By Josh Chernikoff
This week, I had the great pleasure of interviewing Rose Hastreiter. Rose is the CEO of HumanaG Learning Solutions and the Founder of Leonty3C Learning & Leadership. Rose does a lot of work with professional development crowds around the world. teaching workshops in time and project management, really focussing on helping organizations transform every learning minute into something that is real world value using human centric and principled approaches.
Rose’s Journey wasn't easy, she faced a lot if challenges, especially growing her business in the education field. However she’s a real go-getter (always full of energy and determination), and when she found the Ed Sales Elevation Experience everything changed.
Through this program, Rose learned a lot about herself and her business. She discovered new ways to overcome her fears and connect with others who were on a similar journey. She found support and encouragement from the people who had gone through the program and joined the community, and together they helped each other grow.
So happy have her chat to us about her experience in the Ed Sales Elevation Experience.Here is what Rose had to say in the interview:
Tell us why you are such a rock star in life and in business?
Over the last 28 years of being in project leadership and teaching workshops and 30,000 students to date and starting an edtech company, one thing I've really loved along this journey is building this authentic community. I do a lot of work with professional development crowds around the world, teaching workshops in time and project management. I do a lot of keynote speaking, and I really focus on helping organizations transform every learning minute into something that is real world value using human centric and principled approaches to running our projects on time and how we collaborate together.
What led you to the Ed Sales Elevation Experience? Were there any issues you were facing in growing your business in the education space specifically?
I'm what would be classified as an accidental educator. I came from a background of development and IT and working with multidisciplinary teams on digital transformation projects and IT projects . One day I landed in a classroom. They handed us a bunch of books and the client said, I need you to teach this group and I looked around the room and all these people had a variety of backgrounds, experiences, and skills. I looked at the books, looked at the people and said, close your books. Tell me why are you here and how can I be of service to you? And from that moment on, I became that dynamic instructor where I took the approach of being of service to my audience, in terms of giving them skills that they would need. So I'm a big believer in skills development . As an entrepreneur, it's really important to get out of our own way and continue to learn new skills. It's not a one and done. This is a practice. And so for many years I've been in that project leadership and education space delivering.
About three years or so ago, I realized it was time for me to become a student. So I started to engage with more learning for my business. And what I discovered was that there were some blind spots that I did not know how to overcome. There were some fears that I had. no matter what experience is at the table, we’ve got to stay open to doing things differently. Otherwise, we get the same results. So the key issue for me was I needed to scale Leonty Creative and Consulting Corp which is my professional development core company. There's only one of me and we have some digital programs. And I wanted to learn how to sell those in the education space. But I also needed to position and bring my tech company to the stage as well. I came to you with a couple of interesting challenges and one of them is really getting out of the way of my sales growth.
Until you recognised that you wanted to get out of your own way how were these challenges impacting the business?
Revenue and consistency. It comes just right back down to being able to predict the cash flow. We'd have great months, one year you know, and then to the summer maybe not as much. So the workshop cycle or the workshop season is very seasonal, really nice in the spring, really nice in the fall, but how are we going to build that consistency through the year.
So the pain points included revenue and consistency but more importantly, the ability to have a consistent method that would help me scale and reach not just revenue targets, but presence targets within the market. I can only do so many workshops or live events in a year. So we had to really solve for that. And I think I came with the need to invest in digital assets. I need to learn how to sell these in a way that's authentic and and based on the principles that our company actually drive and you brought it even before we had session one with our cohort and what you then observed in terms of improvements in your business one or knowingly in your confidence and clarity in your business or in yourself in your purpose.
Can you talk about what you brought to the table and what you observed (In terms of improvements) in your business, in your confidence and clarity in your business, in yourself, in your purpose?
When I finally said yes to getting out of my own way and taking more learning specifically in the domain that scared me the most. Which I think actually scares a lot of entrepreneurs. And when I realized that I was in this loop of what I call, same same results. I knew that the challenges involved not just I was going to close the deal, so that's never been a problem. It was about how do I bridge the gap between zero and one in finding the ideal client? No, that was one of the first lessons that really stood out. And we use that lesson in every product that we release in every discussion that we have on projects today. Really focusing on quality over quantity was one of the first things we took away in those first couple of weeks of learning and realizing that it wasn't about selling ourselves in an uncomfortable or violating way at all. It had everything to do with authentic human build, and I've known this from the past but then to apply this is a process. So discovering who our ideal client was hard for us. We were kind of like an everything bagel. And I wanted to get out of being the everything bagel and being like a nice sesame toasted for specific clients. And that's really what we saw some results in relatively quickly.
