The Studio B Podcast - Episode No. 49 With LaToshia Norwood: #NormalizingSuccess

[Music] all right everybody welcome to studio b i am your host pastor mdh thank you so so very much for tuning in with us every single week and remember no matter where you're watching us from facebook instagram twitter make sure that you like follow and subscribe so that you don't miss anything going on on the set of studio b and also remember wherever you access your podcast from that's apple music that's spotify that's pandora wherever you get your podcast from you can access studio b from that same platform we have now just passed over 5 000 plus subscribers remember we're trying to get to 10 000 by the middle of the summer and i know we can do that with your help so please continue to support us and continue to tune in to what we're doing here on the set today today to day two day and today man i have a very special guest and this month is going to be exciting i am excited about what god has in store for us on these next four weeks on the podcast because i'm going to highlight four phenomenal women that are making an impact in this world and they are doing big things at a high level they are god-fearing women they are family women they are business women and they have their affairs in order so i'm just so excited about my first guest today not only because she's my first guest in opening up this series but she is a member of the church of bethel's family we love her and her family and so i want to introduce to some and present to others miss latasha norwood mba pmp project manager professional mm-hmm okay uh managing partner of love now give me that the funny thing is people try to make it so fancy okay it's l renee hell right now i'll get ready to combine them oh i know it happens all the time uh managing partner of el renee and associates llc um and you are as i was looking at your story and doing some research on your before our podcast i'm excited about today because you got a story i do and i want the uh the viewers and the listeners here to hear this story so let me just kind of set the framework of what we're doing so for the next four weeks i'm going to be doing i don't want to call it a series you know i'm a pastor so you know we like to operate in series but it's not a series even though it's a series but it's called normalizing success and over the past year and a half we're now on 50 episodes i have stood right here sitting right here at this table uh latasha and i have advocated on behalf of black america that black america is a powerful force and if you look at our history going all the way back uh to 1619 when we were brought over here to these united states we have overcome obstacles upon obstacles barriers upon barriers and not only have we overcome them but we have thrived as much as we've had to fight against and fight for we have thrived in so many areas of life and so this this idea by normalizing success is like i don't think that we should throw parades when we see black people so succeeding i just think that success is a part of the black experience we are highly successful in many different fields of life in many different areas of life so when you see somebody that's successful and they happen to be an african-american i don't believe that that should be a great cause to sit there and high-five everybody in the room standard is our norm it's not what we strive for it's just what we do and so this particular for the next four weeks i'm going to be highlighting women especially african-american women who are doing great things in the business field in their families and educational fields so that i want everybody to understand the power that is in the black community and so that's what this first one is going to be about and you are the perfect guest to start us off so i want you to tell us a little bit about yourself and about your company and just about you sure so latasha norwood born and raised here in houston sunnyside texas sunny side absolutely migrated like most from sunnyside to south park and then to harm clark so i graduated from madison high school oh my goodness um absolutely madison marlin then went on for a stint to lee college and i want to i want to put a caveat there i was the first in my generation to get a full scholarship to go to play volleyball in college wow and getting there i really didn't know what to expect so i didn't understand what a syllabus was and how to prepare yourself and how to be accountable and then managing being a student athlete and so i went off i had a lot of scholarships i wanted to stay close to home so i went to lee college and i got there was playing volleyball and doing my work and turning in assignments and traveling across the country and then it came time for midterms and i ended up getting a call from my coach and she said you failed a lot of your classes and i'm like how is that possible i'm going to class every day i don't understand what happened well what i didn't understand was that the syllabus is the guide that kind of guides you through the curriculum in the class and sometimes the professors don't say hey this assignment is due so i was missing assignments that i didn't even know exist so long story short i lost my scholarship and within three weeks had to figure it out so i was blessed to have a classmate that was at prairie view a m that was willing to allow me to secretly sleep on her bed in an extra bed in her room in her dorm while i enrolled i had to get money very quickly to enroll in college and i lost my scholarship so we had to you know bootstrap it and i remember that entire semester i started with like maybe a 1.7 gpa going into prairie view and i talked to the volleyball coach and she you know willingly allowed me to come in and to walk onto the team but i couldn't even qualify for for financial aid so my entire second year of my freshman year i was i guess homeless where i was sleeping on a bed all my bags packed never could unpack it but i think it was a pivotal moment for me because it taught me the importance of responsibility and being accountable and being aware of what's going on and so i i think i finished that second semester with the 4.0 and then i ended up transitioning and having a great career in volleyball at prairie view a m we won the swac we ended up going to hawaii to compete against the number one team i was interviewed on espn and hawaii news and it was amazing and so i left preview and i ended up going into education um i wasn't really sure what i wanted to do at that point and my mom said well you love sports and you love coaching so why not teach why not be a physical education instructor so i said oh okay that's fine so i ended up substituting for windsor village elementary and i went on to be one of the top instructors there i started teaching teachers how to teach writing curriculum writing standardized exams and did really really well in education and i ended up moving to omaha nebraska and i worked there for a little bit and i realized you know i have some gifts and talents that i'm not using and i really feel like there's more for me but i really i didn't know at that point what moore looked like so i started talking to a mentor and he recommended tv advertising and so i said well i don't even know what this career looks like and he said i think you'd be perfect for it so i ended up interviewing it at the time i was the head coach of a volleyball program there in omaha and had done a lot and i remember going in and interviewing for this job and i'm i'm tearing up because i'm thinking through the blessings that god has just given me and how this path has been paved for me and i ended up interviewing for this job and it was with the president of the station so imagine the highest person in in the company's interviewing you and he says i'm looking at your resume and i'm seeing all these things that you've done and i don't see how you even qualify for this position and i looked boldly in his eyes and i said i'm more qualified than anyone you have on your staff and he says really and i did not know going in that i had tested higher than any person had ever tested in the history of that company on the battery of exams before they even bring you in for the interview so he offered me the job and i said i looked at it and i said no and he said what do you mean i looked at this number and i said i can i can make more than this doing what i'm doing why would i leave my job to do this and he said i want you to think about it and i said i already did the answer is no and he said well well what if we come to this number and i said that that doesn't work either now in my career you've heard what my career looks like i've never negotiated salary it was just always something that was just you know this is what it is okay you agree you move on so i left and he called my mentor and said i want her convince her to take this job and he said i promise you that if you take this job that you'll double your salary every year and in omaha nebraska there weren't a lot of people that looked like you