Sam Jockel

samjockelsite

The truth about 2020 and how personal and hard it really got

by

I feel like the highlights reel on my social media has been alive and well the past little while which mostly leaves me feeling if only people knew.  I think it’s really important that people do actually know so in the spirit of pulling back the curtain I’m going to share a few behind the scenes moments to go alongside the celebrations. 

I can’t begin to tell you what it’s like to see some of the things you have only ever dreamed about start to become a reality.  It’s strange, I imagined in those moments I would have a sense of amazement and accomplishment but the reality has been far from what I had imagined. Truth be told, most of those moments have been me trying to catch my breath, needing space to cry and process and realise just how much I still have to grow myself up personally to be able to not just survive but thrive. 

What I’m learning as the days, months and years tick over is that as challenging and impossible as business can be it’s got nothing on navigating the heart and mind and growing those up.

Never in my life have I ever felt as pushed to my limits personally than over the past 12 months.  I have been confronted over and over with the stories I have been telling myself my entire life about who I am, about my limitations, about what others think of me and it’s been a daily battle to try and process that and keep going. 

For me ParentTV has been the perfect storm to pinpoint my vulnerabilities while subtly, and at times not so subtly, applying pressure in all the perfect places. 

If I’m going to be honest the truth is that for most of my adult life I have never really felt like a grown up.  Even though externally I do all of the grown up things reasonably well, internally I have felt like a child.  Though on some level it’s fun to feel like you are still 14 years old the truth is I have felt a lot of shame and embarrassment about it on the inside.

I have been fortunate enough to have been surrounded by the most extraordinary educators on this ParentTV journey who have shared so much wisdom about navigating parenting and this has been my saving grace.

I have Dr Vanessa La’Pointe ringing in my ears on a daily basis about the first step to being a great parent is having to grow yourself up first.  I can tell you from personal experience there are no truer words spoken and this isn’t just about being a great parent it’s about having peace in your heart and mind with who you are really. 

With this in mind about 12 months ago I started the journey of intentionally trying to grow myself up.  Clearly I wasn’t busy enough trying to build a company and be a wife and mother to 3 children so I thought I would add onto the pile a little challenge to process my childhood because you know … no big deal!!! I knew there was no way I could move into my future without simultaneously working both of these challenges out side by side and I was right. What I have learned is that things can happen to us in our childhood which get us stuck.  If we didn’t have the right support to help us process some of these things then what we tell ourselves in those moments can become truths that we hold onto into our adulthood. Hence the feeling like I never grew up because truth be told in some ways there were parts of me that never did.

There were many truths that I told myself as a child that got stuck.  I love solving problems, it’s my favourite, and I can tell you hands down that trying to solve this problem has been the hardest, most challenging, traumatic and therapeutic journey I have ever been and am still going on.  

When you decide that this is the plan and you welcome it with open arms, with only a few clues on what you should try doing but trusting that unless you work it out you will forever be stuck feeling things you only dreamed could be different you need to strap in for a wild ride. 

What I really want to do is share 2 key learnings that have become the basis of me starting to experience progress and ever so slightly feeling like maybe, just maybe, I’m finally growing up.  

Both of these things are also, funnily enough, the 2 core teachings nearly all of our ParentTV experts share over and over about how to best support our children and ironically these have been the same 2 core things that are little by little changing my life. 

The first one is allowing myself to feel the feelings. 

I have spent most of my adult life not feeling all the feelings and was very selective about what I let through.  I was still a human so there were days when I was happy, sad, angry etc but as described by someone close to me I could be a bit of an ice queen at times. 

Never in my life would I have ever thought that I was an emotionally sensitive person but what I realise now is that I actually am and I’m quite attuned to feelings. As a child I now realise I was quite sensitive and needed some help understanding how to regulate and understand those emotions but I didn’t really get that so I learned how to survive my feelings. 

The past year I have come to realise that feelings can be so incredibly extraordinary and a little scary all at the same time. I have also learned that they can be a superpower that fuel you and give you a strength you never knew was possible.  Once you realise that they don’t have to own you but you can own them it’s a game changer (I’m not there yet but on my way).  

The journey to getting there begins with giving yourself permission to get curious and get a bit messy.  I have found myself crying more in the past 12 months than I have in the past 37 years. 

But here’s the thing!  I have been a bit messy but out of the chaos for the first time in my life I feel like I am understanding who I am and am able to get a handle on myself and grow myself up. I am responding to situations rather than just reacting and am becoming less impulsive and better with my boundaries. Never in my life have I felt more alive and connected and human. I have spent so much energy trying to shut off parts of me but now I just let it flow.

I will admit there are times I feel a bit embarrassed by this.  Telling myself the story that people will think I am high maintenance, emotionally unstable and too much work but I am choosing to call bull shit on that story and am giving myself the freedom to be me.  It is one of the scariest things I have ever done … allowing myself to be truly seen. 

This brings me to the second thing I have learned. 

You can’t go on this journey alone.  

There have been moments I have found myself lost in feelings I could not find my way out of.  When I say this I don’t mean I was suicidal or experiencing a serious mental health episode what I mean is I was feeling big feelings that were very overwhelming.  I wanted to understand what was happening for me and I wasn’t able to do this alone.

