Ashley Moy joins The Savvy Entrepreneur to share how Cast21 is making radical improvements on the traditional orthopedic cast for breaks & fractures.
The novel cast is lighter, waterproof and more comfortable than traditional plastic and fiberglass casts. It takes only three minutes to apply, and has a open lattice net-like design. That design is hard for support, yet open so that the skin is accessible and air can circulate. Plus it comes in several cool colors! 
The idea came about when Ashley and her co-founder participated in an accelerator program at the University of Illinois. Her co-founder, a gymnast with a birth defect, had been in 60 different casts, and knew first-hand how miserable they can be.
Their flagship product is a wrist or arm cast and sold in the U.S., but as you’ll hear in Ashley’s interview, the opportunities for new products and new markets are enormous.
That said, creating a novel new medical device — especially in the U.S. — is no easy task. Designing, manufacturing, marketing, and dealing with a host of regulatory issues, Ashley and her co-founder have carefully but determinedly pushed on.
Cast21’s story is inspirational and Ashley’s interview is full of great tips.
A transcript of our interview follows, or you can listen to the original show by going here.
Doris Nagel 0:12
Hello out there all you entrepreneurs and small businesspeople! You are listening to The Savvy Entrepreneur Show.
I’m Doris Nagel, your host for the next hour.
The show has two goals first, to share helpful information and resources. I don’t know about you, but I’ve made a lot of mistakes as an entrepreneur over the years. And I truly, truly want to help some of you out there not make some of those same mistakes.
The show is also intended to inspire. I found at least being an entrepreneur is confusing. It’s often lonely. Sometimes you have no idea if you’re on the right track or not, or where to turn for great advice.
To help with both those goals, I have guests on the show every week, more willing to share their stories and their advice. And with me this week is Ashley Moy. She is the CEO and Co-founder of a very cool company called Cast21.
They make a lighter, waterproof and comfortable cast alternative to traditional plastic and fiberglass casts. And it takes only three minutes to apply and has a open lattice net like design that leaves the skin accessible and allows air to circulate under the cast.
I’m sure Ashley will amplify on that. And I’m sorry that we are audio only. When I do the podcast version of this, I will include a picture that will help you really visualize it.
Ashley, thanks so much for being with me today. Welcome to The Savvy Entrepreneur Show.
Ashley Moy 2:00
I’m so excited to be here. Thank you for having me.
Doris Nagel
First, talk a little bit more about your business. I did a little introduction, but talk about Cast21, your product, and why you decided to make this product.
Ashley Moy 2:17
Cast21’s flagship product is a waterproof alternative to a cast or brace.
As you mentioned, we have the only product on the market that can be applied in seconds to minutes. With no modern day luxuries such as heat, water, electricity or scanners, were able to achieve a really nice moldable fit despite not requiring any of these modern day luxuries.
We also have the only product that is really customized and uniquely designed for each individual patient, which we’re really proud of. We started this company because our co-founder has actually been in over 60 casts and braces in his lifetime.
Doris Nagel
Oh no!
Ashley Moy
Yep, that is not a misspeak. That is six zero different castes and braces.
Doris Nagel
Is he like Evil Knievel or something and doing motorcycle stunts, or what?
Ashley Moy 3:14
Close! He’s a gymnast, actually, and he was also born with a birth defect. And together, he’s worn casts all over his body. And actually, he continues to wear braces every single day of his life and will continue to do so until he has a limb amputation. Yeah, crazy, right?
Doris Nagel
Well, obviously there’s somebody who knows the market. If anybody knows what it’s like and the bad things about a traditional cast this person certainly knows!
Ashley Moy 3:48
100%! And we were talking about all of the hardships that he was going through, and just as a passion project, we decided to try to create something better for him.
And then on a whim, we decided to enter into a collegiate competition for new business ideas. And we won!
So we decided to keep entering in business competitions as students at the University of Illinois, and we kept winning and doing really well.
And that’s when we realized we didn’t just create a new product for our Co-founder when he inevitably needed a new cast, but we have really disrupted a centuries old industry and provided value for people up and down the ecosystem chain.
