that’s intriguing enough to ask more questions, but clear enough that they’re not completely confused and dismiss you. And so once you go through that and you have this soundbite, you communicate in that and then you listen, because there’s power and silence. And therefore at that point, you can really see what this person needs and you can insert passion A or passion B or passion C. You don’t have to give them the whole kitchen sink as I call it, at one time.

You can actually streamline things to the need of your customer and give them what service, product or program that you have that fits that need. And normally, that funnels into your next thing. So for example, with myself, my common thread is that I provide clarity. Now how I do that, I do that through coaching, through speaking, through programs, planners. There’s so many different ways that I can offer you a road to clarity. But when I initially say that, I’m a conductor for clarity. And normally 9 times out of 10 people are going to ask me, “Well, what does that mean?” Or, “Tell me more.” So that then I can actually have that natural genuine conversation with them to see what their needs are and then give them my solution to their needs.

Melinda Wittstock:

I get it. Yeah, that’s really interesting. And so how long of a process is it? So take me through someone who signs up to work with you and kind of the curriculum, what they go through, what’s the before, kind of what’s the after and how long that takes really for them to feel really in alignment and good to go in terms of telling their story to the world.

Jateya Jones:

On average, they’re pretty much ready within 30 days, but I try to keep them in a program or coaching within a 90 day timeframe so that they actually have the time to implement the things that they’re learning, practice the things that they’re learning. So when they’re out in the world doing it alone, it just comes natural. So I normally funnel people into the PLAN to W.I.N Incubator, which is where we curate your custom strategy or winning strategy to transform whatever this more is into reality. And within that we work on your common thread, communicating clearly and effectively what you need to get across to the person as I call them, vegetables in the smoothie. Not per se what they need but what they want in a way that they can receive it, so then you can present them with the solution. So within 90 days, my rate is at this time about 85% success with clients feeling confident and courageous enough to go out there and say, “Hey, I have this bananas idea and I know it works and I’m offering it to you.”

Melinda Wittstock:

And so how did you arrive at creating this business to Jateya? Was this born of your own personal experience? I have a feeling you’re multi-passionate.

Jateya Jones:

Definitely. It has been a journey, decades of a journey, which is why I’m super excited to work with the individuals that I do work with so that they don’t have to have such a long pathway to purpose. So for me, I have had a business or call myself a serial entrepreneur since about 10 years old. I was the babysitter’s club. After reading the books in my neighborhood, I got together with some friends and said, “Hey, let’s do this thing.” But I’m also a certified nail tech, certified bartender. I’ve pretty much done it all on this journey of trying to find more, and eventually with none of that working as well as doing the traditional nine to five, I have a background in instructional design, technical communication, as well as public health. So when I presented myself to the world, everyone was confused, even my mother. She never was able to tell people what I did, where my brother is an attorney and so that was very easy for her.

And so at one point I was like, “I love what I do with the nine to five, but it’s not fulfilling me enough. The money’s not enough and there’s not enough money,” so to speak. And so I went on this journey to truly find what is this thing, how do I do this thing? And that journey led me to creating the ABCs to Clarity for myself, which I share with others, which is accepting. Then believing, that internal work that you spoke of earlier. And then connecting the dots. So I did connect the dots from my past to present as well as what I felt like I wanted to do, which was help the younger version of me not spin their wheels, not change their major 500 different times and pay attention to the signs, because I make such great grades in business. But I was like, “No, we’re here to be an engineer that makes the money.” So it was definitely a long, long journey that I now get to streamline and shorten to get others on their pathway to purpose in a shorter time frame.

Melinda Wittstock:

Well it’s so interesting because we tend to create businesses more of our own experience. There’s a reason that we go through all the challenges we do. So then we can turn around and give helping hand to someone who is going through what we are going through. And Jateya, you also have a non-profit. Tell me a little bit about what you’re doing with your non-profit as well.

Jateya Jones:

Definitely. So the term that they token, the youth is disconnected youth. Those are the individuals who aren’t in school or they did go to school but they can’t find a job, a sustainable job. And with so many kids these days are going to college and they’re spending thousands of dollars to do so and then get out and not have the job that they thought they were going to have with the salary that they thought they were going to have. And so my whole entire goal was to actually help youth. We focus 12 years of age and up, actually get clear on what they naturally do, put their eye back on that exploration phase to figure that thing out that brings them joy, it can actually pay the bills. So that again, they don’t have to do what I did in college and focus on the thing that actually quote on quote makes the high paying salary.

But also they enjoy and they get to use all of their skill sets and desires to really put into making something better, either in business or for themselves. And so we help them truly explore that. We have an entrepreneurship program as well for those that want to dabble into that and see if they want to go to college or not, because they have the opportunity, or more opportunities than I had back in the day while age myself to actually step into entrepreneurship and be successful and have that salary that they desire without actually having to attend college.

Melinda Wittstock:

So many of these things we get set so early on in life on a path. You mentioned it earlier in the show about sort of the life of should’s. All the things that people are around us, whether it’s our parents, social media, friends, whatever, and lose ourselves in that trajectory. So for young people to really get a sense of themselves much earlier on and get that kind of empowerment that doesn’t really come through our education system as currently configured is great work. So I want to go back to the business for a moment because you have a whole kind of plan to win and a workbook that you’ve generously offered a nice discount to for all our listeners here. Tell me a little bit about PLAN to W.I.N, and the work, how people can use it.

Jateya Jones:

SO W.I.N is an acronym for What I Need, Why I Need, and Who I Need. I mentioned earlier about networking. I actually love networking as an introvert, excuse me, which was a prior business because I was helping other introverts actually embody networking as a lifestyle and not just an event as well, because that was my mode of transportation from A to Z was making my dreams come true. But with that, I included it within a planner type style workbook. So you can take these huge audacious goals, these visions that no one else can see, and actually break them down into bite size manageable pieces so that you’re not overwhelmed with creating something that doesn’t really currently exist in the fashion that you feel that it should. And the main points that you always need when networking is actually knowing what you need and who you need, but in a way that you can articulate your real why.

Because when people can’t see your vision, they have to buy into the why of your vision in order to support you. And if you break these things down, then you can break it all the way down from a huge audacious goal to task that you must do and/or should do, which is how I break down my planner because my to do list is forever growing. But if you can get three things on your must-do list done, you can accomplish your goal within a shorter timeframe than you probably estimate. And so with that, the workbook guides you through breaking these things down and truly being articulate the why. The example I always give is a friend said, “I need a job. Do you know anyone hiring?” And I was like, “Well, I just saw a sign at McDonald’s.” And she’s like, “No, I mean really a six figure job. I have kids and da da da da.” And I was like, “Well, you really should articulate the why and more clearly it’s specifically your needs in the job so that others can go out and do the work for you.” Which is the key to networking as an introvert. Once you express that, others will go out and kind of bring you the things back that you need who are more extroverted than you. And that was how pretty much the workbook and the planner was born to do the steps that I did to help me truly articulate the small pieces so that I could put the pieces of the puzzle together to create this whole vision.

Melinda Wittstock:

That’s fantastic. So what’s the best place for people to find you Jateya and work with you?

Jateya Jones:

Definitely jateyajones.com. My playground, as I call it on social media, is Instagram. So you can definitely DM me. I love to respond, I love to connect. But I am on all social media platforms. But the easiest way to find them is at jateyajones.com.

Melinda Wittstock:

Fantastic. Well thank you so much for putting on your wings with us today and sharing this lovely view of the multi-passionate entrepreneur.

Jateya Jones:

Thank you for having me.