This is where understanding co-regulation changed my life 🙂 I have come to understand the concept of co-regulation through ParentTV.  Anyone who is a parent or has ever been around children or teenagers knows that their emotions can get way out of control.  The emotions part of their brain is not fully developed yet and one of the key ways they experience emotional regulation is through co-regulation.  It’s your job as the parent to come alongside them as they feel the feelings and be that source of co-regulation.  This is how our children’s brains develop the neural pathways to learn emotional regulation. 

This isn’t just true for kids it has been true for me as an adult too.  I have realised that I am not an island and that for me to be the best I can be I can’t do it alone.  That the key to unlocking and healing the parts of me that never grew up was about having the courage to feel the feelings and to reach out and ask for help when it was too much for me to process alone. 

This is a lot harder than it sounds as it can evoke feelings of embarrassment and shame (particularly when you are an adult asking for help and behaving like an emotional 14 year old) but it has been so critical in my journey.

To the people in my life who have accepted me just as I am, shown up in those moments I have needed some co-regulation and helped me change the stories I have been telling myself for a very long time … thank you! 

One thing I know more than ever is you can’t grow a company or yourself without a team. This being human thing is a team sport!  

I didn’t really plan the distinct shift into the next level of ParentTV, it’s like I turned the page and there it was.

by

It has been nearly a year since “The worst case scenario any founder could ever imagine happened to me” and now here we are … 

I woke up a week ago and I just felt sad.  I’m not one to become sad or depressed in general, if anything, I’m often on the other end of the spectrum and a little manic (I’m pretty certain I am undiagnosed ADHD).  It was an unexpected sadness and I would go as far as saying it was grief. 

What I knew is I had to feel the feelings and give myself permission to not be ok but what I didn’t know at the time, was exactly why I was feeling this grief.  I knew it had to do with my business and I now realise it was the process I needed to go through as I walked into what I am now calling Chapter 3 of ParentTV.  

It was the grief of unfulfilled promises, making the wrong calls, of money wasted, of hiring the wrong people, of not seeing what was right in front of me, of wasted time and resources, of behaving in ways I was not proud of, of yes not really meaning yes, of unsuccessful grants, missed opportunities and all the realities that exist in the world of innovation where there are no answers and you are just making it up as you go. 

It was accepting and moving through the things I got wrong because in startup you get so much wrong because there is no roadmap.  I know this is normal and failure doesn’t scare me but I am learning that there is still a process I have to go through to accept what was, so I can move into what is next. 

Someone once said to me that running a startup is like gaming.  Now I’m not much of a gamer but I know how it works in general.  This is the kind of game that has multiple levels.  You start playing at the basic level and generally speaking most things are trying to kill you or stop you from succeeding and you die and then try again and die and try again and eventually you work out the level and make it to the end. You do a little high five and then straight away find yourself on the next level.  This time it’s a bit harder and there are a few more things trying to kill you and you die and try again, get a little further then die and try again until you finally make it to the end of that level.  You do a little high five again and straight away find yourself on the next level.  Once again it’s a bit harder, more things are trying to kill you and you have to work out how to make it to the end of the level.  This keeps going on and on and on and at some point you ask the question: Is there ever an end to these levels? And the truth is there actually isn’t until there is but the game is being made up as you go so no one actually knows when this is going to happen.  You just have to keep playing. 

When I think about the last 3 years of my life I can honestly say this is such a great analogy.  With time you do get better at playing however, things are always stopping you getting to the next level and once you feel like you have finally made it, you realise you are just on the next level and it’s even harder and there are even more things that you have to work out. 

The timing of this grief popping up was a very strange thing because ParentTV has been having some amazing wins in the past few months, we have an extraordinary team starting to form and are really getting out there and known.  We are on the brink of signing off on a deal with the client of our dreams that will be a game changer for us moving forward (This got signed off).  It was an unexpected grief and what I now understand is it was ParentTV moving to the next level in the game.

On the one hand there was the high five of completing the last level but on the other hand there was that heavy realisation that we are not there yet (wherever there is) and we are now entering into an even harder level with more things we have to work out.

Being the founder of a startup is relentless.  Making it up as you go and innovating what comes next every day can be exhausting.  Having said all of that, I freakin love it and could not imagine doing anything else except exactly what I am doing.  I can’t kid myself that it pushes me to my limits some days, that I constantly feel vulnerable because we are always moving forward into unknown territories, that I worry my team thinks I’m a little crazy as I ride the highs and lows of startup life.

But here I am.  On the brink of signing a deal that changes everything.  With a team who have seen the good, bad and ugly of me trying to work it out as a first time founder and CEO of a startup and they continue to show up, extend me grace and say we are with you on this adventure of a lifetime. Without them none of this would be possible … they truly are the greatest gift I could ever ask for.

The grief is mostly gone.  It was only a few days of accepting where I had got it wrong and letting that go.  If we don’t give ourselves the grace to get it wrong and go through a process of letting that go then we carry those mistakes around like dead weights that eventually get so heavy it stops us being able to move forward.  When you stop taking action and stop moving forward you die.  Anyone who has ever played a computer game knows that.

It happened to me. The nightmare. That worst case scenario as a founder

by

It happened to me. The nightmare. That worst case scenario you lay in bed at night thinking about that could happen to you as the founder of a startup.  It happened to me.

I’m going to tell you my story because sometimes that’s all I know how to do.  It helps me makes sense of it all and I know reading other people’s stories has always helped me so maybe this might help you.