and me and there weren't any people in that department that looked like me and i said you know what i'm willing to take a shot at this so they met me at a number that i was comfortable with and i left and i transitioned into that career not knowing anything i was so i was so green i was as green as the wall behind you so green just didn't know and i'm so grateful that i took the leap because i was willing to bet on myself and to walk my faith and to know that i was going into the unknown and that ultimately god was in control it it helped me to get to my destiny of where i am right now so when i ended up leaving that station i came back home to houston to work for channel 11 for seven years and again negotiated my salary which we don't we don't negotiate salaries unfortunately women and i've understood that minorities don't do a really good job of negotiating absolutely because we don't really have a a marker or or something that we can measure ourselves a baseline to measure ourselves against or even honoring and acknowledging our our gifts and the experience that we bring even the boldness to say i'm more qualified than anyone that you have and i was but i was willing to say it and to be confident in it and so work the channel 11 for seven years reach that that same you know block in the road and say you know i i want more i don't know what more looks like but i know that i want more so i started my company while still working full-time at channel 11 and i just started moonlighting taking on any client that i could from every industry from construction to entertainment to you know anything i could touch and then i made a decision that an opportunity was interesting enough that i was willing to take it and so i did i left channel 11 and i worked for another company and i hated it it was terrible but it was a six salary that i wasn't willing to walk away from so i i decided i'm just gonna stick it out and still work my business until it's time well god said the time came sooner than what my time said so one day i was working newly married my husband walked he was on his way to pick me up to take me to lunch and i see this meeting pop up on my calendar that i didn't schedule and at that time i've been working on projects and working with the largest companies with that that company worked with and been doing amazing things and had righted so many wrongs and just helped to really you know bring some crazy projects back into alignment and my manager brought me in and there was another lady that was sitting in there and it was i'm thinking okay hi what's this meeting about and not knowing that i was getting laid off after being there for about a year and i i remember just sitting there just shocked because i'd never been in that position before and then the hr director said well you can you know you can reapply for your job on monday this is a mass layoff that we're doing you know workforce reduction i don't remember everything that she said all i heard was your fire yeah so i said do you mean i'm fired and she said no this you know this happens with the company you can reapply so i remember walking out of the building with my box and my husband's sitting outside waiting for me and he said whoa what are you doing i know you're not happy but you know are you are you quitting and i said no i got fired and he said well are you okay and i said i'm fine and i think he thought i was having a nervous breakdown he said are you sure and i said yes he said do you still want to go to lunch i said listen i've got to handle some stuff in there you go ahead and go back to work i'll handle this and i'll see you at home so i get home he calls me says are you okay and i said yes he said well what are you doing i said i'm on i'm on the internet i'm looking for another job and he said why and i said well we just bought a house we just got married we can't afford for me not to work i'll have another job by monday and what he said to me was a pivotal point in my life and in my career he said close the computer i don't think that's what god wants you to do and i said he didn't tell me that and he said god's got us and i've got us just take a minute just take a moment just stop breathe and breathe he said you know every time you feel like you want to look for a job pick up your bible and find a scripture and have bible study and meditate on that and it didn't it didn't dawn on me what god was doing and how he was using him to get to me so that he could show me what he already had for me and that lasted for a little bit and i said listen i need to find a job this is not working so i ended up interviewing for a company that was a really prominent company here in houston and they brought all their c level executives in they brought the person they wanted me to report to they were going to create a position for me and this was after a series of interviews and i said i said honey you know this is a great company it's not really what i feel like i want to do but it's my foot in the door so i go back and she's bringing all these binders in she's showing me all these things that she wants me to do and i looked at her and i said listen i have so much respect for you and your company but i have to be honest i would be bored out of my mind doing this and i don't want to do this i feel like you deserve to have someone who's going to be here and give you the the you know the longevity in the company that that it deserves and she said nobody's ever said anything like that to me before but if i could ever be a reference for you if we can ever do anything or work with you let us know so i remember getting in my car and driving on my freeway and i said god i'm hiring myself i'm not going to try to prove to anybody else who i am or what i'm worth i'm gonna trust you and i'm gonna hire myself and from that moment on god has blessed me beyond to work with some of the largest and the oldest and the biggest and the craziest opportunities that i couldn't even write for myself that's just how good god is but it took all of those things it took those stories it took that path in order for me to receive and to continue to work really hard to know that god has something bigger and greater for me now natasha let me tell you that when you look at the journey i think a lot of people are so focused on the destination that they forget the power of the journey right and and and the learning the skill set the building the encouragement is not in the destination it's in what it took to get you there and there's a lot of meat on that bone that you just that you just explained there um a lot of things in which we see when we talk about value when they put that number in front of you and you said no to that number and i think when you say that we don't negotiate and i think it's not just from a necessary point of people just don't negotiate they just don't know their value so when you go to a job a job places a value on you and your time and so they'll say you're worth 15 an hour you know we believe that your time in this company and this particular skill set is worth x well when you don't know your value you take anything that is given to you and so that kind of that'll lend us to a to a place to where when you're looking at how you got to where you are and all the ebbs and flows that it took to get there when you're seeing that where god and and we're gonna we're gonna make sure that we hone in on god right because we can talk about the success but had it not been for the hand of god over your life none of this stuff would be possible but tell me about the the earliest visions of your life like what did you see yourself doing did you did you always envision success um and did you come from a successful family did you were you surrounded by success was this just part of your everyday life like what did that early childhood look like so i will tell you this and i say this often i feel like i've been able to take the equity from everything that i've done and i've rolled it into el rene and associates and i'll give you an example when we purchase a home the idea is that we're going to purchase it we're going to take the equity out we're going to roll it and then we're going to continue to graduate into that next level so my earliest memory of equity was in kindergarten i would learn i'd go to school i would come home to my grandma's house and everything i learned i would create worksheets for my little cousins and i would teach them everything i learned i remember drawing worksheets that the banana equals five and the grapes equals two and the orange equals seven and teaching them and that's exactly what i'm doing right now in el rene associates i'm teaching i'm taking something down that taking something that would otherwise be very difficult and really hard to understand and i'm breaking it down at a very plain level making it exciting and fun so that i can teach them and break down the barriers of understanding to really help them to connect to the knowledge i did that in education i did that in business development and sales and i do it in project