Doris Nagel
Like I said, it’s really too bad people can’t see it, but do your best to describe it because it really looks kind of it’s very unique.
I happened to see Ashley’s product when I was down at mHub [Chicagp] for their recent birthday celebration. The first thing I noticed first of was the cool colors it comes in. That was very cool.
But it’s also got this like open lattice design. Talk more about that.
Ashley Moy 5:06
For everyone who’s listening and trying to visualize what this looks like, imagine the netting that sometimes comes around fruit. It has that diamond structure and its stretches around each different fruit item, and then really hugs, or contours, the different shapes of the fruit.
This principle is very similar to what we use in order to get great fits around patients bodies.
Doris Nagel
Yes. It’s hard, but it’s also open.
And I’m sure that has a number of advantages. I’m guessing not only that it only takes a few minutes, or a few seconds, to apply, and that it’s custom made. And comes in cool colors.
But my guess is because of this lattice, the skin gets more air. I mean, most of us have seen traditional casts when they come off of people and their skin looks kind of like a prune – the skin is pretty yucky looking underneath.
So I’m guessing this less design helps get air to your skin, and that helps with healing?
Ashley Moy 6:18
That’s absolutely right. It helps get air circulation around the skin.
Some patients always say that our product is not itchy at all, which is partially because of those open lattice structures.
And what’s really unique about this particular design is that air can not only flow around it, but other fluids like water when you’re showering, or maybe you’re going to jump into the cold ocean.
And now the water goes over the product and around it. And there’s spaces for this liquid to exit or egress the cast as well. So it doesn’t stay soggy on your body.
Doris Nagel
And I noticed somebody on your website had made a comment that it your cast was great, because you could still scratch an itch, which I thought was pretty funny. But if you’ve ever had an itch that just was driving you crazy, I’m sure this makes a difference.
Ashley Moy 7:15
Absolutely. And what’s nice about this design is that we actually eliminate a lot of the reasons why patients would want to scratch in traditional cast. We have patients tell us that they don’t itch at all with this technology.
That’s partially attributed to the fact that you can have your dead skin cells wash away. You don’t have to have your pores clogged by sweat or bacteria buildup, either.
Doris Nagel
Talk about how you designed this product and then got it manufactured.
It’s one thing to have an idea, but then to be able to take it and produce something that can be mass-produced is another challenge, right?
Ashley Moy 7:59
Absolutely. And also part of the fun is not just the challenge of creating not just one product, but how do we create 1000s 10 of 1000s of different products that can help people everywhere.
We take a balanced approach, keeping in mind the users needs as well as the engineering necessities for the different products.
Doris Nagel
When did you when did you start the company? How long has it been in existence?
Ashley Moy 8:29
Cast21 has been around since 2016. We officially incorporated our business as part of an accelerator program.
Doris Nagel
You and I were chatting just a little bit before the show started about the University of Illinois, where we’re both alumni. They had a number of resources there. Talk about how you were able to tap into some of the resources there.
Ashley Moy 8:55
I feel so privileged that our alma mater, the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, had so many wonderful resources available to entrepreneurs, and to student entrepreneurs in particular.
It’s so interesting. When I left the collegiate environment and ask people for advice, they would always say things like, “Oh, go talk to your network,” or “Raise money from the people you know.”
But I was a college student and the person in the dorm room across the hall was not going to be able to underwrite a medical device company!
And so having all the wonderful programs available through the university at no extra cost to us was a fabulous learning experience. They had courses that we could take, they had supplemental projects that we could go through, they had a mentorship program. They also had some really sophisticated programs for consulting and accelerating and launching your business.
Doris Nagel
That’s fantastic! I’m glad to know some of my hard-earned tax dollars are going to support that.
But back to the manufacture of the product. How did you go from prototype to actually producing your product. What was that process like?
Ashley Moy 10:24
Oh, my goodness, what a story there! I’ll try to make it as short as possible.