You learn pretty quickly in founder life that things can change in a second.  There is no such thing as just plan a, you have to have plan a, b, c and d on the go at the same time as you never really know what’s around the corner and we’re all just making it up as we go.

This is what plagues my thinking late at night when I am trying to fall asleep.  I’m often playing the tape of the worst case scenario around in my head and then wondering what b, c and d looks like.

There was no particular reason or event that happened which was making me think plan a was about to come undone.  If anything ParentTV has been kicking some serious goals this past month and we are really starting to find our groove. I just know in business a done deal isn’t a done deal until it’s done no matter who it’s with.

And then it happened.  

It was a Friday morning, I had spent the last hour jumping on the trampoline with my 4 year old son until my mother inlaw arrived to look after him so I could pack my bags and get ready to head to an event to speak on a marketing panel which was followed by a keynote from Todd Sampson.  I had to head straight to the airport to fly to Sydney after that event for a conference the next day so had to get everything organised.

It was an hour before I had to leave the house and I got the email. I had played this scenario over and over in my head for months so in a way I do feel like I was a little prepared but truth be told I am not sure you are ever fully prepared.

I entered this startup world about 2 years ago with very little experience in this type of business.  I had been running my own businesses successfully for the past 8 year so I understood the basics but things like term sheets, capital raising, preference shares, cap table, vesting, dilution were all foreign to me.

I navigated my way through getting pre-seed investment, building a product, launching said product, getting customers, building a team, pitching at events and getting my head around what the roadmap for a startup generally looks like.  

All things considered we were doing pretty well, getting some good traction and the logical next step was to raise a seed round of around $1M to give us a decent runway to really try and set this thing on fire.

It was about a year ago that I opened my round (whatever that means haha) to see who was interested in participating.  I had no idea what I was doing but I jumped in and gave it a shot. I had established a mentoring relationship with a successful tech entrepreneur who was helping to give me some direction and guidance at my capital raising attempts.

I had lots of interest early on and people wanting to talk, I was fresh on the scene, we had a great product, pitching was my strength and we had some good traction 3 months after launch. And what I learnt was exactly that … people want to talk and talk and talk and wait and talk.  I tried the close the round with a deadline and that didn’t really work … mostly just a not yet we’re still watching. I remember feeling quite devastated at the time as I had put quite a bit of work in and people really made me think they were keen but not yet. I remember my mentor saying don’t worry this is really normal, just wait a bit it will swing around again and now you know what you’re doing a bit more.

We still had some money in the bank and enough runway for at least 6 months so I thought I would focus on the business, build our revenue and try and hit some key metrics investors said they were looking for to invest.

I was always good at social media and telling the ParentTV story online as that was my background so off I went to do all of the things and tell all of the story.

A few months after my failed attempt at a capital raise I received a text message from the person who had been mentoring me saying he wanted to invest a substantial amount into ParentTV.  You know how I said I would lie in bed thinking about my worst case scenario happening, well on the flip side I would also think about my best case scenario happening and this was it. I couldn’t quite believe it. I had to keep pinching myself that this was real and checking and double checking and it was.

With this kind of backing and endorsement it got the interest of a few of the other investors who had been sniffing around and we had a deal on our hands.  With my mentor leading the round it was all lined up to go ahead after a month or so of making plans I got the email.

We were one or two weeks out from finalising everything, my husband had been volunteering in the business the last 6 months with 2 weeks of his long service leave pay left, the plan was that he would not go back to his old job and join us, I hadn’t taken a wage in 2 years and things were about to get pretty tight pretty quickly, I had 3 staff wages to pay, a month or two of runway in the bank but the hard work of my last year was about to pay off with an investment that would give us an easy 2 year runway combined with our revenue.  And then I got the email.

I was finishing packing my bag for Sydney and sat down quickly at the computer and there it was.  The email that let me know that my mentor and lead investor had some personal circumstances unfold which meant he was having to withdraw from all investments.  I was assured it was not personal or about the business on any level and he wished me well. And that was that.

I sat at my computer staring at the screen.  In that moment in time I knew I had just lost my mentor, $1.2M and was walking into a world of imagined humiliation I had thought about over and over again.  I had checked that it was ok for me to share this investment was happening and was told yes so it was no secret to pretty much everyone in my life and network.  I was excited, young and naive I guess.

I knew I had to hold it together before I left the house as I didn’t want to frighten my son and walk out the door and him not see me for a few days so I said nothing and packed my bags, kissed my mother-in-law and son goodbye as I got in the car to drive to the event I had agreed to speak at.

As I got in the car and started to drive I just burst out crying.  It was that gut wrenching cry that comes from deep down somewhere. One of the perks of being the founder of a startup that films videos with leading experts around dealing with big feelings and emotions is I knew what I had to do.  

I had to dive in.  I had to allow myself to feel all of the feelings and go there.  I tried to pull myself together once I got out of the car but I was broken and struggling.

I walked into the event and straight to my table where one of my team was waiting for me.  He waved as I was walking towards him and in his friendly as always french accent said, “hello, how are you?” I could barely say a word and somehow mumbled I’m not ok and burst into tears.  He wrapped his arms around me as we stood in the middle of this event surrounded by hundreds of people as he whispered into my ear, “it’s ok to cry I’m here with you”. Let’s just say Guillaume has been our key videopher and filmed 80% of our expert’s videos and knew exactly what to do.

We just stood there hugging as I cried, Guillaume had been on this journey with me from the start.  I showed him the email as I wasn’t able to speak, he knew exactly what this meant to me and he said it’s going to be ok I’m with you.