management so for me i've always felt a responsibility that every time i learn something every time i'm introduced to something i have a responsibility to share that with someone else and that's carried me through every aspect of my career from teaching to working in you know media to now working in project management and building other businesses that i've been blessed to build over the years so my earliest memory was probably at five or six helping to train and teach and i love it it's a gift so and i want to give a quick shout out because you did go to preview so you're a panther yes shout out to pray of you my daughter goes to pray of you praise god for that i see a lot of stuff going on right now in this climate um good and bad um a lot of tension on both sides a lot of stuff going on uh but i come from a family to where uh my mom had me when she was 16 years old um and i've told this story of nauseam uh but my mom had me when she was 16 years old it was um you know for lack of a better word latasha it was um you know they wasn't boyfriend and girlfriend it was just one of those things that happened and outcomes marcus d holman right so never knew my father come from third ward you know that whole environment so my mom went back to school uh graduated from the university of houston with a degree in business and my mom growing up would never allow me the excuse of my surroundings she would never allow me to take the easy road out my mom was very very hard on me making sure that she pressed me to higher levels of living all my earliest memories are my mom being on my back for school and this and for that but my mom pressed me to success and i take that mentality where we are right now as african-americans in this culture in this nation in this time and i try to amplify that times a million because i believe that your story my story and others like it uh how we got to the place that where we are right now yes we've all encountered barriers and obstacles and challenges but what you did with those challenges ultimately determined how successful you would be in life so talk about some of those challenges that you faced early on in your career in your life that you had to overcome in order to get to this place to where you are right now man there are so many of them i think one of the challenges is really internal it's a mental challenge of trying to find you know be comfortable where you are for that moment to continue to push and know that there is more there's something greater there is an inner voice and i i say this often the silence can be so loud and i think we are so used to putting things around us whether it's music or it's other people and now it's social media to try to fill the the space so that we don't have to deal in that quiet time but i force myself sometimes just to be quiet and to be still so that i can hear and really understand what god's voice is when i think about my mom um who's passed on i i could be in a crowded room but if i hear her voice i can hear it plainly through all of the noise of everything that's going on because i have a relationship right so for me when i when i find myself in those points whether it's a peak or a valley where i feel like you know i'm not i don't have my footing i don't know what i'm doing i'm not really sure what what's the next move i have to be quiet enough so that i can hear his voice but in order for me to hear his voice i have to have the relationship because if not it just sounds like a stranger it sounds like everyone else is talking and i can't really understand what it is that he wants me to do so when i think about those moments in my career where i felt unappreciated or i felt like i wasn't getting what you know i knew i deserved at that point i had to get really quiet and to really just understand okay god what is it what's the lesson that i'm supposed to learn from this my mom would always say eat the fruit and spit out the seeds you know take what's good the stuff that's bad toss it be careful where you toss the seeds because if you water them then they're going to grow a crop of something else so i mean i can think of countless times in my career where i was challenged or i i mean even now with it within my business you know as an african-american woman in the industry that i'm in um there aren't a lot of us who are doing the type of managing the types of projects and managing the type of businesses and accounts and it takes a great deal of audacity to go in and not consider you know what chair am i supposed to sit in but to pull my chair up to the head of the table or to be in the front of the room and know that i deserve to be there so you know if i were to think of one situation where i felt like you know i my back was up against the wall i would say it happened um i would say probably within the past two years where i was working really hard and keeping very focused and out of nowhere something just came up um into the business exchange that was so unexpected i don't really believe in haters i don't i don't subscribe to that i don't think that people have that kind of time to just sit and try to figure out how they can uh destroy something i just i i never never understood that concept i feel like people have other things that are more important to do but i had a situation like that happen where someone just started throwing these accusations and doing things i'd never met this person before in my life did not know anything and um and later found out that there were some things that were working to try to undermine but what god has for you come on now it's for you and when you don't give those things oxygen and you just keep yourself focused it's it's about operating it with integrity and if you know who you are and what you're doing and what your responsibility is those things can really knock you off like they can throw you off but if you really stay focused and you operate with integrity you realize that you you really don't have to respond to those things if you just stay focused and stay the course everything works out you don't even have to you don't even have to give it any oxygen you just keep moving forward and know that if it's for you god is going to deliver it and make it happen so that's what i did so now when you're going back to college and you lost your scholarship there are the fork in the road at that moment i could go left i could go right right and we all get to those places in our lives to where we face that pivotal fork in the road something happened life issues you know just life in general and so that was a pivotal moment in your life right you got a scholarship didn't work out and now you have to make a choice on what you're going to do with this life event that you didn't see coming and so when we're talking about life latosha and and there's a spiritual part of this but when we're talking about life life is going to bring with it is challenges now jesus said that it's going to rain on the just and the unjust right it's going to rain uh whether you're walking with god or whether you're not walking with god that's just life and what life brings but the blessing of the problems that come along with life and how is how it builds you up for the next season of your life because everything is a preparation right so when you're looking at the challenges of your life and how you overcame those things if there's somebody that's watching right now that's going through a very difficult stretch um whether that's family whether that's financial whether that's career whether that's spiritual they're in a difficult stretch right now in their life like what would you tell that person that's listening that's going through life right now something has hit them that they did not see coming and now i have to respond to it what's the encouraging word to that person right now i would first say congratulations because what you're hoping for is on the other side of this you just have to be patient and walk it out so patience yeah even in the midst of what i'm going through patience and congratulations because even if someone comes and and something really really tragic happens to them i just have that kind of faith that i know that a everything works for the good of those who are called according to god's purpose and there are so many things that are beyond our control and all we can do is try to hold on to the controllables and do what we can do that's a good word and if you have faith and confidence in knowing that you are walking in god's purpose it's it's gonna be okay sure i mean whether it's death or it's divorce or it's a loss of of anything just know that god is ultimately in control and if he took it from you that means that he has ended that phase or that period and it's mo he's moving you into another phase in another chapter and you're going to see it you can't always see it at that moment you don't always understand what's on the other side of it but if you just if you're just patient and you keep trusting and you keep working and you keep believing it's going to work out it always does it has to