I’ll start by saying when we make medical device products, there are certain quality standards that are very important for the users and for regulatory bodies. So making sure that we partnered with these people was very, very important to us – it was mission critical.
We reached out to different regulatory bodies to see which organizations were following the guidelines already, and had the capabilities that we knew we needed in order to create the product that everybody’s using today.
Doing that process with the regulatory bodies was very helpful. It helped to narrow down our search for partners in a really quick way, compared to some of our peers.
Doris Nagel
I’m not sure where this was manufactured. But I will say that geographically, you probably had some pretty good alternatives to at least consider locally, because the Chicagoland area — not everybody knows this – but it’s a pretty strong hub for medical companies and medical device companies in general, right?
Ashley Moy 11:40
Absolutely. We actually now — fast forward six years — are the manufacturer of our product. We’re the listed manufacturer for our device, based here in Chicago.
Doris Nagel
Wow. Good for you!
You mentioned the regulatory bodies. Is your product regulated by the FDA? And if so, how did that affect your timeline and the cost to get to market?
Ashley Moy 12:06
Great question. Our product is registered and listed with the FDA. I use the word parallel very loosely here when I say what we received was parallel to a clearance or an approval.
We did not have to go through the 510K process or the GMP process, which was very nice for us. But I would say, to your point about the marketing, that’s a little bit of a double-edged sword.
So while we did not have to go through all of the hoops and hurdles that come with a 510K submission,
Doris Nagel
And the expense! Sorry to interrupt, but that’s the reality.
Ashley Moy 12:45
Absolutely.
But the other side of that is [that] we don’t have that FDA clearance or approval when we go to market to say this is the level of regulation by the FDA.
So we ended up doing the tests anyway that the FDA would have required for a higher level medical device. That way, we could definitively and empirically show that our product functions as intended.
Doris Nagel
It’s a horrible process to go through. Pull aside any of your friends or colleagues who have been through the process, and they will regale you with stories of how much it cost, and how long it took, and how much back and forth it required Most people engaging with the FDA, do not view it as a very pleasant experience.
But as you say, once you have it, people say, “Oh, well all right then! No more questions. We know you’ve already been through the ringer!”
But you essentially decide to go through the equivalent of the process to address questions from a marketing standpoint?
Ashley Moy 14:00
Correct.
I’m not sure if any of your listeners are familiar with the book “Crossing the Chasm”, but it talks about how those early adopters will always be really interested in trying new things.
But for the healthcare industry, one that is very risk averse, is a wonderful way to show that your product is functioning as intended.
Doris Nagel
Who are your customers? As we chatted a little bit before the show, the problem with selling medical devices — especially new medical devices, at least in the United States — is that there’s a lot of different decision makers and potential buyers, people that touch the process.
So who are your primary buyers?
Ashley Moy 14:53
The doctors and their practice or office managers are the people that we sell products to.
So for any patients out there who may be interested in this, we cannot sell this directly to you.
We do not encourage you to try to treat your own broken by yourself – go to your doctor!
Doris Nagel
So I guess what you have is what some people in the business described as a physician preference product, where you kind of go around the whole mass buying process for hospitals and emergency rooms.
Talk a little more about how you’ve navigated some of those touch points, or plan to.
Ashley Moy 15:38
We work up and down the chain, depending on the organization.
If you’re listening to this and also work in healthcare, you’re probably rolling your eyes in agreement, when I say that no two healthcare systems purchase the exact same way, even if they try to put parallel processes in place.
In fact, even within healthcare systems, [different departments and parts of the system] will not even purchase similarly.
So we really took it upon ourselves to be bespoke, and to be available for whatever the organization needs, in order to ensure that the patient can get the product. So we maintain that flexibility.
Doris Nagel
So how do you go about selling and marketing your product?
One of the one of the advantages of these large buying organizations in our healthcare system in the US is that, if you can make inroads in one of them, then you’re kind of on the preferred list.
By going directly to the physicians, you can kind of get around some of that, because they may see products and decide they’ve just gotta have this product. And a lot of them have enough sway in the system that they can do that.
But the downside is that you’re not getting to the masses as quickly. Talk about that balance and set of challenges.