I managed to pull myself together, got up on the stage, participated in the panel discussion, finished up at the event, got in my car, cried on my way driving to the airport, got on a plane, flew to Sydney, got to my hotel room about 8:30pm where I was finally alone for the first time and then just kept crying.  I replied to the email that evening. I wasn’t angry I was completely devastated.

One minute I had the deal of my dreams on the table I had worked a year of my life towards and it wasn’t just the investment money it was the people as well and in an instant it was gone.  

It had been a really long time since I had experienced real grief but I can tell you the next week of my life was full of grief and extremely personally challenging.  Everything I had been working on the past few months was intertwined with this investment, everybody was across the future plans, we were all excited, plans were being made and not only did I have to deal with my own personal disappointment, as amazing and supportive as my team were, we were all disappointed and the future was unclear for everyone now.

I had, had the rugged pulled out from under me with no offer of support, I had lost $1.2M, I had lost my mentor, I was a sole founder so this was all on me, money was going down, down, down in our personal bank account, my husband had 2 weeks long service leave left and everywhere I turned I had to explain what had happened and start trying to execute plan b, c, and d.

Nearly every document I had created for the business’s future had faces and names and plans which needed to be changed it was pretty overwhelming and I couldn’t escape it.  I won’t go into some of the worst situations I found myself in having to explain what happened but I really would not wish this on anyone.

Despite my worst nightmare becoming a reality and being consumed by grief and a now uncertain future there were moments of light in all this darkness.

Guillaume who had been with me at the event sent me this message once he got home:

🙂

“Hey Sam, you must be at the airport now Just wanted to let you know that we’ll make it work. I believe in Parent TV and most of all, I believe in YOU! And if this tough news means that I have to take the risk and work/help Parent TV for free for an undetermined time, then  I’m in  Smash it in Sydney!”

This was then followed by another message from one of the backbones of ParentTV Britta also known as my work wife:

“You are going to do great things today for your business; and all by yourself! You don’t need anyone; you’ve got this!

You are single handedly going to increase our ARR today and that is because you are incredible.

It feels lonely at the top, but that is because you are a true leader. It’s lonely, but IF you feel weary and if you slip and fall, there is a whole group of people who are just a few steps down ready to catch you and help push you back to the top. We’ve got you.

You are doing great things Sammy.

One step at a time; one day at a time.

😘

As Maggie would say: love you to the moon and back ”

And another message from another of my team Erik who had been with me since the start:

“It makes me so sad to see and hear what you have gone through in the last couple of weeks. I know you are in the arena and so need to “fight” what is in front of you but when people offer to help and then renege on that offer, then that is not a fair fight.

Driving home from church and thinking about what you had told me makes me only more determined to help you in whatever way I can to make PTV the success that I know it will be.”

And a few of the messages some of my ParentTV experts sent me when they heard the news:

❤️

“Always remember Sam-I-Am that everything will be okay in the end. And if it isn’t ok, then it isn’t the end. Love you infinity!!! ”

“You have got this Sam – just a bend in the road!! ❤❤”

““The women I love and admire for their strength and grace did not get that way because shit worked out. They got that way because shit went wrong and they handled it. They handled it a thousand different ways on a thousand different days, but they handled it. Those women are my superheroes.”

And finally my husband who had to deal with one very unstable and emotional wife and mother over this week … trust me when I say it’s not easy being married to a person doing this founder startup thing and after a week of crazyness one night as he walked past me, he stopped me, put his arms around me and whispered in my ear … “I’m with you”.  

After taking a few days to gather my thoughts I emailed my pre-seed investor who is also the chairman of our board to let him know what had happened.  He had met with my mentor/lead investor in person a month or so ago and was across everything that was happening. When he got my email the first thing he did was pick up the phone and call me and when I picked up he just said, “Hi Sam … are you ok?”  I can’t tell you how much it meant for the first words to come out of Graeme’s mouth to be are you ok?  We had a really good chat and he let me know he was with us and he will help with the making of plans b, c and d.

One of the most challenging days for me was about 5 days after I had received the news.  That day was a really, really tough day. It was full of meetings where I had to explain what had happened back to back and when I walked in the door at home at 6pm I had to pick up my 4 year old son and take him to a violin recital for his 2 big sisters.  We were there for 3 hours and didn’t get home until 9pm when I had to put all 3 kids to bed as hubby was out at a meeting that night.

Once I had put the kids to bed I sat down for the first time that day on my own and just quietly started to cry just releasing the emotions of an intense day.  My eldest daughter who is 11 heard me and comes walking out and just looks at me and says: “mum, are you ok?”  I look up at her, tears in my eyes and said, “I’m ok darling, it’s been a really big day for mummy and I’m still having to deal with all the changes in the investment situation for ParentTV and I’m just getting out some of my big feelings” (I had previously told her what had happened).  She walks over to me, hugs me for a bit, kisses me on the head and goes back to bed.  

One of the biggest gifts I know I can give my kids is to be a real life example of trying to live your dreams and failing and getting back up again and failing and getting back up again.  A lack of resilience is one of the biggest issues facing this generation of kids and if I can help my kids understand resilience through being an example of what that looks like then that’s a pretty amazing silver lining for me.

I’m not exactly sure what is going to happen next but you should absolutely know plan b, c and d is underway and if I didn’t know before that I was surrounded by the most amazing team who have shown up and backed me and ParentTV in some pretty dark days then I absolutely know now.