so i have a uh and i want to make sure that i get your um permission to do so uh because in talking about challenges and what life brings problems that it may present you know of course as a pastor we are constantly in counseling sessions and we are counseling from a to z and anybody that knows anything about bethel's family it is a real church for real people this church is literally open seven days a week and so there's no time schedule you know somebody's gonna just come up on monday they come up monday tuesday wednesday thursday and all throughout the week and so think about whatever problem that you can name we talk about it here in this ministry and we're oftentimes trying to lift up people that are in the pit of the valley i mean not walking into the valley they're in the pit of it they've been in there for a minute and they've been in that valley for so long that they're even used to the valley they're used to the darkness but we try to get them to understand that this problem that has come up on you that you did not expect can actually turn out for your good no matter how bad it may be and so i want to talk to you about a personal issue that happened a couple years ago and you know where i'm going tell me um with your with our dear sister your dear sister yes um here at the church of bethel's family we got rocked to our core and this is from a church perspective i know as a family perspective it was even greater um valentine's day 2018. um i got a call from our pastor early in the morning um that our dear and beloved dr latonya earl had gotten into a tragic accident car accident and god had transitioned her to glory literally singing on sunday and the next day you have to grapple with the idea that she's not here tragic event nobody saw that coming like it came and life just kind of smacked us in the face and said now what are you going to do and our whole church family had to respond because she was such an integral part of the ministry to this tragic news now as a family i can only speculate that if we felt that way as a church family how much more intense that was as your family so as you guys had to deal with that what was that process like how did you guys get through that event that was uh magnanimous to say the least how it just hit you head on and then just told you to deal with it so how did the family the earl family get through that particular situation yeah so it feels like a long time ago but it was only a year ago yeah it was only a year ago um it was tough to say the least that was in 2019 it was 2020 2020 yes that's right because that was right before right before kovic yes you're right before correct yeah yeah it feels like it was that long ago but then it doesn't um it was it was just about a year ago i remember getting a call that morning it was valentine's day morning and um my husband and i said we're just going to take the day off as a business owner you never take the day off so i said okay we're going to take the day off and we're going to drop layla off at school and we're just going to go and have lunch we're going to hang out we're going to have a good time and i remember getting a call from one of my relatives and she said hey have you talked to tanya and i said no and she said okay um all right and i said well what's going on and she said well we've been trying to reach her i don't know what's going on but you know i was just wondering if you've talked to her and i said well no you know talk to me tell me what's happening and she said well i don't really know i don't want to get you i don't want to get you worked up and at this point i'm like tell me what's happening and so she said um i i don't know and i could tell the hesitation in her voice so i said tell me what's going on so she said they said that she that she died and i remember almost passed out i was i was i was like what she said i don't know i don't know and i'm like okay okay okay so i remember telling my husband let's go let's go let's go let's go drop layla off let's go figure this out and i started calling um wayne her husband and he wasn't answering and we just kept calling and kept calling so we got here to bethel's and to drop my daughter off at school and i remember a couple of the the attendees walked up and they had a look on their face and i'm like why are they looking at me like this and one of um one of the um attendants at her school looked at me and she said i'm so sorry and i said sorry for what and sister august just grabbed her really quick and she said no and i i started getting really nervous so i said okay and then she said sisterhood says well um sister latasha pastor august wants you to come over to the church he wants to talk to you and i said okay i'm thinking i don't know what he needs to talk to me about but i need to go so i we drove over and i don't know if they spoke to my husband at that point because he's pretty much a rock when it comes to situations like that he'll just try to just you know help me usher through whatever it is so we get over and pastor august meets me outside and he opens his arms and he says sister i'm i'm sorry and i said sorry for what and he said she's gone and i just remember an emptiness it was just a hollowness that i couldn't describe and i just fell and i did not know i couldn't understand it i didn't understand what happened i didn't know any of the details i just they just said she's gone and so immediately we started calling again to her husband to reach out to find out what happened and then finally he answered and he told us that she was involved in an accident and we said you know have the do the girls know and he said no and i said well what do you want us to do and he said can you go to them so my husband and i left and we were unfortunately the ones that had to share that news with them and they were distraught they were you know completely confused caught off guard just you know just very um unaware it's it's nothing that you can ever ever ever ever prepare for it's not any news that anyone ever wants to share and in that moment of hurt i had to transition into being a strong force for them and in helping them and coaching them through and helping them to understand you know what this transition means and how much their mother really loved them and how much you know she you know was just a warrior and to to try at least for a moment to shift the narrative and to understand that although she's not physically here she will always spiritually be here for them and she she represents so much as much as she did for bethel's family she represents that for our family as well she was this amazing god-fearing warrior that i was blessed to call sister we had so many fun moments of our relationships that i i reflect on just the friday prior to her passing away we all got together to go to dinner and we all hung out we laughed we sang we had a really great time and i feel and it hadn't happened for a while and so i feel like that was god giving us that moment to to just to spend together and and to be there but she is just this amazing powerhouse that represents so much and and through trying to process it my husband really helped me he said you know god has us here all for a reason and we're all here to give him glory and too and he gives us all an assignment and he said you know it's a blessing that she completed her assignment by almost at 50. you know sometimes you know people's assignments take a little bit longer some take a little bit less but the lives that she touched and the impact that she had and the work that she did and how she gave her life for christ god felt like you know what your job is complete and i'm ready to bring you home and so for me as much as i miss her you know anything that would that's funny i would want to call her if something crazy happened i'd want to call her i'd look forward to seeing her at church and hearing her voice and seeing her minister and you know when i when i think about just how talented she was she was an amazing singer but she was anointed yeah yeah that's difficult there's something there's something that's so different about that you know it's not about the runs i mean we come from a singing family right so it's not just about the ability to bend and fold your voice but it's about how you can help to heal and even through her transition i would randomly see someone and i saw a lady at the store and she said you know i haven't been able to return to church yet and i said really she said i just every time i go i just i i want to hear a voice i want to see her i want to hear you know hear a word from her people that i never knew said you know your sister sung me to christ i was so lost i was in a valley i didn't know what to do but through her ministry it helped me to have that hunger and that desire to get into the word of god and so when people use the word ministry of music this is the last thing i'll say about it you know when they would say minister of music my sister studied the bible like like she was really a pastor of a church she'd wake up in the morning she had at least