Ashley Moy 16:58
You hit on something really important that I know a lot of entrepreneurs think about: how do I balance my speed to market and success there with getting it to as many places with as many users or as customers as possible?
For us, we made the conscious decision to not use the big purchasing organizations – or GPIOs — immediately out of the gate as we were starting as an organization.
This is the thought process that we had: First of all, we have a brand new technology. And while it’s incredibly simple and quick to use, there is a learning process to this.
The GPOs are not responsible for training the users. All they do is ensure that your product is in their catalog system if someone wants to buy it. And when we first started, we certainly did not have the sales force necessary to go out and follow up with all the purchases that would be made on these platforms.
Secondly, we really valued speed –data speed to information. And some of these GPO contracts could be very difficult and time consuming [if we had decided to go that route].
Doris Nagel
Having been some of that in my past career, I can say it’s a nightmare. It’s not something I miss it all, I can tell you.
Ashley Moy 18:23
We’ve heard some horror stories, probably putting it lightly, of some people navigating that process.
So for us, just starting out, we were able to get information feedback more quickly going to the doctors themselves. And when we were first starting, that fast user and customer feedback was way, way more important to us than anything else. We needed to validate our hypotheses around our organization and around the product that we knew people wanted, but we wanted to ensure that we were actually delivering what they wanted
Doris Nagel
That makes sense. Did that process result in any changes? Or did it just validate that you’re really on the right track?
Ashley Moy 19:07
So yes, and yes.
As I mentioned, we really try to maintain our flexibility to be available for whatever the healthcare systems need.
And now we are in some purchasing programs to be available for those larger academic centers or healthcare systems, but we still will sell directly to physicians as well.
Doris Nagel
How have you found funding to do what you’ve done? You mentioned winning some pitch competitions, which I’m sure Oh, and that you didn’t actually have to go through the full FDA 510 K process, but you did a lot of work anyway. And still medical devices and and, you know, doing the, the just getting getting started and getting feedback and changing things. And it costs a lot of money more than you probably expected, right?
Ashley Moy 20:02
Oh, my goodness, I tell people now, however much money and time you think it’s going to take, quadruple and double that, and you’ll still be off target.
We had to go out and raise money. As I mentioned, we started our company as undergraduate students, and there was no way we personally were going to bootstrap this company by ourselves. Building a physical product company is expensive. Building a regulated physical product company is even more expensive.
And so we ended up raising venture capital, we did angel investments, and we applied for public and private grants.
Doris Nagel
Talk about the angel investing and venture capital process.
Ashley Moy 20:52
I’d like to clarify for everybody who’s listening here. I think a lot of early entrepreneurs think angel investors are perhaps less savvy, or more willing to give money earlier.
But that is certainly not necessarily the case. It does not qualify anybody in any direction to be called an angel investor.
I think the important distinction here is that an angel investor invests their own money, whereas a venture capitalist invests and manages other people’s money.
Just as we entrepreneurs go out and raise money and then decide to spend it on different items to be successful as an organization, a venture capitalist does the exact thing, same thing. They raise money from others, and then deploy it into different portfolio companies.
Doris Nagel
That’s an interesting observation.
I think traditionally, people think of angel investors as more early investors. I guess that’s why the name angel was used — they took companies very early on and gave them a little funding initially to do their proof of concept and maybe gave them some mentoring. And then it was later that you maybe would be ready for venture capital funding.
But that that doesn’t sound like that was your experience.
Ashley Moy 22:14
In general, I think we’re seeing a shift towards venture capital organizations splitting. They either are going to do the later stage things where it’s just growth capital, or, in order to make sure you get great returns, the organizations are investing earlier and earlier now.
And I will also add that — at least in our experience — being an angel investor versus a venture capitalist does not mean that one or the other has more frequent or better advice. I would say the experiences are just different.
In either case, I encourage entrepreneurs to really get to know the investors that they will be partnering with.
