The 5 pieces of advice I’d give my younger self (as a woman in a male dominated industry)
I've raised $8 billion for boutique asset managers, which has led to 30 billion in follow-on AUM. Against the odds.
The odds are stacked solidly in favor of the bigs in the investment industry. Now on paper, I have no business being in this business. I’m a blue collar girl from a working class town who got the wrong degree from the wrong school. I didn’t study finance. I didn’t grow up in a family with Wall Street ties. I certainly didn’t set my sights on being a capital raiser in the fund business.
I used to dream of becoming a literature professor. I love words. I’ve always loved words. As a kid, I spent Saturday mornings re-typing books on a vintage typewriter, sure that I would become a great writer simply by osmosis. I read my way through childhood. I majored in Literature in college.
In order to save for grad school, my high school soccer coach offered me a job at his multi-billion dollar small cap equity boutique and I never left the industry.
“It turned out there was a place for a girl who loves words in an industry full of men who love numbers.”
The journey to success and confidence was a struggle though. I was a young woman in a male dominated industry, often the only woman at the table. It took years to get comfortable. If I could speak to my younger self, just starting out in the investment industry, here’s what I’d tell her.
Don’t try to fit in
On the investment circuit, the conferences were 95% men. They all wore navy suits and practiced imaginary golf swings mid-conversation. I was only in my 20s. I remember worrying that they’d call me a “booth babe” so I dulled my edges. I took the advice of a female mentor and wore a ho hum, blue suit from Brooks Brothers. I brushed my hair into a low ponytail. Didn’t wear make-up. I tried to be less “pretty,” more “smart.”
Guess what happens when you fit in?
You don’t stand out.
As I built my credibility, eventually I began to dress more like my true self. I wore my REBEL graphic tee. I put on my heels. I rocked my big hoop earrings. Looking like myself made me feel like myself; I gained confidence.
Will there be people that you repel when you don’t fit in? Absolutely. One of my bosses told me I should go back to the Brooks Brothers’ suits to be “more professional.” I didn’t take the advice that time. You have to repel to be able to attract your true fans.
Gain the courage to be disliked
Even today, as an entrepreneur helping investment boutiques, I am almost always the only woman in the room with clients and investors. I knew I deserved a seat at the table, but sitting there in my authenticity was scary. If a woman is assertive, she’s perceived as aggressive. If she shows emotion, she’s too female. If she doesn’t show emotion, she’s cold hearted.
You could spend all day worrying about being the only woman in the room… or you can own it. How incredible that you have this seat at the table. How empowering that you are paving the way for other women. Own who you are; it doesn’t matter who anyone else perceives you to be.
“The best weight you’ll ever lose is the weight of other people’s opinions of you.”
Ditch the script
In my industry, sales people have been taught by big companies to speak in template format. Formal. Professional. [Cue the yawns.] The managers on the receiving end of these calls get a hundred voicemails a day that start like this...
“Hi Dan, This is Stacy Havener calling from Havener Capital. I was wondering —”
*click*
Because I didn’t start in this industry in the typical way, I never knew the script. I never used the script. I pretended I was calling my best friend.
“Hey Dan, it’s Stacy. Remember when we talked last and you had that great question about that new fund? I have the answer to your question. Call me back when you have 5 minutes.”
I guess my younger self practiced this tip (only because I didn’t “know better”), but I’d like to share it with you. Ditch that script. When we talk like ourselves instead of trying to sell, we forge authentic human connections.
Tips:
Speak naturally. Kick the overused industry terms to the curb.
Serve your true fans. Your phone calls, emails, texts, voice mails, marketing messaging, everything… should all be about your client, not yourself.
Affirm your people. Show appreciation through quick texts and calls, or even go old school with hand-written notecards (my fave!).
Be authentic on your own journey
There were a lot of fancy dinners raising capital in the early 2000s. People talked deal points while eating their salads. They negotiated while passing the salt. Coming from my humble background, I was nervous for many reasons at these events, but the main reason was, I didn't know where to put my fork on my plate after I took a bite or I finished eating. And to me, the shame around that was incredibly big.
It seems so silly now. But it’s real. We are so worried about projecting an image, about knowing everything when in fact, we’re so much more relatable not knowing everything. Being authentic.
Brené Brown is my go-to authenticity authority. (Her TED Talk is one of the top 10, most downloaded TED Talks of all time!) Her definition of authenticity is the daily practice of letting go of who we think we're supposed to be and embracing who we are. It means cultivating the courage to be imperfect, to set boundaries, and to allow ourselves to be vulnerable; exercising the compassion that comes from knowing that we are all made of strength and struggle; and nurturing the connection and sense of belonging that can only happen when we believe we are strong enough.
It's letting ourselves be seen in our strengths and our struggles, because when we own both, we allow our clients, colleagues, and truly everyone around us to see themselves too.
Connect with humans through storytelling
When my coach hired me at his small cap equity boutique, he was like, “OK Stac, we're going to launch a fund.” Umm, great. Don't know anything about that. He told me, “Your job is to go get investors.” Umm ok, I don't know anything about that. But the one thing I did know was how to tell stories. Like I said, I was a lit major. I loved writing. So that's what I gravitated toward. And as it turned out, that was exactly what helped me raise so much capital. It was revolutionary to be storytelling in this industry in the early 2000s. Tbh, it still is.
But it took awhile to unpack what was working. To codify it. To repeat it. To scale it.
The world has a whole lotta businesses. Customers and clients have loads of choices. As a boutique, the odds are stacked against you. So tell your ideal customers what your story is. Human connection comes from the heart. Tell your true fans why you are on this mission to serve and how they can trust you.
At the end of the day… be yourself, always.
As humans, we have a tendency to want to fit in.
I think you should stand out.
We naturally want to be liked.
Gain the courage to be disliked.
We’ve been coached to stick to a script.
Ditch it. Let’s talk like friends.
We worry about being perfect.
Try being real. Imperfect. Authentic. It’s a daily practice.
We think people want to hear stats and data.
The truth is humans connect through storytelling.
Hey rockstar, here’s the mic. Wow em.
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