three or four different you know references to the bible that she could refer back to she she was really really about god's word and it's amazing because i remember seeing her and it was a reflection of my mom my mom would do the same thing she was a student of the word and i i think that through her study and her commitment to christ and knowing how important it is to be invested spiritually in a ministry is really where that anointing really comes through for her and i'm prayerful that her children her legacy will continue to carry that same that same thirst and knowledge for christ and it also is a call to arms for me as well because i know that i had a praying grandmother and a praying mother and a praying sister and i'm looking at my daughter like okay i owe it to you too so um i just really really am honored to have to call her sister and for me you know as much as i miss her i i think that for me she's still here because i still get a chance to feel her presence around me although she's not physically here but we miss her tremendously and latashi the reason why i bring that up is because again as as we are as you are travailing through life trying to do the best that you can do um there's no manuscript on life like there's no book that that's got chapter and verse that tuesday this is what's going to happen like you can't plan this stuff out but when life kind of shows its hand to you it presents you in my opinion and i've gone through my own shared struggles that we won't bore the audience with but life presents you in my opinion with the benefit of the challenge it's hard to see the benefit of a challenge in the middle of a challenge but i've seen so many people when life throws its best punch and knocks them down i've seen so many people get stuck there and it's a tendency especially when you're walking with god and you're trying to be faithful and god allows this to happen there's a tendency to get mad at god there's a tendency to say why me why now and people get stuck in this little chasm that they're in with that traumatic event that happened that impacted everyone's life how are you guys able to harness that harness that hurt that pain that travail how were you able to harness that and use that for your benefit moving forward how did that bless the family did it bring it closer did it did it reveal some new things that god wanted you to do talk about that process once you guys got your hand around the issue so for us we have always been a god-fearing praying family so of course nobody saw this coming so it was one of those situations where we knew that we needed to take a step back and ask god okay what is that you're trying to show us what is it that you want us to do and one of the great responsibilities was our ministry and my cousin sister donna chapman was you know there in the choir with us and you know directing and you know really carrying on the ministry in different ways and so when pastor august invited her to take on that role she came to the family and she said how do you all feel about this you know i know that this is something that is so very new for us will you all support me will you all stand with me will you all allow me to honor uh tanya or sister earl in this way and of course we said yes and so for us this was as traumatic as it was it was still an opportunity to show the heritage of our family and our faith and to know how important it was to carry on the ministry because hey that's what she would have wanted us to do and that's what god intends that's what he created us to do so for us we still as much nobody can play the piano or sing like she can so we still you know on any given sunday that we're all together you can find us harmonizing looking at somebody because they're off key are challenging each other to just continue with their ministering with their walk so really and truly our our focus has been to just stay very prayerful to continue to keep her immediate family her daughters her husband her son her grandson lifted up and to continue to be what god intended for us to be and that's a family that loves god that honors him and that tries to use every gift that he gives us for his glory and so that's really what we've what we've done and i will tell you at that time that this was happening that that happened with my sister i was negotiating one of the biggest deals in my company and it was really it was really [Music] unbelievable how god showed up because it was at that moment that you would have expected for me to be wallowing in the bed somewhere and there were moments where i was paralyzed but i could hear her voice i could hear my mother's voice i could look around me and see that you know my responsibility was to keep going so i actually used it as fuel to move me forward and to propel me through and to to celebrate those wins with her and with my mom and with my family here on earth knowing um that i was able to make it happen even through some of the most critical times in my life so i just thank god that he allowed me to have an amazing support system my husband my family my team to make sure that we were able to make it happen but it would have been it would have been so much sweeter to have her here to celebrate with me but the great thing about it is although i don't i don't have the ability to call her and tell her she's with me anyway so she's there with me in my ear talking and encouraging me and celebrating the wins right along the way so um this is a preachery saying okay it's it's real preachery um but people see the glory but they don't know the story like they see the bells and whistles they see the house they see the car they see the family they see all the outward appearances and they admire you from afar like wow they got it going on but oftentimes what they don't see is the backdrop the the struggle that led to this particular place and all of the things that you had to go through go beyond in order to get to this place now we're still not there god is still molding us and shaping us uh into conforming us to the image of his son but i'm so so very thankful because as i look at the life of christ as latasha i see a man that was perfect in every way shape or form but as you look at his life his life was filled with challenges and as you see this man who was without sin he never said a bad word never did a bad deed never thought a bad thought and this man that was perfect had to overcome challenges upon challenges upon challenges and to ultimately the final challenge which was on the cross of calvary and so as i look at where we are right now but i appreciate hearing about the journey the the the niceties of the moment is great we celebrate the success in the moment but i think what the encouragement comes from people who listen is to hear about what it took to get to that place because a lot of people right now are in places that they don't think that they can get out of and and from whatever a to z and whatever problem that that may be we all look at problems and deal with issues in different ways and sometimes life kind of swallows us whole and so i hope that when people are listening to you um yeah you are the managing partner yes you have your own company and you are doing tremendously well you got a wonderful family god has blessed you and you had a place into your life to where you've gotten your feet up under you but i pray that when people hear about the journey not the destination that they're able to draw some encouragement from that because they can say within their own minds okay this is where i am and and the model that i give to everybody look no matter where you are in life start there okay no matter what if you got a dollar start there if you ain't got no money start there wherever you are start there so i hope people can look at and hear the journey of latasha norwood okay and what it took for her to get to this ultimate place of where god wants her to be and draw some serious encouragement that you've overcome some very difficult challenges in your own life but you were able to harness that pain and use it to your benefit so i want to ask you this i have a heart for young people i've always said sister latasha that i will not contend with a grown man i'm not going to argue with anybody that's grown because you know a grown man a grown woman has already made up their mind they're going to do what they're going to do but if you give me a young person i will contend with that person i will walk with that person through the valleys and the struggles of life because there is potential on the other side of that person so you got a young person right now that in our youth right now are going through things i'm 48 years old this year our youth right now in 2021 are going through things that i myself and my youth never had to go through issues and challenges social media stuff that i never had to go through so the youth right now are in a very very vulnerable place and i believe that one of the things that the church is not doing very well is we're not putting a lot of attention on our younger generation so