Day 24: Tya Bolton

October 24, 2009 at 12:01 am, Category: Inspiration

“And so I get insight from many different places just to make sure that I have a second voice that what I’m doing is in alignment with what the universe needs.”

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Toni Reece: Thank you so much, Tya, for agreeing to take part in this project, and before we begin, can you take a few minutes to introduce yourself?

Tya Bolton: Absolutely, Toni, and thank you so much for having me.

Toni: You’re welcome.

Tya: Thank you.  My name is Tya Bolton, and I am the CEO of a full-scale administrative services firm named Exceptional Business Solutions based in Columbia, Maryland, and our core services include virtual assistance, recruiting, some on-site support, and event management.

Toni: Okay, well thank you for that.  Tya, gosh, with all the work that you do and running your business and even personally, when you think about inspiration, who do you inspire and how might you do that?

Tya: I think that I inspire a couple of different groups and I inspire them very differently.  I do realize that I don’t inspire everyone.  I can’t possibly do that, because I don’t think we ever appeal to everyone in the universe, right?  There’s always people who are matched just perfectly for us, and so I inspire existing entrepreneurs and some * entrepreneurs.  For instance, our niche market is coaches and trainers and authors and speakers, and so we help them throughout the structure and efficiency around whatever their business needs are, whether that is helping them put together a shopping cart and be able to sell those products online and help them with social media or simply helping them with scheduling and that kind of thing.  That’s how we help that particular market.  And then for other people who aspire to be virtual assistants or looking at that sort of business, we help them by providing teleseminars and things like that and just sharing our story.

Toni: Oh, I see.  Okay, and so basically you’re looking for the inspiration on who you inspire, it’s helping those who need your service and knowing that they can take care of their day-to-day business by hiring someone like you and your service to do that, but also people who are looking to get in that type of business.

Tya: Absolutely.

Toni: When you are working with others, how do you go about inspiring them?  What do you do?

Tya: I like to get to know more about what their story is, how they got to where they are today, try to get people to expose that so that I can maybe highlight for them, “Wow, you’ve accomplished a lot, you know.  Look at what you’ve already survived and look how much there is to come.”  So I like to do things like that, and I like to find the positive so that people … it sort of decreases the barrier; it allows people to open up and share and then get that energy so the conversation starts to flow.

Toni: When you are working — whether it’s somebody that’s going to be working with you or someone that you’re working for, and even in personal arenas — what do you do that you believe helps to explore the potential in others?

Tya: I think that energy is important.  I always bring my energy, and I smile a lot so that other people will sort of naturally smile back, to break the monotony a little bit, so that’s definitely one.  Again, probing, asking those types of questions, and just sharing information I think is so important that when you go to, you know, start conversing with other people or try to inspire them, that we look at how we can provide insight for them and what we can provide for them, not so much what they can do for us.  I like to see what I can offer to help them with whether it is personally or professionally.

Toni: So your attitude is “How can I help you, not so much how can you help us?”

Tya: Absolutely.

Toni: Okay.  Tya, when you’re looking for inspiration for yourself, where do you go?  What do you look for?

Tya: You know, I like to be really focused, so because I’m an introvert, I often need some time to myself.  So I start off every day just getting up and being thankful ,and so I profess before I even step foot out of my bed what I’m thankful for.  The gift of life — thank you for allowing my kids to be awake this morning.  And I pray for energy and to be in alignment and to be in the right place and to seek guidance.  So that’s how I start the day, and then I always reevaluate where I am versus what I anticipated I would be at a specific time.

Toni: And when you’re going through it, it sounds like your source for inspiration — particularly the way you start your day — is expressing gratitude in prayer, and I would wonder, do you seek any sort of tools or resources to help you stay inspired?

Tya: I do like to talk to the people on my dream team, and I define my dream team as those people that I can always go back and ask questions for to help me shape who I am.  You know, “What do you think about this?  If I do this, how do you think people will react to X-Y-Z?”  And so some of those people on my dream team are family, some of them are other colleagues, many of them are business coaches and life coaches.  And so I get insight from many different places just to make sure that I have a second voice that what I’m doing is in alignment with what the universe needs.

Toni: Did you purposely set out to structure a dream team, or has that just kind of evolved for you?

Tya: It has evolved.  I didn’t realize I needed a dream team until I became an entrepreneur; and before I started my website and bought business cards and did any of that stuff, I created the dream team.  I said “You are going to be the core group of people I need to be by my side so that I can bounce ideas off of you, and you can keep me focused with what really needs to happen.”  So anytime I make a serious business decision, I consult with these people.

