The Invisible Mentor

Archive for March 10th, 2010

Today, I present 24-year old Nathalie Lussier. It’s the first time that I have interviewed someone so young, but I thought it important to bring you a diversity of voices. Open your mind, and see what you can learn from this young lady who is not only passionate about what she does, but is wise beyond her years. It was a pleasure to interview her because she is so thoughtful, and she was willing to answer questions which require the wisdom that comes with age. For instance, when asked, “If you had to start over from scratch, knowing what you know now, what would you do differently?” she responded, “I would have started earlier to try to understand what people wanted, see what they had trouble with and help them in that area.” In my opinion, that’s good advice because we often create products that we think people should want, instead of what they actually want.

Tell me a little bit about yourself.  

I am known as the raw foods witch, and I help people to eat more fruits and vegetables. I have a background in software engineering and all of my nutritional knowledge is self taught based on the experience of the results that I have had eating this way.

What’s a typical day like for you?

I wake up and drink a green smoothie, which is basically fruit and green leafy vegetables. After that I work on the computer, and sometimes I go for a swim during the day because I like to break things up. I do more work on my computer and in the evening I have a big salad with my boyfriend Robin, and later read a book.

How do you motivate yourself and stay motivated?

I like to get feedback so when I hear that others are enjoying my work or getting a lot of results from what I am teaching, that propels me forward and motivates me.

If you had to start over from scratch, knowing what you know now, what would you do differently?

I would have started earlier to try to understand what people wanted, see what they had trouble with, and help them in that area.

What’s the most important business (or other) discovery you’ve made in the past year?

Making relationships a priority is the new way of doing business today. You can really connect with people online with tools like email, Twitter and Facebook. You can really get to know people and build relationships over time, and give them what they need instead of just pushing stuff in their direction.

What’s one of the biggest advances in your industry over the past two years?

In terms of raw foods, things are shifting away from being very strict, and moving toward welcoming everyone to try eating this way a little bit more.

What are the three threats to your business, your success, and how are you handling them?

1. The first is time management. I would be reading email and responding to them then I click on a link in an email and all of sudden a lot of time has elapsed and I realize that I have not done any work. So what I do is frequently check the time and see how I am doing and ask myself if I have done what I said I was going to do by that time of the day and that is how I handle that threat.
2. Another threat I would say is misinformation. When people hear the term raw foods, they immediately think it’s all or nothing, but the way that I teach it is you can eat fresh fruits and vegetables and get the benefits from that. You do not have to be that strict with yourself.
3. And the third threat kind of relates to the first idea is that I have a lot of passion and am prone to go off on a tangent and do something new and different that does not necessarily relate to what I am doing right now. The way that I deal with this is to focus on what my goals are and where I am headed.

What’s unique about the service that you provide?

I like to make it fun, informal, down-to-earth and accessible to anyone who is remotely interested in getting healthier, and I like to deliver all my stuff online except for a few things that I deliver personally, which I enjoy. I love to do videos and recipes that are simple so everyone can get their hands dirty. And what’s really fun about the way that I teach things is that I am known as the witch so I like to bring in a special magic feeling to everything that I do.

What do you observe most people in your field doing badly that you think you do well?

Most people in my field do not have the type of technical background that I have so I am able to have interactive technologies and videos on my website and this may not be easy for them.

Describe a major business (or other) challenge you had and how you resolved it.

One of the challenges that I had in the beginning was getting people to visit my website and get interested in my services. I think that’s also a challenge that many people face. I resolved the challenge by writing something that really connected with my audience. In the beginning when I was writing articles, blog posts, I was really writing for myself. I was writing stuff that was useful for my colleagues and myself, but not useful to those who were new to raw foods. So just shifting to write about what raw foods is, and how you sprout your own nuts and seeds and dehydrate stuff has made a difference and my business took off.

What lessons did you learn in the process?

I learned to really listen to my people and when I had no readers to listen to I learned to use Google Keywords to identify what people were searching for in my field. I learned to shift my mindset to what my customers were thinking.

Tell me about your big break and who gave you.

My big break happened last October about Halloween time. I basically did a big launch, had done a speaking engagement, another audio interview and a couple of radio that same week. It was an accumulation of all these speaking events and giving talks about raw foods that pushed things over the edge and made the launch a big success for me. One talk was at The Big Carrot in Toronto, Canada and I did some online podcasts.

Describe one of your biggest failures. What lessons did you learn, and how did it contribute to a greater success?

Before the big launch that I did, I tried to do something similar to provide a program for people, and it really didn’t resonate with anyone. It didn’t connect with my audience and my offering wasn’t quite right, the timing wasn’t right either. It was a failure in that I launched a product that didn’t take off, but it was useful to me to see what it took to create a program like that, the time it took and what people really wanted. Learning from that helped me down the line to achieve success.

What has been your biggest disappointment in your life – and what are you doing to prevent its reoccurrence?

I always felt that I had this knowledge of what I was meant to do and it had something to do with health, but I became a programmer because I was very idealistic and thought that I could create software that would lead to finding the cure for cancer or something like that. I guess I was very disappointed that things didn’t turn out the way the way I expected. That has made me think about how I make decisions and my expectations of the world. These days I think about my decisions very differently from back then. I was pretty young when I made that decision.

What’s one of the toughest decisions you’ve had to make and how did it impact your life?

The toughest decision that I made was to turn down a job offer and go out on my own to start a business. I had a job offer to work on Wall Street in New York City and I also had it in my mind that I wanted to travel and visit China. My boyfriend Robin is from China and I wanted to visit his family. So I made the decision to turn down the job offer and figure out what I’d do when I returned from China. It was a very tough decision to make but it turned out very well.

What are three events that helped to shape your life?

1. I am a black belt in Tae Kwon Do and one of the events which shaped me was attending a big competition in the US and winning a medal there. And it was great to see what it was like outside of my tiny home town in Ontario. The experience built my self confidence.
2. Another event also occurred when I was younger. I participated in a forum for young Canadians. A bunch of high school students were brought to Ottawa, Canada and we talked about politics and how to change the world and it made me realize that we are all in this together and how we take action is how we differ.
3. I lived in California for four months for an internship and just being there, meeting people and attending a seminar was really life changing for me to be around people with different mindsets. Being there started bubbling some of my business ideas.

What’s an accomplishment that you are proudest of?

Being in business right now.

How did mentors influence your life?

Mentors influenced my life a lot! One of my mentors was my tae kwon do instructor and she was very influential in giving me self confidence. It was good to have someone who believed in me and wanted to see me go far. Other mentors were very instrumental, especially in business, and women I met online were very motivational to me and gave me the power and courage to step out and do this.

What’s one core message you received from your mentors?

Trust yourself, listen to your intuition, and take action.

Which resources (books, movies, training etc.) did your mentors recommend to you?

One of the ones I liked was a book called Book Yourself Solid by Michael Port. Other books recommended are all the books by Seth Godin and the Ultimate Sales Letter by Dan Kennedy.

As an Invisible Mentor, what is one piece of advice that you would give to readers?

Trust yourself that what you are doing is going to work, put yourself out there and show people that you care and build relationships. Stick to what you are doing and don’t give up when things aren’t going well.

What nuggets can you take away from Nathalie’s interview?

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