Doris Nagel
The other piece that’s interesting is when you have multiple investors, it starts to become very challenging. I mean, in the ideal world for a lot of startups, you’d have this one venture adviser that really took a lot of personal interest and was very simpatico with your team and what you’re trying to accomplish and was always there to support you, at least early on, and then kind of stepped back as you spread your wings.
But you know, when you have more than one investor and more than one type of investor, I’m guessing that that gets quite challenging?
Ashley Moy 23:40
I would say the challenges are different, but perhaps not more or less with a single versus more investors. I think when people start having tension with the thought of having too many chefs in the kitchen, kitchen, it could stem from it unclear vision for the company, in which case, everybody suddenly starts to think that they know where the organization should head next. And if that mission and vision in the 10, three one year plan are really clearly articulated by the leadership team. It becomes more collaborative, the in at least the conversations from the investors on how to achieve those opportunities. And I love hearing the diversity of ideas. So for us, it’s Welcome to have more people participating.
Doris Nagel
That’s good advice.
Ashley, one of the things we didn’t talk about, is that your flagship product — when I saw it and talked to some of your team members at the mHub, open house — the only product that I saw was for your arm or your wrist. Is that your only product at the moment?
Ashley Moy
Correct, But I’m very excited that we’ll be releasing products for other body parts soon.
Doris Nagel
In fact, I wanted to ask you about growth.
No wonder venture capitalists are interested in your product. It is very cool, and it’s an innovation in a in an area that frankly, not a lot has been changed in a long time really in the world of casts, at least not to this degree.
But you could probably grow in a number of ways. You mentioned physicians offices, but that’s only a small piece of the potential market that’s out there for you. I don’t know how many million casts our healthcare system puts on people every year — you probably have some idea of that.
Of that big market, where do most of the casts get put on in this country? Emergency rooms? Physician’s offices? Urgent care centers?
Ashley Moy 26:00
All of the above! And Doris, one of the things that really excites us about Cast21 and the technology is that we have invented a platform that allows for flexible to rigid immobilization of pretty much anything anywhere.
So you’re right, this is not just limited to wrists. And it’s not even limited to the conventional places where we think of treating fractures such you mentioned — urgent care centers, or the orthopedist office. Our technology could even be used on the sidelines at sporting events, or in disaster areas.
Doris Nagel
That’s amazing. I wouldn’t have thought of that.
And you alluded to this, too, that, people don’t only get fractures or break bones in their arms or wrist, right?
Ashley Moy 26:57
Yes, absolutely. And what’s also really fun from a challenge perspective for our team is that humans are also not the only species to break their limbs. The sky’s the limit with our technology!
Doris Nagel
Wow, I didn’t think about that, either.
For humans, are arms & wrists the most common breaks or fractures?
Ashley Moy 27:19
The wrist region is the most common place on your body to experience a fracture across all age groups, but as you split genders or age, sometimes that changes.
Doris Nagel
You’ve got my mind spinning! You know, my mom’s in a nursing home. And it seems like every week I hear about some patient that’s had a fall and broken something.
So I assume that might mean better care, potentially, for nursing homes or group care settings?
Ashley Moy
Absolutely.
Doris Nagel
That is so exciting!
And that leads to me to a question about managing growth for the future.
Where do you see Cast21, say, three years from now? How do you decide which way to grow? I mean, there’s lots of different things you can do. And it’s not just the US either — we didn’t even talk about all the places in the world that also might want this product.
Ashley Moy 28:22
Our vision for Cast21 in three years is to be the go-to brand that doctors and patients think of when they need non-surgical orthopedic care. And so that means growth in several different directions.
That’s Just a matter of prioritizing, as you mentioned, geographies and body parts, and different subsections of the market as well.
Doris Nagel
That’s pretty exciting.
And is the next step for Cast21. If I understood you, you might be releasing soon a product for another body part? I don’t want to spoil your thunder, but it sounds like that might be in the offing?
Ashley Moy 29:07
Yes, we’re very excited to be releasing new products
Doris Nagel
Cool!
Let’s talk about you a bit. It’s not like you were the chief operating officer for a couple of startups before you took on this role, right? So you’ve been doing a lot of learning and growing as you’ve been in this business.
