Here’s the picture – you’re on honeymoon in a jaw-dropping romantic setting, and you’re given a choice by hubby, between remaining his wife in a regular job or being a successful big-dreaming entrepreneur. Which would you choose? For many of us, this might be a no-brainer – go for the marriage, right? But for some, giving up your dream would be so devastating that walking away from your marriage would be the only option.
So guess what my Page 1 Woman did? She ditched her marriage. Crazy? Not when you see the absurdity of the choice and dream of being an influential entrepreneur.
Meet my charismatic, tenacious and relentless risk taking Page 1 Woman, Bilyana Georgieva; a Bulgarian polyglot and known to her family, jokingly, as the ‘Black Sheep of Bulgaria’. A multi-award winning international speaker, Tedx speaker and international transformation expert, she has led transformation programmes for many well known global companies (e.g. River Island, Bank of Montreal, DHL). She's now driven to transform the business decision-making paradigm, through teaching an effective blended spirituality. Keep reading and learn more about Bilyana’s work.
What do you do?
Bilyana: I’m a consultant who helps corporates to stop bleeding to death, by transforming their businesses and bringing them from the past into the future. Early in 2019, after 18 years as an operational director, I started to help executives to use their intuition to drive their business more effectively.
Executives usually prefer data and analytics above their intuition. But people like Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, Indra Nooyi and Jeff Bezos, have all said that their best business decisions come from their hearts and guts. I often repeat these words so that C-level people fully understand and can word it so their teams get that it’s a good business decision.
Bilyana Georgieva
For example, about 10 years ago when Pepsi produced only Pepsi Cola the CEO, Indra Nooyi , told investors that they needed to change the company’s DNA and sell sugar free, natural, organic products. This was based on her intuition, backed with evidence of people swapping sugar drinks for water during meetings. Now, Pepsi produces ‘Naked’, one of the best organic coconut waters on the market.
It took me five years to find the courage to openly say I'm bringing spirituality into corporates. When I first meet executives, I use the masculine word ‘gut’ and avoid using ‘spirituality’. Gut embraces my values - G - Growth, U - Unity, T – Trust. So, I usually say ‘To take it from the past into the future, I'll use your guts and my guts’. And ‘I'll help you grow effortlessly by motivating your people to work from their intuition’. If people are negative, I ask, ‘Do you think animals use their intuition to survive each day?’
I now work with companies as a non-executive director on their boards, meeting them once a month and doing consultancy work applying my ideas.
What essential steps did you take to get to where you are now?
Bilyana: Step one was to start a business based on my intuition. It took me five years. I found courage through people like Steve Jobs saying it aloud.
Step two involved saying, ‘let's do it’ in April 2019. My dream was to stop working Monday to Friday, nine to five, and work with more than one client at a time, (that’s all I could handle as an operational director). I learned through a friend that a non-executive director role ticked all the boxes as it’s one meeting per month. So, I could have numerous clients simultaneously and transform top down instead of bottom up. So, I became a non-executive director for my friend’s company.
Step three was using social media to publicise my career change to non-executive director. Step four involved growing my team. Now I’ve team members in South Africa, UK, Australia and Bulgaria. We speak on Slack when necessary and we meet on Zoom once a week. And it works. So, I can teach corporate companies about ‘Distributed Workforce’ i.e. it doesn’t matter where employees are located, if they're happy working whilst travelling the world, for example, and they’re engaged, they’ll do their job well and you'll be happy too.
When I moved to London in 2006 my accent was so heavy that people couldn’t understand me much. Part of my job was to run training events. So you can imagine the stress of learning a language properly and fast. I actually never studied English in school. I learned it from CDs and textbooks.
Between 2011 and 2014 I led a massive transformation programme in Monaco for a huge oil and gas company. At the end of it, I was exhausted physically, mentally and emotionally. When I left the company I took nine months out and slept. I met a life coach during that time, who challenged my beliefs and core values every day. It was the start of my journey to now.
What was the greatest challenge that you faced on your journey? And how did you overcome it?