That nightmare. That worst case scenario that happened to me.

I survived it!

And you know what the funny thing is.  ParentTV has been kicking some serious goals this past month and we are really starting to find our groove.  I have never felt more confident that we are exactly where we need to be, doing exactly what we need to be doing and I am sure one day I will look back on all of this and be one of those people that say it’s the best thing that ever happened to me.

Will we ever find a way out of this mess?

by

Last night as I sat on my couch and watched the 60 Minutes story about parents becoming the school bullies I just felt sadness.  When is this all going to stop? Will we ever find a way out of this mess? No one is winning or really getting what they want and it seems we are all getting angrier, more disillusioned and lonelier than ever.

One thing I can tell you above all else is that the parents of this generation really, really love their kids!  I should know as I am one of them myself.

The question I have been trying to answer over the past 8 years after running 2 online parenting communities with 650,000 parents is how is it that a generation of parents who fiercely love and protect their kids in ways we have not seen before is resulting in a generation of children experiencing mental health issues like never before including suicide as the leading cause of death amongst our young people.

What is happening and where are we getting it wrong because the truth is we are getting it wrong and although everything in me says you can’t write that Sam, that’s not helpful for parents they already feel like victims and everyone is blaming them, they are going to stop reading this now because it’s not them (which includes me) it’s society and schools and the media doing it to us.

And this is the key to where I believe we are getting it wrong.

We have lost that sense of we are all in this together and have become an us and them society.  A society that says every person for themselves.

I was reading an article the other day written anonymously by a mother whose daughter had died by suicide.  She was talking about some of the shame around that and trying to process what had happened. She wrote these words that I will never forget:

“If it takes a village to raise a child does it take a village to kill a child”

Here’s the thing, this every person for themselves approach is not really working for us.  We as humans are biologically wired to exist within a community and as the grown ups it’s our responsibility to show our kids what that looks like.

There is a generation of kids out there broken, scared, angry, experiencing levels of anxiety like never before, taking their own lives and they are our kids.

We can no longer bury our heads in the sand or point our fingers at who is to blame, we have to educate ourselves and find out what is going on so we can turn this around.

We live in a world of judgement, whether it be the reality TV shows we watch, our instagram or Facebook feeds, we have been wired to judge nearly everything we see or experience and that comes into how we parent.

The problem with judgement is there is a good and a bad which means someone is to blame.

When you walk this line of good or bad one of two things happen.

  1. You either tell yourself a story trying to process a situation which makes it was someone else’s fault  OR
  2. You tell yourself a story that you are worthless and it’s all your fault which is also not helpful.

What is happening with our kids is actually no individual person’s fault it’s a village issue.  The only way we are going to find our way through this is to stop approaching it as an us and them and to start getting on the same team.

If you are reading this and thinking … “things are out of hand these days, luckily I’m not one of those people”, the truth is you actually are.  I say that because I am too. It’s all of us, it is the culture we live in and it’s become our norm and this has made us blind to who we are and who we are becoming.

I believe education is the key for us to find our way out of this mess.  Education is not about judgement it’s about understanding. We as parents really need to understand what is happening to our kids so we can do something about it.  Getting angry as schools and teachers and other parents gets us nowhere. It just teaches bad behaviour to our kids.

I’m not saying people or institutions are perfect and don’t need to be challenged on how they are approaching situations when it comes to our kids.   I’m saying we have to be clear that we all need to get on the same team … our kid’s team!

We are the grown ups, we have the adult brains, it’s time that we start to educate ourselves about what is happening because our kids are suffering and as hard as this is to say … that’s on us!

Confessions of a seemingly successful start-up 1 year in … what really goes on behind the scenes and what it took to get wherever I am now

by

Hi I’m Sam and I’m the founder of ParentTV. I‘ve recently had a wave of people comment about how rich I must be by now and how I’m smashing it out of the park and how incredible it has been to see ParentTV’s rise to success.

It has been 1 year since ParentTV launched to market and I want to tell you a story. It’s a true story. It’s the story of the last year of my life and what really goes on behind the scenes of seemingly successful startups … or at least what has been going on behind the scenes of mine.

I have had a background as a blogger / social media influencer for the past 8 years and built communities of over 650,000 followers so when I stepped into ParentTV I was very skilled in content and storytelling online. All of the social media updates I have shared about ParentTV have been true however upon reflection the things that helped me the most have been people’s untold stories that don’t make it into the highlights reel. I want to share those stories of mine with you.

I have no doubt that I wouldn’t be where I am today without the community of people who have showed up for me via phone calls, accidental meet ups, coffee dates, formal meetings, blog posts and books. The gratitude I feel in my heart for some of these people is so intense it nearly makes me want to cry. If this blog post can help even one other person who is in the arena whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood but is giving it a go anyway then this is one way I can pay forward the incredible generosity people have given to me.

So the big question … am I rolling in all of the money and smashing it out of the park and taking over the world?? Not quite yet 🙂

I have been working on ParentTV for 2 years to date and still have not taken a wage. To get to where I am today I have invested around $80,000 of our own cash and that does not include the opportunity cost of my time for the past 2 years. To add to this my husband finished up his job at the end of last year to join our team and be around to support our 3 children more. He took 6 months part-time long service leave that finishes in about 3 months. We are currently living off this and my School Mum blog / influencer community income that is decreasing by the month due to my full attention now being on ParentTV.