What part has been the most fun for you about being a CEO and Co-founder?
Ashley Moy 29:38
Oh, I love this question. My favorite part of my job, and the most challenging part of my job, is people management, and managing human resources.
I love my team dearly. And I take it as the most important responsibility that I have to recruit and retain the top talent that we can find. And it’s just been such a joy to do that with such amazing people.
Doris Nagel
Well, it helps when you have a very cool product, and also when you have funding that’s certainly very helpful.
What’s been the hardest thing about starting and growing this business?
Ashley Moy 30:22
I think the hardest thing for me –besides that people management challenge, of course, because everything You stems from your people — is the prioritization of what needs to happen next.
In an ideal world if we had all the money in the world, and the perhaps a challenge that larger organizations don’t face is how do you bend a limited resource? And how do you ensure that it’s going to take you to the next level, to reach the milestones that you promised to your investors or your customers? Right, that’s certainly a challenge that we all enjoy.
Doris Nagel
There’s never enough hours in the day, that’s for sure. No matter how much money you get, or how long your hours are, or how little sleep you think you can live without, there’s just not enough.
Talk about what a typical day looks like for you.
Ashley Moy
Oh, my goodness, a typical day….
Doris Nagel
If there is such thing, I guess!
Ashley Moy 31:21
I will try to generalize my day as much as possible by saying I start by waking up and having my morning routine, which always includes breakfast, I never skipped breakfast, the true favorite meal of the day.
I put all of my planning and meetings in the morning, and then in the afternoon is when I actually work on execution or new strategies.
Doris Nagel
Is that when you find your energy is best to do those kinds of things?
Ashley Moy 31:51
My energy is actually highest in the morning. I am a morning person, for sure. Definitely, my favorite time to work is before 9am.
But I find that if I can get all of the meetings out of the way and taken care of, then I have the capacity to focus as hard as I need to in order to meet deadlines.
Doris Nagel
As someone who spent a lot of time in the healthcare industry, it’s always bothered me, frankly, that there are so many intelligent, bright, amazing women that work in health care, but so few who are in senior management, and even fewer who are founders and CEOs of healthcare companies.
And so I was delighted to feature you on the show, because you’re kind of a unicorn. About I’m glad that you’re out there and delighted to hear the successes of Cast21.
But it still makes me sad that there aren’t more of you. And I’m curious from just from your perspective so far, why do you think that is?
Are there additional challenges, or different challenges that you faced? Is it just a generational thing, with today’s generations being more open to it? What’s your read on it?
Ashley Moy 33:19
I would say all of the above.
And certainly, I recognize how rare it is for me to hold the position that I do. I’m also really proud of the fact that our core team is majority minority, and that we have a 100% female leadership team, which is pretty unheard of for STEM startup.
Doris Nagel
Good for you!
Ashley Moy
Thank you. We take this challenge really seriously, because we so firmly agree with a quote that talent is distributed equally and evenly, but opportunities are not.
So how do we ensure inclusive environments? And we talked about what some of the challenges are? The first one is the historical pipeline. And so when we do recruit, we take it upon ourselves to think about what attributes do we want this next team member to have in order to be successful and fill this role.
We don’t ask what degrees do they have. We don’t ask where did they go to college, or how many jobs have they had in the past three to five years.
Doris Nagel
Or how old are they, or the color of their skin, or any of that.
Ashley Moy 34:39
Exactly.
We also score our resumes blind. It takes a ton of work to not feed it through a system that just reads for keywords. We score every resume objectively to see if a candidate is definitively and objectively demonstrated the skills that we said we need for this role.
And we do that blindly. So we don’t know who the person is, their name, gender, anything. Again, it takes a lot of work. But it’s something that we feel really strongly about when we do skills assessments.
So by this point, you’re probably thinking, “Wow, this application process is pretty ridiculous.” But we find that the candidates really enjoy it, because they’re able to really let their skills speak for themselves.