as that young person is listening right now and that young person is watching right now and they're listening to you how would you encourage that young person going back to your own early years about where to start how to continue on what type of mindset should they have what do i need to do in order to be the best that i can be like what would you tell that person who's in the valley of life right now and how would you encourage them i would tell that person to do exactly what i did take a sheet of paper rip it out draw a line down the middle write what you like and what you don't like and just write it all down everything that you love to do whether it's eating healthy or eating snacks or helping people or writing or you know basketball whatever that thing is that you enjoy doing write it all down on the other side write down what you don't enjoy doing whether it's homework or it's math or whatever it is just write it down and then take a step back and everything on the like list do more of that do it as much as you can and then while you're going through that list highlight some of those things that can maybe make a little bit of money maybe you like cutting hair maybe you like writing stories highlight those things because those could potentially be career opportunities for you now the dislike list is also important you gotta ask yourself three questions on the dislikes what can i do about this can i change it how can i change this and maybe make it not so bad that i can sort of kind of shift it to the light column or is it something that i have no control over and i have to get over it like you can't get a new mom or a new dad right there are some things that are constants and then the other things are i can totally eliminate this out of my life completely i don't want to do this anymore this doesn't this doesn't bring me joy and so when i did this for myself i realized that there were some things that were in my life on my light column that i wasn't giving enough attention and that i needed to devote more time to and things that could possibly be a career opportunity for me that i could monetize and make money so if i'm looking at a new job that i want to go for maybe i can find something that is on the light column that mirrors that and maybe that's a career option that i can look at or maybe add to my business or something else that brings me joy those things on my my dislike column i got to make some real decisions because there are some things that you just you can't control and you have to accept it and realize you know what this is something that's a part of my journey if i'm adopted if there is something tragic happening that i have no control over i've got to realize that you know what i've got to put this in god's box but these other areas that i can control i will control them the other thing that i would tell people which i don't know that people do it a lot is to create a vision board yeah vision boards are really really really a great tool it really helps you to see there are different learning styles some people have to taste it some people have to say it they have to hear it they have to touch it they have to see it what how do you connect right a vision board can be something that you either do digitally on the computer maybe in powerpoint or maybe you go grab some magazines and you do it the old school way you get go to the dollar store get one of those big posters for a dollar and cut out pictures and words that represent what it is that you want and post it somewhere where you see it all the time and that you can hold yourself accountable to it but i'm going to take it a step forward when i look at vision i have to ask myself okay what is it going to take for me to do it is it going to take commitment of time do i need to find someone else that can get me closer to it who are the people that i need to surround myself by is it going to take money maybe i need to start saving or scaling back how long is it going to take me to accomplish this do i have the willingness to stick it out and to really really focus on getting it done maybe you know that journey might take a year it might take 10 years but the progression that i can see myself flowing through will help me get there what are the risks what can go wrong if this if this blows up am i okay knowing you know what that was a part of the journey it's it's just par for the course i'm gonna keep going and keep pushing so i would say number one writing those things down really helps you to visually see and it holds you accountable to it what those likes and dislikes aren't committing yourself to doing it even if it's committing yourself to doing it for a week or a month right maybe it's working out or eating healthy whatever that thing is commit yourself to doing it highlighting those things that you feel like are things that maybe can take you a little bit further re-evaluate re-evaluating that dislike list asking yourself those questions and then creating a vision board to kind of help you and once you have a vision i don't know where the quote comes from but it says if you don't know where you're going any role will get you there and it's like jumping into a car that's what the gps is for if you jump into a car and you just start driving you'll get somewhere i don't know where you're going you're going to get somewhere but you're going to waste a lot of time potentially a lot of money and a lot of energy but if you get into a situation where you plug in where you're going the coordinates or the the destination of where you're going it might take you a little bit longer to get there you might have to pivot because maybe there's some traffic on the road maybe there's some construction maybe you have to detour but you'll get there because you know where you're going and that list helps you to identify what that looks like and that vision board helps you to visually see where you're going what do you put on your vision board you can put a house you can put college you can put marriage whatever those things are that are part of your vision because it's very personal to you but it's something that you have to commit yourself to and it needs to be time-bound you need to give yourself a realistic timeline of when i want to accomplish this so you can use it as benchmarks to say okay how close am i getting it's just like what the gps tells you you'll be there in 15 minutes if you look up 30 minutes later something went wrong yeah but you don't stop and pull over and get out of the car and give up you keep going until you detour and you get there and that's the same thing that life presents us but you got to have a destination you need to know where you're going the other piece of advice that i would say is if you can find a mentor and i know we talk about mentors all the time but a mentor they they have different purposes in your life there might be a mentor that's just willing to call your baby ugly and tell you that is crazy i don't know what you're thinking about don't do that anymore there are some mentors that will rub your back and will coach you through and help you and wipe your tears and i mean we all need different things in our life so figure out what helps to motivate you but ultimately a mentor is someone that should hold you accountable and it should be someone that you're willing to be honest with absolutely that you're willing to share and be naked and transparent with to say you know what i haven't figured it all out but i know where i'm going and when i feel myself getting weak or if i feel like i'm getting tired can i come to you for some encouragement can you help me to understand maybe how i can pivot through this journey to get where i'm going is there somebody that you can connect me to is there somebody that i can watch or shadow or mirror who's doing what i want to do that can kind of help me along this path but having that vision and knowing where you're going and what's important to you and what you want and what you need i think that's that that's a really really important secret sauce of getting to where that destination is the final thing that i would say is pray about it god is ultimately in control of this thing and he's the ultimate project manager so as much as we feel like we know exactly what we want and where we're going and what we should be doing who we should marry what school we should go to what business we should start how much money all those things got it's in his hands anyway so present those things to him and and ask him god is this what you want i want you to be the navigation for my life if there's something or someone that's in my life or there's something that's going on that's going to take me away from what your purpose and what your calling is remove it because sometimes we aren't strong enough to do that we aren't strong enough to walk away from that six-figure salary to go and start this business that's going to be a multi-million dollar business because we can only see starting at prairie well starting at lee college losing a scholarship staying on somebody's bed at