Our children go to state schools, we are very grateful for Australia’s public healthcare system, I shop at ALDI lol, camping is our favourite kind of holiday and luckily I have little desire to upgrade the TV we bought 15 years ago. I am living as simply as I can right now as I stare into the abyss of what is our unknown future holding only hope and a dream in my heart that if I can just listen hard enough and exist for long enough ParentTV can truly make a difference and turn the mental health and suicide epidemic around for the next generation of kids. It’s completely insane but I’m doing it anyway. In about 3 months things are going to get interesting hahahaha … having run my own businesses for the last 10 years as much as I am a bit freaked out I also know we humans under pressure can solve what seems like impossible problems. That’s what this whole start-up thing is about isn’t it?

I hope that answers that question!

So what has been going on behind the scenes of ParentTV over the past year?

I clearly remember sitting across from Paul Mansfield at a one-on-one session I won with him after winning the Pitchblak demo pitch night (the first proper pitch I ever did). For those who are wondering who the heck is Paul Mansfield, as he is an under the radar kind of guy, he is an extremely successful Brisbane based tech entrepreneur who has built and exited multiple tech companies including Cloud Sherpas and Skedulo. As I was sitting across from him on this particular day I remember saying how I was pretty solid as a person and not too high maintenance as I have a background in social work / counselling and had done a lot of work on myself to date. I really believed that with all of my heart but little did I know what was about to unfold.

(The first time I met Paul)

I have never in my life felt so exposed and vulnerable presenting ParentTV to customers and investors knowing that if I could not get them on my team I could not succeed because for this idea to exist it needed more than just me. I had to do so many things I had never done before and found myself in a world I understood very little about.

Looking back now I realise that the work for me as a founder in my early days had very little to do with my actual business and absolutely everything to do with me as a person. Before I could accelerate ParentTV I needed to accelerate myself to be able to lead this company and this is where I had to learn the really big lesson.

Despite the fact that I had successfully founded multiple businesses in the past and built communities of over 650,000 parents, been the primary breadwinner for my family for a couple of years and was quite a capable person deep down I didn’t believe that I was enough to pull this off.

I thought there was an us and them and I was just a mum of 3 kids who lived in Redcliffe who got lucky a couple of times. I had never worked in fancy corporate jobs or managed hundreds of people or … or … or … I had a double degree in Human Services and Theology and started out my career in social work. I knew I was capable, I knew I had grit, I knew I had grip, I knew my ideas were good but I did not know that I was enough to do the big stuff like they do.

Paul Mansfield who I mentioned earlier kindly agreed to mentor me after our initial one-on-one catchup. For most of our first year he had been teaching and guiding me through the ins and outs of raising capital, investors, terms sheet negotiations along with numerous other things.

I can still hear myself on the phone to Paul only 3 weeks ago after calling him so excited that I’d managed to finally put together the terms for a substantial deal on the table with some overseas investors and when I went through it with him he replied …
“oh Sam you have no idea the potential consequences of what you are just about to do”! It was like a punch in the guts and I literally said to him on the phone … “Paul I’m just a mum from Redcliffe with 3 kids, I need them because I don’t know what I’m doing … you have spent enough time with me now do you think I am capable enough to do this?” I can’t remember what he said as that conversation is a blur but I do know he never saved me from myself as I believe he knew the only way I could survive and lead this company was to do the work myself to realise I was just like them and I was enough and there was nothing anybody could say to me which would change that … I had to do the work.

There is this thing called mentor fatigue and I think it’s when you as a founder annoy the crap out of your mentor and it’s a problem. I could see this unfolding in front of my eyes and I needed to do something or I was going to burn out the very people who were so generously trying to help me.

In comes Nick Bowditch. It was at the start of this year (2019) that things were really starting to spiral out of control for me in terms of my feelings and thinking about my ability to build ParentTV into a successful company. One night I was sitting at my computer and I got a marketing email from Nick (I was on his mailing list) about getting a 3 week coaching package. I had met Nick a few years back at a conference we were both speaking at. He’s well known for being the only guy in Australia who has worked for both Facebook and Twitter and he now speaks a lot about mental health and the power of storytelling.

I needed help in the business with some of our social media strategy and thought Nick would be a good help for that. One thing I know is that if you want things to be different you have to do things you have never done before. I had never paid for coaching before and I knew I had to give my mentors a break or I was going to burn them out and I liked the idea of paying someone to coach me as it wasn’t a favour I was asking. This meant I wouldn’t feel bad constantly asking for help because they were being paid to help.

Coaching with Nick was a game changer. After 1 session I signed up to work with him on demand for a few months which was a little pricey but I needed it. I really struggled to do it as I was trying to conserve every dollar we had in the bank but at the same time I knew I needed help. That money has been the best money I spent.

For the past 2 months Nick and I have been having weekly Skype catch-ups for 90 minutes and then on demand support through text and messenger and on the phone. I thought I was working with Nick to help me with my social media strategy but what ended up happening was all about me. He helped me reframe my thinking and asked me some hard questions. He was in disbelief about how I talked about myself and the stories I would make up trying to fill in gaps when there was silence. There is so much waiting and silence when you are a founder trying to create something from nothing. You have to do all the work trying to convince people to pay attention and get on your team and the thing is there are 1000 other founders trying to convince those same people to get on their team. When you don’t hear back from people straight away you start to create stories in your head about why. For months Nick would stop me in my tracks and say … “Sam, focus on fact”!!