The other thing was realizing that there was a system that we could tap into and having a system allows us to build habits and a building habits and repeating those behaviors, builds confidence. Confidence just doesn't happen by itself. We have to fail. We have to do things differently that are uncomfortable, that challenge. So we have to face those fears and the only way to face those fears is sometimes to suck at it. so the concept of being able to identify what we needed as the ideal client and then validate that and start to have conversations on the human level with our audience and see what they needed more we always ask the audience, what do you need? That was the secret sauce in 28 years of success as a professional development educator. But to translate that into sales your program allowed me to help me generate leads in a way that was authentic, so ideal client quality. I also think about building the process. So every product that we have, anytime we even consider a new product we take it through the process. So what I liked about the first few weeks is we saw value right away.
Can you talk about the support that you received and continue to receive from the people who were in our cohort?
It takes time for him to kind of bond and get to know each other and there's a safety and a trust that needs to be established. You establish that really quickly, Josh and that says a lot to the fact that you have remained humble through this process. Even with the concept, you're open to the fact that you're still learning and you are applying all of this, and you are open to feedback. We are going to iterate and take it from you and have developed over 75 workshops and programs. It's always interesting like there is no such thing as perfect, this myth of perfection the perfectly generating process. I will stay far away from those programs because they look like miracle solutions and they fool you everytime.
So, the concept of defining success and defining it quickly and that we are not diminished in any way by staying open and coming in with an open mind but also almost a quiet mind. Just forget everything I know. And let's see what is going to happen. So right away the support that we received gave us an immediate sense of a safe space where we could be honest with each other. You cannot build trust without that honesty and that ability to be transparent. So thanks for that by the way, to carry that forward for months now most programs would end and I would try to have community after and what happened.
It goes beyond friendship and it goes into a rising tide that lifts all boats, right like we are actually there for each other authentically because we have that shared lived experience of being entrepreneurs. We know what it's like to get up at 5:30 in the morning, to go to bed and just get the job done. And we have real world challenges. So that's why I found a lot of great work in this group was to solve these challenges.
To be able to have space, you gave us space to speak and explore and discover challenges and how we can solve them as a shared experience. That 's knowledge it's a wisdom group that you're building here. you gave us a way to share with each other and I think that went a long way to being authentic and strong. And you help us bust some myths right like the myth of sales has to be diminishing and you have to put yourself in like a couture gold gown and a step forward glass slippers. But, that's not how it is. It's like learning how to be present and build awareness around your brand learning how to have those conversations. Even though we've done it for 30 years. It's less try again in this modern world in this different era of LinkedIn and posting and, and building social presence as well. Building the focus but also redefining success.
So for example, one of my programs is actually called redefining where we take a look at redefining how we run our day, our time and our collaborations. And so that's actually the project we brought to this group. And it's one of my toughest products to share the value to my clients. That's why we chose them. Right away. Everybody in that room was amazing. They would give feedback in a constructive way, things that we needed to hear. That's the blind spot, you know things about yourself and people know about you, but also learning about the blind spots that you didn't know we had, so many improvements on that and with actual feedback that we then translated to our digital assets, which I then presented in front of hundreds of people to great success. But the concept of having that feedback and critical insight was essential to us creating a product, a new product in a way like the new version of the product.
It's the same product, the same potato chips, different ways of selling it. And I think the focus that you gave us, we had to figure out a way to make this available? You challenged us to think differently and get out of our own way. So promotional language was helpful. Your guys helped us with some of their crafting that shared language that we needed to do getting the one pagers out. And you helped us because of the length of the program.
Based on the inspiring journey of Rose and her transformative experience with the Ed Sales Elevation program, it's evident that success is not just about individual achievements but also about the support, learning, and growth that come from being part of a community. Rose's story exemplifies the power of perseverance, authenticity, and a commitment to continuous learning.
One of the key takeaways from Rose's journey is the importance of defining success on your own terms and embracing a mindset of continuous improvement. By recognizing her blind spots and being open to learning new skills, Rose was able to refine her approach to sales and develop a deeper understanding of her ideal clients.
The support and camaraderie Rose received from her peers in the program were invaluable. The community provided a safe space for honest dialogue, constructive feedback, and shared experiences. Through collaboration and collective wisdom, Rose and her fellow participants were able to challenge conventional myths about sales and redefine success in a way that resonated with their values and goals.
As Rose reflects on her journey, she acknowledges that success is not a destination but a journey of growth and self-discovery. By getting out of her own way and embracing new opportunities, Rose has not only transformed her business but also gained clarity, confidence, and purpose in her professional endeavors.
Want to know more, get on the waitlist for 3E Ed Sales Elevation Experience and be the first to know when doors open again.