prairie view trying to get myself back into college transitioning into physical education and being a fourth grade teacher and then moving into media and then starting my own company that's now a multi-million dollar company right we don't we we don't see those journeys because we we if god showed it to us we probably mess it up that's exactly right it's too big it's too big right but but god has to you know hate has to allow us you know to to walk the journey out but here's the thing that i have not shared yet a few years ago six years ago women started coming to me asking for me to be their business coach and their mentor and i just knew i didn't have the bandwidth to do it but i feel like if someone asks you to do something and there it takes a lot of vulnerability to come and ask for help and if you do nothing i feel like it's disrespectful so i decided okay i i can't coach 40 women right but what i can do is i can host a dinner i host a dinner i'll invite these women to come in we'll participate we'll share i'll share we'll hold each other accountable we'll move on i did not know that just a few months earlier than that congress had just designated october as national women's small business month so i did the research and i said you know what i think i can do this a little bit bigger so i approached the urban league and the sba and said hey i'm looking to host a dinner for about maybe 20 women would you like to participate and they said sure so within four weeks it transitioned from 20 women to over 120 women we hosted this beautiful dinner at the houston area urban league the dinner was free we had a three-course meal we completely transformed the space we gave away airline tickets apple watches quickbooks everything that you can imagine we have panels of women who scale their businesses from ground to multi-million dollar companies and those who transition from corporate america every phase that every woman could possibly find themselves in it was by invite only and we were able to raise over forty thousand dollars in less than three weeks to underwrite this event and it was beautiful and um at the end of it women were waiting for me to to talk to me and they said latasha i've never experienced anything like this before i was waiting for the gotcha the gimmick of who was going to try to sell me something and it never happened they said i'm used to people praying on me you know to come and attend these events and then they want us to buy into something but this was amazing i i can't believe like i can't wait until next year and i said whoa next year no no no no this was just one time we were hosting this dinner and here we are six years later we've transitioned it the organization is called she said she led she is it's an organization that is really about helping women to be audacious and to be bold and to walk into a room and know they deserve to be there whether they have one toe in corporate america and the other one in their side hustle or they're fully vested in running their business or they're kind of teeter-tottering and wanting to do it and so every october we have this big conference where we host workshops we bring subject matter experts in we've partnered with some of the biggest companies and we bring all these experts in to teach women to help them to understand what it means to grow and scale a business or to start a business or to get into contracting with government and we've been we've blessed thousands of women and um it's one of those things where i feel like you know every time i clear a hurdle i know that there's somebody who's probably right behind me that's going to approach that same hurdle and it goes back to me being in fifth grade and learning how to do math and coming and creating those workshops for my grandmother at my grandmother's house i'm still preparing those same worksheets for these women through she said i'm still saying hey i just learned this somebody else is probably going to be faced with this situation let's build this into our curriculum so that we can provide this type of coaching and training for women so that when they do meet these obstacles or when they are looking to scale their business or they are looking to hire a team or transition from 1099 to full-time employee or higher employees or offer them 401k or benefits and all those things there's no manual that teaches you how to do that and so that's what she said gifts me to do so it's a ministry so we've been able to grow it from an llc to now a foundation and we just recently launched our advertising agency as well so women who are looking to promote their businesses they can now come to us we will help them to cultivate and to craft their messaging and to get it on television on billboard and so if you're following this everything that was a part of my journey teaching i'm still teaching doing advertising and marketing i'm doing that within my business helping people to figure out how to put things together i'm doing that in my business through project management so that same place where i started of that equity and that journey that god allowed me to pivot through negotiating and understanding what that means one of our clients came to us she had already negotiated her contract and i said send it to me i looked at it and i said no this isn't a good contract we can get you more we ended up getting her over fifty thousand dollars of value built into the contract she had already agreed to so that same table that i set at when i was transitioning from education negotiating my salary i can still use those same techniques to negotiate on behalf of someone else to get them what i know they deserve so it just all it all fits together so again normalizing success black people have the acumen in whatever field that they may be participating in not just to be in the room and we got to get rid of this idea of just being in the room and being happy with being in the room but it's about knowing your value knowing what you bring the table your skill sets your your abilities and all of this is amazing when you're looking at life latasha and you see how you know the bible is intertwined through life and there's so many life principles that you look at but then you look over here in the word and it's been there for two thousand years two thousand years now the book of habakkuk says to write the vision and make it plain putting black ink on white paper um am i in my years as a financial advisor i would always tell people this you got to know the numbers if you don't know the numbers then nothing will happen if you don't know the numbers and as i was looking at african-american women and they are starting right now 1500 businesses every single week in america 1500 are started by african-american women 1 500 uh of businesses every single week are started by americans they create 1.2 million jobs in america they have an annual revenue of 127 billion dollars now i'm just talking about african-american women just the women i'm not even talking about the men right now they have an annual revenue of 127 billion dollars when black america makes up about 13 to 14 depending on what uh poll you're looking at african american women in the workforce can employ almost five percent of that population that's a huge footprint right now i know that it's well below our counterparts and i understand that theirs is almost 11 trillion dollars so there's a huge gap that we have to make up but there are ways in which we can close that financial gap and in my heart latasha my heart is one of the quickest ways to close the economic gap between the have and the have-nots is through education one of the ways that you close this gap and the quickest way to close that gap is through education so i want to give you this last word our time is really shot by very very quickly i want to give you this last word because i think it's important that people understand that success um is not something that we are high-fiving everybody about it's just what we do and once god has given us the opportunity to participate in whatever field or endeavor we may be in we will succeed in that field so give me give me two of your core life principles mission statements whether that's a mission statement for your job or whether that's a mission statement that you carry on in life those two core principles are mission statements that keeps you doing what you're doing now what are those you know what i would say it's just one and it's the advice that my mother gave me and it's eat the fruit and spit out the seeds in every situation there's always a lesson there's always something that you can learn there's something that can be used as fuel to get you to the next thing and so in every situation that has happened in my life i have to take a step back and say okay god what's the lesson what's the lesson for me how can i use this how can i learn from this how can i grow from this and the seeds are what i get a chance to share to help prepare the next person that's going to follow in the journey behind me so i know that you know it's there are good