I can’t exactly put my finger on the moment it happened but somehow I woke up and my lens had changed, I realised that my stories were just that … stories. For the first time in my life I knew that I was enough and I didn’t need to be rescued because the reality was I was just like them … we all are … HUMAN. Words cannot describe my past few weeks because it wasn’t just about ParentTV it was about everything. It was about me as a mother and never feeling good enough, as a wife, as a friend … all of it and everything … I was striving so hard for my whole life to get to the point of being enough.

My whole entire life I have been telling myself a story that I don’t fit anywhere, that I’m different, that I’m an outsider and I just need to accept that reality, and because of that I will never be like them … I will never be enough. Here’s the thing I realised … in a way that is true but there is another side to that story and I can choose how I tell it. Hi I’m Sam and I actually fit everywhere … you see I’m a connector that is my superpower along with reverse parking haha. It’s not that I am not this OR that … I am this AND that. My whole entire life I have been connecting people … all different kinds of people from all different walks of life and that’s the thing that makes my heart sing the most. Wow that’s a different story to start telling yourself and it took me 35 years to get there.

Here’s where this story really gets funny. Over the past 15 months while I was literally emotionally exposed, overwhelmed and struggling to believe that I was enough, this is a list of what I achieved all while juggling the needs of my three children (11, 8 + 4) with my hubby …

Raised $450,000
Hired a tech team to build the ParentTV platform in 3 months
Signed 20 of Australia’s leading parenting educators to ParentTV
Signed 4 of America’s leading parenting educators to ParentTV
Signed 2 of Canada’s leading parenting educators to ParentTV
Flew across the country and the globe and filmed over 450 videos with said experts
Signed 45 paying childcare centers
Signed 30 paying schools in Australia
Signed a network of 20 afterschool care centers
Signed 20 paying childcare centers in America
Signed the Foster in Texas network in the USA
Signed a childcare center in New Zealand
Signed a childcare center in the UK
Grew our team to a staff of 5
Signed up over 500 individual paying parents
Generated more than $100ARR
Maintained my School Mum and ALDI Mum communities and did weekly sponsored posts and content as my source of income as I am yet to draw a wage from ParentTV.

And all the while really struggling with my own personal demons around whether I was enough.

As I sit here and look back on the last year of my life and question if I think this mum of 3 from Redcliffe is enough to build ParentTV into the company I know it can be. I’m not sure if it will always be the case but for now yes I absolutely am enough to do this. In fact I’m pretty sure I’m the only person for the job right now considering it’s my vision.

Coming to this understanding was something I could only do myself however I had a team of cheerleaders and guides around me the whole time showing me the way.

I was at a lunch last week with Leanne Kemp who was recently appointed the Qld Chief Entrepreneur. That woman is incredible! She spoke about many things and one of the key things was about the importance of the start-up ecosystem not relying on government funding and how as founders and entrepreneurs we need to support each other and be one phone call away in those moments when you really need to phone a friend.

I have not done an accelerator program for ParentTV or received any Government assistance to date. One thing I can tell you is I got to where I am because truth be told I’m a borderline workaholic and was very fortunate to have had some amazing mentors, advisors and successful founders show me kindness for no gain of their own over the past year. I want them to know that their wisdom and time made a huge difference for me and this is partly why I am here today.

I also want to share with you what I have learned from them in case you have not been fortunate enough to spend time with those who have gone before us …

So to the people below THANKYOU whether it was 2 minutes of your time or replying to my never ending text messages it mattered and I want to encourage you to keep giving even a little bit of time to founders starting out like me because it matters!

Luke Anear (Founder Safety Culture) – Gave me a little of his time over the past year and I remember him saying to me clearly “Be careful you don’t give away too much equity too early and know your value”

James Colquhoun (Founder of FMTV) – I had a 2 minute introduction to James at the launch of their new documentary series and all I can remember is him looking me in the eyes and quite intensely saying … “Just keep going … just keep going” and then he was off.

Glen Richards (Petbarn/Sharktank) – I was fortunate to get a few one on one meetings with Glen over the past year and one of the questions I asked him was how did he do all of the things and keep his family together over the years. He said to me he made a promise to his wife in the crazy years when he was building that he would be home every Friday to Sunday night no questions asked but between Mon-Fri he could be anywhere. He kept that promise.

Adrian Osman (Pitchblak / Mr Yum) – Everyone needs a phone a friend any time day or night who knows a bit (or alot) more than you and can calm you down and normalize all of the big crazy feelings you are having.  Adrian has been that for me.  He was there from the start and has walked this entire journey as one of my biggest cheerleaders.

Nick Bowditch (Facebook/Twitter)– My key takeaway from our time together … Make sure I keep asking myself is that a story I am telling myself or is it fact? … focus on fact!

Steve Baxter (PIPE Networks / Shark tank) – I have had a number of conversations with Steve over the past year and I have come to have a deep respect for Steve as someone who shows up and puts him money where his mouth is. Steve is known for speaking his mind and has challenged me on a number of occasions and once in particular about how I viewed the VC/founder relationship. He really changed my perspective to stop viewing it as “losing equity” but rather gaining a strategic partner who was invested alongside of me to help me grow the business.