Bilyana: The greatest challenge was promoting my business on social media in April 2019. I couldn't use the word ‘spirituality’ and had to find the corporate language to explain my values, vision and mission and why I believed that people can grow from trusting their guts. I felt good about it but worried about people’s response. But surprisingly, I was applauded and supported and within two months became a role model.
I held meetings to check out what people thought about intuition and meditation and learned that 25% of office workers meditate and do calming exercises (e.g. yoga), and trust their guts at work. Promoting myself in this way, meant I had to listen to my intuition telling me to use social media.
My current challenge is to embed quantum physics and neuroscience in my work. I love the way that scientists explain how the brain and the sixth sense work. I’ve been studying this for a year now, and will be adding it to my training events.
What was your greatest lightbulb moment?
Bilyana: My biggest lightbulb moment was realising that my dreams were bigger than me. I was married for a year and broke up with my husband on our late honeymoon, on Valentine’s Day. We were on the world’s most romantic beach in the Philippines, at sunset. My husband pushed me to choose between entrepreneurship or being his wife with an ordinary nine to five job and no crazy dream of a successful business. I knew that if I said ‘yes’ to my marriage, I would eventually return to my dream because being an entrepreneur is who I am. So, I had to stay true to myself and my dream to change the corporate world. I’ve no regrets.
What resource has been crucial to your success?
Bilyana: Money, of course. A few months ago, I put the money for buying a flat into my business and I sold my crypto currency server because I knew the time was right to grow my business. I can buy a flat and another server any time.
The other resource is my team working on my social media presence, because visibility and positioning are crucial when changing your career and passing your message to a big audience. And there’s also my mentors and my networks, as a non-executive director and a public speaker, and my social media networks which constantly update me on what works.
Without these resources I’d be making good money but still dreaming about working a few days a month.
What do you understand by leadership?
Bilyana: For me a leader means finding and empowering the right people to work for you in specific roles. When I hire for my team or on behalf of the corporate companies I work with, I aim for people with new ideas, inspiration and balls. I lead by delegating everything and giving my team freedom to do things the way they want to. But I do bring the team together, and discuss what needs to be done and the best way to do it. I then let them get on with it.
As a woman leader, I’ve never felt disrespected or treated differently by men. But I've seen women being bitchy because I'm a woman. As a leader I try to change their mentality. To me gender doesn't matter when we're talking business.
I got my business mentality from my dad, who’s been a manager for years. When I was 15 the school created a student organization. I applied to lead it at my teacher’s suggestion. I stood before sixty people and tried to say what I would bring as their executive director. The words wouldn’t come. After I reminded myself that I had something important to contribute, I did it and became that executive director with a salary. My dad couldn't believe it. His 15-year-old had the skills to lead a team of thirty! But my calling is to lead people and businesses to a brighter future.
What are your top three tips for women who want to be leaders in their field?
Bilyana: Number one, trust your intuition – always. Things will happen faster and effortlessly. You don’t need long-term goals. You need a long-term destination. By leaving the Universe to decide your steps, (yes, it sounds crazy), everything will happen fast. That’s my experience. For instant, when I decided I didn't want to work regular hours or have one-to-one clients, people started calling me with pathways, tools and opportunities to become a non-executive director.
People get brilliant ideas but often ignore them. Then the same idea flashes up again and they ignore it. And after a third flash, it disappears. They end up regretting it.
Number two, meditate every day; calm your thoughts. Be still. And when you’ve finished, you’ll see and concentrate on the highest priority tasks instead of wasting time on low priorities. You’ll progress much faster. That's why successful entrepreneurs are practicing meditation daily.
I didn’t used to believe in meditation and couldn't stay still to meditate. Now, I meditate and connect with my energy source and higher self. And when fully connected, I get the steps of what I need to do.
Number three, be bold. Take action. When it's time for action we often stop ourselves by worrying about people’s reactions. A friend of mine says, ‘Other people's opinion is none of your business’. By being bold you won’t worry about what people say as you’ll know through your intuition that it’s right. So, just do it. Then take the next step. Have fun with it. Feel the joy and be grateful for everything happening in your life.
To find out more about Bilyana, click here. And to hear her TedX talk on 'Shrink 7 hours of meetings and emails into 4 minutes', click here.
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