Today we’d like to introduce you to Alyson Miller-Greenfield.
Hi Alyson, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Thank you for this opportunity to reflect on my career. It has indeed been a Voyage!
I’ve had two lifelong passions: one is entrepreneurial and creative, the urge to build something cohesive and meaningful from the ground up, and the other is being of service, the pursuit of the spiritual principle of Tikkun Olam (the Jewish tradition of “repairing the world.”) At the center of both passions is the human experience, exploring it in as many diverse ways as possible, and finding meaning in it so I can make a positive impact. In my early days, rather than having a specific career plan I centered myself in these values and goals and opened myself to a range of opportunities.
My company, in partnership with my husband Don Greenfield, is Venture Growth, LLC, a marketing and growth consultancy to entrepreneurs and social venture leaders. As a businessperson I guess you could say I am an odd duck. I was not raised to believe that success was about material accumulation. Rather, my parents and other role models were mostly in service. So I came to the different understanding that success was about using my gifts and experience to benefit others. Being a contributor to the community and in my little part of the world is a major driver, as is the satisfaction of working with kindred people who are creative changemakers.
During the Pandemic I was also able to launch a dream project that had been incubating for a long time: www.tellyourstory.com. I have invited women across the globe to share multi-media stories on how they have made personal peace with various life challenges. The overall mission is to help women Make Peace Personal – so they can bring peacemaking skills to their families, their communities and to the world at large. I have bootstrapped the first phase with my own funds (creating the website and sharing sample stories). Now I am embarking on seeking funding sponsors to scale up the effort: to engage more partners, more storytellers, outreach more, provide more stories and launch online, on-demand training in personal peacemaking skills.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Honestly, I’ve never experienced a routine or one day like another – more of a curvy mountain road – and I love that! I worked in civil rights advocacy and bias incident response, entrepreneurial education, several of my own businesses (including an entrepreneurial training center in Boulder and our entrepreneurial consulting practice). I’ve also provided volunteer and pro bono services to social justice causes, and initiated community-building groups and resilience training in the communities in which I’ve lived.
The challenges have provided lessons and growth too. Wading into problem-solving of any kind – in business, in service, in relationships and communities – invariably has put me in touch with conflict. Emotions run high, people become stressed, and change is much harder for people even when they seek it, so I as the messenger, guide or leader have caught flak from time to time. Also, while accomplishing goals can be exhilarating, most folks have to muddle through the pain of resistance and periodic self-doubt along the way to personal growth, venture growth, and celebration. I empathize.
Personally, the greatest challenge in recent years has been a medical odyssey, due to my husband being diagnosed with a rare, chronic disease. At times I have had to assume the role of caretaker, and we both have had to scale back our extensive activities. We have had to adapt to major lifestyle changes but have taken this as a creative project as well. We have reinvented our life to some degree!
I have grown enormously through these experiences and relationships with so many different kinds of people. We ALL have experienced traumas in our lives – deep valleys – as well as the breathtaking mountaintops – peak experiences. Both professionally and personally life has been and continues to be, expansive. Embracing it all – even when the experiences and feelings are opposites and paradoxical – is like a great puzzle. And anyone who knows me knows I love a good puzzle!
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
In our Venture Growth world every client brings a new set of challenges. Though there are commonalities in terms of business development and marketing strategies to affect growth, the mission and goal of each organization varies widely. We’ve worked in technical fields – the commercialization of software, applications, medical devices, food products, and scientific discoveries, and worked with more conventional retail, service, and online types of businesses. We have also consulted to nonprofits on strategic planning, communications, and fundraising.
Most of the people we work with are experts in their own fields, who want to grow their customers and clients, their product/service lines, their revenues, and their social impact. We are brought in to help them to plan strategically how to get “from here to there,” and sort priorities in actions and resource deployment.
At the heart of it all is facilitating CHANGE. You know how you want to be skinny or wealthy but are daunted by what it takes to reach those goals? It is human paradox that we often want a result and at the same time resist the changes necessary to get there. I’d say that is the biggest challenge our clients face – and by extension, our biggest challenge as change agents.
Both Don and I have always recognized the power of storytelling in building relationships of trust. Listening to our clients and relating our own experiences and those of other clients, we can usually normalize stressful situations that can be otherwise isolating for leaders of businesses and organizations. Even when I was a kid, other kids and adults – some familiar and some strangers – would feel comfortable telling me their stories. I am a decent listener but more than anything my curiosity apparently puts off a welcoming “tell me vibe”. As a result, I’ve come to understand that while we are all motivated by similar instincts – to love and be loved, to see and be seen, to have our basic needs and those of our loved ones be met, and to make some mark on the world while we are here, a legacy of some kind – we express those desires in a wide variety of ways. More than any business principle or service principle, having empathy for others as we walk in the world has compelled me forward.
Networking and finding a mentor can have such a positive impact on one’s life and career. Any advice?
I have been blessed with many mentors at different stages of life. I can see clearly how they have contributed, each in their own way, to my thinking, worldview, personal growth and professional accomplishments.
Without being completely “woo-woo” in explanation of how I found them, I do believe that each has shown up right when I needed them most. So being open and paying attention to those you encounter is very important. Is someone in your realm right now “speaking your language” – expressing views that align with your own? Are they further along in their development than you? Do they have something – a very specific skill or contact or knowledge – that if shared could advance your venture or cause to the next step? I use the word “specific” because seeking a mentor for general support is much more difficult if seeking that relationship with a stranger.
In turn, I have mentored wonderful people over the years. It is a big commitment on the part of both the mentor and the mentee. Respecting each other’s time and using it wisely is important. My advice would be to start with what you need most and have the least access to, and look at people who have some knowledge of you and your work. A good introduction is always helpful too.
The ask – and it should be crafted as an ask – should include a brief of your story (this is what I built or created, this is where I am in that process due to my own investment of effort and money, these are the challenges I’ve faced, and how I’ve overcome them to date.) Then the to-the-point question: this is the one specific challenge I’m wrestling with now and I wonder if you would be willing to (one of these): brainstorm it with me, walk me through your own thinking about it, connect me to someone with experience dealing with it, coach me for a specific period of time as I work it through myself, join my steering committee, join my Board, point me to someone I can hire to address the issue, hook me up with some other resource who might be able to help.)
Don’t take it personally if the ask is rejected in any way – you may not know why. My husband has a great saying regarding asking for what you want and need: “some will, some won’t, no worries, move on.”
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Website: www.venturegrowth.com
- Other: www.tellyourstory.com
Image Credits
Top Left: Alyson Miller-Greenfield, Founder / Lead Consultant, Venture Growth, LLC Top Right: Don Greenfield, Co-Founder, Venture Growth, LLC Bottom Left: Venture Growth/PivotGuild hosts New Product Meetup Bottom Right: Venture Growth Accountability Group Members