Kim Jackson (Skip Capital) – I sent Kim an email and she replied. Thanks for replying Kim! She then went onto the ParentTV platform and created an account and had an experience of ParentTV. A few days later Kim Jackson randomly called me on the phone and said how she thought what I created was pretty great. That phone call meant a lot Kim 🙂

Brene Brown – It was 2 ½ years ago when I read “Braving the wilderness” by Brene Brown and that was the catalyst which caused me to blow up my life and start my ParentTV journey. I have since read her Dare To Lead book and strongly encourage any founder out there to read it and all of her work it is life and game changing. She is one of the leading voices when it comes to leading with vulnerability. I am one of those people who is honest about all of the things (if you haven’t noticed haha) and is constantly living in vulnerability. I often tell myself a story that potential investors, my team, my mentors, our customers or anyone thinks I am weak and emotional and high maintenance because I’m honest and vulnerable most of the time. Thanks Brene for being that voice in my head telling me that the world needs brave humans willing to be vulnerable and that it’s actually a sign of true strength.

Simon Sinek – I have followed Simon Sinek for a while online and have found his teachings to be really helpful when it comes to leading other people in my team. Things like …

– When we take care of our people, our people take care of our business.
– To drive sales, make a pitch. To build loyalty, make a friend.
– Leadership is not about being in charge. Leadership is about takin care of those in your charge.
– A true leader’s focus is beyond their own personal success. True leaders want to help those around them succeed.

Paul Mansfield (Cloud Sherpas / Skedulo) – Paul gets a special mention as he has been a key mentor for me over the past year. Fortunately or unfortunately for Paul he had no idea of the crazy he was signing up for when he offered to help but I think it’s safe to say we survived the first year and fingers crossed I think I am through the super annoying, high maintenance and quite needy toddler phase lol. Mentor fatigue is a real thing and as start-up founders we have to be mindful of that.

The level of wisdom, value and insight Paul has given to be over the past year has no price tag. Below are a few of his gems that have helped me which might help you too.

– Be deliberate, not desperate
– If you get your foundations wrong you can never recover
– In the position I was in when I got started (3 kids and a husband) you either sacrifice some of your company (equity) to get the help you need, or you sacrifice your family trying to do it all
– Don’t take money from people who need this to work
– Don’t take money from people if they don’t have money to lose
– Calm down you have 5 years
– You need a team or it is going to come crashing down
– Stop worrying about the wrong things
– Terms are only a problem when you are not doing well
– 10% esop is a must
– When you finally agree to take substantial investment for equity view it as I’ve finally got a board to support me and hold me accountable which generally brings better results rather than keeping the mindset of I’m a sole trader running this ship.

Graeme Wise (The Body Shop Australia Founder / ParentTV founding investor) – I partially can’t believe that Graeme has not gotten a mention until now. If it was not for this man there would have been no real story to tell. It’s the interesting thing about Graeme he is such a humble man who has been in the Sam Jockel stadium this whole time cheering me on. I worked for his foundation over 10 years ago but never met him personally. I accidently called the wrong Alex which resulted in having a meeting with Graeme one week later. I walked out of that meeting with $200,000 investment into ParentTV based on the idea and prototype I paid to have built. Graeme knew I was enough the day I met him and he has believed that ever since. He has since followed on with another $250,000 investment.

Graeme has taught me …

– To trust myself and follow my instincts as it got me this far and will take me further
– To be wary of people who think they know what I should do next based on their position or experience doing something similar years ago
– To see value and opportunity in younger people starting out in their careers willing to learn and be molded
– To employ a mini-me asap so I can get some support for everything I am doing as he believed me burning out was the biggest risk to the business (happy to report I found her and her name is Britta or otherwise internally known as my work wife 🙂

As my founding investor, Graeme has never put pressure on me. He occasionally asks me when my last holiday was and has never told me what to do. He has told me on a number of occasions that it’s clear I know what I am doing and he trusts me but has also made himself available anytime I need his advice or opinion. I secretly call him my Yoda investor. I realise Graeme is not your average investor but what I will say being on the founder side of this kind of investor is that more than anything I want to honour Graeme and his investment into ParentTV and belief in me. His approach has only driven me to want to succeed even more out of immense gratitude for the trust that he has put in me without restrictive terms.

We are currently over 4000 words and you are probably asking yourself will this post ever end haha.

I need to give a quick mention to my team … Erik, Britta, Simon, Guillaume, Daniel, Lachlan, Adrian, Stu thank you for going on this adventure with me. Thank you for showing up, giving your best and sticking with me through my personal ups and downs this year. This may have started with my vision but what has been created is a result of a team effort. I can’t wait to see what unfolds for us in year 2 of ParentTV.

So hereth end this ridiculously long post. I hope it was helpful. I have no idea what is going to happen next for ParentTV. I have my roadmap and a clear understanding of our market and the problem we are currently solving. Our vision and mission have become clear to show up for parents, principals, teachers and childcare workers saying we are here to serve … how can we help because the one thing I can tell you with absolute certainty is they need all the help they can get right now. I am also entering year 2 with a belief that I am enough to captain this ship for the time being.

I spent year 1 accelerating myself and now it’s time to accelerate ParentTV.

If you are a founder or entrepreneur and are curious to know more about my story and the last 10 years of my life leading up to ParentTV here is a keynote I gave recently telling all of the back story (no holding back haha).

If you are a person who supports founders, entrepreneurs or artists on a community level here is a similar keynote I gave recently with insights into what was helpful.