Toni: I see.  Well that’s great that you have a dream team, that really is.  When you are looking for and seeking inspiration — and whether it’s the gratefulness at the beginning of the day or talking to your mentors or your dream team and seeking their advice and that second voice — what do you do in order to continuously explore your own potential?

Tya: I do self check-ins with myself quite often.  I will review my goals.  I will ask our clients and family, “How am I doing?  Have you been able to reach me in the most effective way possible?  What can I do better?”  I’m always looking to be better, and so I’m always checking myself.  And then I compare with that how other people have perceived me to be over a certain period of time.

Toni: And once you receive that feedback, then what happens?

Tya: Then I know if sometimes I feel that my way is maybe the way that makes the most sense — but it’s just good to have those other opinions — and so sometimes I’ll adjust because you have to be agile.  For instance, the dynamics of the business today are completely opposite of what it was when I started in 2006, and so I’ve had to be agile to make sure that I can stay in the game.

Toni: I wanted to ask you, too, Tya, when you talk about how you inspire people with your business and also help them to explore their potential, it does really correlate with what you’re looking for in inspiration and exploration.  Before you started your business, where did you find the inspiration to be brave enough to step into self-employment?

Tya: You know, I’ve always been surrounded with a really great team of people in all the full-time jobs that I’ve had as business managers and office managers.  You meet so many different people, and I’ve just been pushed by people saying “You’re gonna do such great things” and “You’re so young.”  And people spoke those things into my life and so, eventually, you start to pay attention to it.  And at some point, I decided to start the business actually after being downsized in 2005 from a business manager position.  It’s when I really started to listen to those other voices that I had heard before.

Toni: So I’m hearing now a little bit of a common theme.  And what you said is that you started to pay attention, that you were given the feedback, which is what you seek.  You were listening to other voices, which is what you seek, and you started to pay attention.

Tya: Yes.

Toni: And that helped you find the courage or the inspiration?  How would you define that?

Tya: I think I’ve always had the courage, I just wasn’t sure when, what, how, where, and absolutely why, but I think that it definitely has given me the inspiration to say “You know what?  I can do it.  I’ve been doing it for other people all this time, let’s give this a try.”  And so that’s what I’ve done, and I don’t look back.

Toni: So this “I can do it” sense of inspiration that came from all of the feedback and the voices that you paid attention to, how did that then translate into the services and the relationships that you work in and around for your own business when you’re helping to inspire others?

Tya: So because my background is so diverse, what I realized I needed to do not too long after the business started was to find other people that I felt were like me.  People that aspire to do the same types of things.  People that give off the same type of energy and are just as caring and ethical as I am so that I could offer this myriad of services, but that every person — even if they didn’t work with me — would experience something very similar.  And so trying to find the right people to be on my EBS team was very essential.

And I didn’t necessarily know what my niche market was going to be until coaches just started … it was like one coach who started in 2006 and then she referred another coach, and then it just happened to me that way.  And I thought, “Well, viola, this is my niche market, this is my niche market; this is where I feel most comfortable.”  I resonate really well with this community.  I get lovely advice from them all the time.  And when I share my story with them, they enjoy it so much that they encourage me to continue sharing this story, and so it’s that that keeps me motivated, and having that little engine that could mentality of “I know I can.”  I just need to strategize and make sure that I obtain it.

Toni: So your inspiration has come from listening to other voices, paying attention to them, and then moving forward with your action and then staying in alignment with your values, finding like-minded people, and that then allows you to inspire others that you work with and work for.  And by you continuing to stay in that state of inspiration and gratefulness, I would assume that just carries over to your successful business.

Tya: Wow, Toni, I couldn’t have said that better – that was awesome, thank you!

Toni: I didn’t say it, you said it; I’m just relaying back to you what I heard, and that is what is so fantastic about these interviews.  Your story of really listening, knowing that you were hearing affirmations in your life … but when you started to pay attention to them, that’s what really became the engine that could and has translated and transferred into you being able to — within your business and your values — help others, not only as a service but also to know that things are possible and to keep things moving for them.  So I think that’s amazing.  I think your story is very relevant, and I thank you very, very much for giving your time in this space for helping us with the Get Inspired! Project.

Tya: Oh, it’s an honor.  I love to share.  I love to do this kind of stuff, so thank you so much for allowing me the opportunity.

Toni: You’re welcome and good luck to you.

Tya: Thank you.

Toni: I hope we speak again soon.

Tya: Thank you Toni.

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For more information about Tya Bolton:  www.ExceptionalBizSolutions.com

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