it's just it's a part of life that they're going to be ebbs and flows and they're going to be good and bad things that come from it but if i really just stay focused and understand understanding that god allowed this to happen to me for a reason something that is going to be used to grow and propel me into the next phase or the next chapter of my life and to not allow myself to to squallow in that but to brush myself off to get myself ready and to keep pushing forward that really really drives me the other thing that i've learned over the years because my mother started giving me that advice when i was probably old enough to even understand what she was saying i understand that with seeds they need water to grow and sometimes those water is our tears that's how we fertilize whenever you're trying to prepare soil to reap a harvest you got to tear it up sometimes you got to get the soil prepared and ready and there is a season when that has to happen and sometimes you can't see it immediately you can't see the fruit you can't see the the the harvest that's coming but you have to be patient and you have to do the work so i realized in that lesson that she was teaching me that you don't just plant a seed and walk away and expect for something to grow you gotta do the work you gotta water it you gotta shine some light on it you gotta you gotta maintain it and and know that the seed that you're planting can reap a harvest for so many absolutely right and and there is growth it doesn't mean that it died just because the seed is inside of something it's not gone it can grow into something else and continue to replenish so for me i use that advice all the time i realize whether i'm having the best day ever that there's a chance that something is on the other side of it and to be thankful and grateful for that moment and to be appreciative of a lesson and to be aware of it but know that in those darkest times when i i cannot even see one foot ahead of me to know that if i trust god and if i really stay focused that it's going to be okay so for me i have it i have that quote posted in my office eat the fruit and spit out the seeds well let me tell you um and and i want to bring this to a crescendo okay i am sitting across a table from an african-american woman who has went through many different fields in her life she has um by god's grace started her own business a business is doing extremely well i sit here at this table many a time sister latasha and i have caught hell from people with the message that i that i preach i preach a message of empowerment okay i don't buy into this mantra this idea uh about the oppression of black people i know too many successful black people and name whatever problem from a to z name poverty name incest name rape name fatherlessness name any problem that you want from a to z and i can put my hand on an african-american male or female that has been through that overcome that and then going on to do great and dynamic things in life i know too many my circle is filled with very successful black men and black women who are doing well in life and so i push the idea that black america is able and we're not looking for a handout we're not looking for people to post us up yes we're going to go through our challenges yes we're not going to skip down the yellow brick road and sing kumbaya i get that i understand that i believe that but within black america is the power given to us by god when you look at any other ethnic group uh we have been spiritually empowered by god since our founding and we have something inside of us that drives us through every problem and situation that we may come up against and so i push i advocate for empowerment that no matter where you are in life you can be better than where you are but i also sister latasha i redefine what success is everybody can have the three letters in front of their name ceo coocfo everybody can't operate on the 50th floor and i hold the mantra that we don't value as much as our four parents did and forefathers did the value of hard work so whether that's you taking out the trash somebody's got to cook the food my grandmother was a didn't get anything more than an eighth grade education she was a waitress all of her life but she was the hardest working woman i've ever known so she taught me the value that no matter where you plant it bloom there and so i i pushed the idea of empowerment and that we don't need everybody posting us up and we don't need people caressing us on the back telling us it's going to be okay allow us to do what we do and you will see black america flourish you are a prime example of that and i want to thank you from the bottom of my heart because i believe that people need to hear this story and the other stories that will come about people that have gone through hell in high water but did not allow those problems to stop them from progressing forward and so i want to say publicly to you congratulations thank you um congratulations matt i'm so so proud of you um and i'm not and i don't want to specify this just to an ethnic conversation um but it's it's important to me that i get people to understand the dynamic of black america that black america is not the images that you see on tv sure okay that that doesn't define the populace of black america uh black america is strong it's resilient it's smart it's capable and we can do very very well if you allow us to do it right and so i want to thank you from the bottom of my heart uh your family is a jewel here um and i believe that as pastor august always said i'ma steal this from him i'm giving him credit uh the best for you is yet to come thank you uh the best for you is yet i receive it so i want you to look right here into your camera and i want you to give a plug a big strong plug and i'm not going to put the words together this time l renee and associates llc i want you to get hitting this camera sure and i want you to give a big big plug for your company how they can reach you what you do and so on and so forth great el renee and associates is a project management consultancy firm that supports companies from the c-suite to the front desk by providing training consulting and recruiting for professionals so if you are interested in learning more about project management it is a very viable career path no matter what industry you want to work in project management is industry agnostic so if you're interested in learning more about how you can be more competitive in the job in the workforce give us a call you can reach us at 713-393-8745 or of course you can find us on our website at www there you'll find out more about who we are and what we do and how we can help you and for those of you who are interested women in starting a business growing a business or scaling a business check us out at she said sheila dot com we have our annual conference coming up in october we'd love to connect you to resources and people that can help to mentor you and coach you and help you to figure out what that is that you can start that business doing or if you're looking to scale your business or do government contracting we can help you do that too so i'm really excited about what you're doing and what god has put bless you and positioned you to do and if i can help you to get one step closer i'm willing and happy to help you do that miss latasha norwood managing pardon of el renee and associates llc you want to give a quick shout out to your husband and your kids absolutely um you know the person that is like the cheerleader of all cheerleaders my husband will norwood who is absolutely amazing thank you for being such uh the the blessing that god intended for you to be we prayed very early on for our marriage to be our ministry and it definitely is i'd like to also acknowledge my baby girl layla jean and also lily and all of my family my team at el rene associates my team at she said and all of those who are always championing for me thank you so much for your love and support uh mr tasha i am so so thankful that you accepted the invitation to come on here on studio b uh everybody i am pastor mbh thank you so so very much for joining us here on the set remember remember wherever you're watching from like follow subscribe comment so that you don't miss anything going on on the set of studio b and remember god loves you he has a rich plan for you and until next week we'll see you soon scope time and cost are constraints every project faces and having the right team to manage them is the key to your success el renee and associates is an industry leader in project management and an authorized training partner with the project management institute from training recruiting and consulting our project management experts will help improve your team's performance so whether it's construction technology health care and more el renee and associates is your partner for all things project management let's get started today [Music] you

Channel: Studio B Podcast

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Length: 76min 39sec (4599 seconds)

Published: Mon May 10 2021