Doris Nagel
I don’t think it sounds ridiculous. A lot of employers make mouth noises about their people being their most important resource. And yet, if the first step in your hiring process is to shove them through some sort of key word, robotic program, and you have a cookie cutter kind of approach to hiring, I think it sends a message rights from the beginning that you’re not truly invested in these people.
Your process says, “Our people really are our most important resource, and we spend lot a lot of time making sure we find the right person because we care.”
Ashley Moy 36:18
This process, by the way, is adapted from Aleta Miranda Wolf, who was in Chicago for a while when she taught me this process.
And what’s really nice about it is we don’t need to hold quotas, or specifically evaluate different resumes based on their backgrounds. Because it’s blind, we remove all of that. And again, we just let the skills and potential speak for themselves.
Doris Nagel
That’s inspiring.
I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but that may be the answer to the question, “How do we change things” – it’s one brick at a time, maybe?
Ashley Moy 36:57
Certainly, and I know you’ve been in this game longer than I have. And already sometimes I feel like, instead of moving forward, we’re maybe sliding back and forth.
But it’s something that really motivates me and my entire team to how do we get more inclusive teams and communities to work together and solve problems together?
And that’s also why we created our product specifically to not need any modernday luxuries. Access to health care is something we believe is a fundamental human right.
Doris Nagel
That’s exciting. Because as blessed as we are in the United States — we may grumble about our health care system — but there’s a lot of people in the world who need your product. And there’s certainly lots of places even in the United States still that need easier, faster alternatives.
Ashley, when you hit a rough spot, where do you look to inspiration? What keeps you going?
Ashley Moy 38:00
What a great question. I don’t know if I’ve had this question before. When I’m feeling like I have a lot to do, or I’m hitting a rough spot, there are a couple of different things that I like to get through.
First of all, my dog always brings me joy.
Doris Nagel
Yes! A fellow dog lover!
Ashley Moy 38:19
I love my little puff ball. I have a small Pomeranian who certainly helps bring joy into my life.
And on a more practical level, I am very much a list person. So when there’s something challenging ahead of me, I’m a list-making person.
I like to make lists. So that I can break down the challenges in front of me and then feel a small sense of accomplishment when I cross off each step of overcoming whatever the hurdle is in front of me.
Doris Nagel
I like that too. I saw an article somewhere recently that said you shouldn’t make lists because what you really need to do is prioritize things because with lists. It’s too easy to just do the easy ones.
But I find for me personally, too, it’s a pretty good way to stay organized. And to feel a sense of accomplishment.
Ashley Moy 39:48
You know, there’s always balance to these types of techniques for getting through your day or your tasks.
One of the things I remember the most from my college graduation is that our commencement speaker told us to “Eat the frog first.”
Doris Nagel
Eat the frog first? What does that mean?
Ashley Moy 40:07
I know it sounds strange. They described it as doing the hard things first.
And that always stuck with me. So when I make my lists, I actually pair it with the frog system, the complicated time-consuming things, but I also put another layer of project or task management over it.
I got this technique from one of my professors in undergrad who showed me this from the “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” You make a grid — a T chart, if you will — so that you can organize your tasks by what is are important and urgent or not important, not urgent.
And as you sift out the items in your list, and you think about what is important and challenging and urgent, it really nicely prioritizes your tasks for you.
Doris Nagel
That’s something a lot of my entrepreneurial guests on the show have talked about: getting away from those super urgent kinds of things that just are not necessarily important, but are easy wins, maybe or feed our egos and the desire to feel wanted and needed.
We’re all conditioned that as soon as we hear that, our brain and our attention goes right to there, right?
Ashley Moy 41:36
Oh, certainly. To help myself stay focused — and this is something I shared with my team — I rely on a technique from my swim team days. We called it pyramid trading. So in the pool, you would swim a small distance, and then take a break. Then you’d increase the distance, take a small break, so on and so forth, until you reach your maximum distance, and then work backwards.
I like to do the same thing with my time when I’m having trouble focusing. I turn off all the ringers on the devices. And then I set a timer for say, 15 minutes, 30 minutes. And then after that timer goes off, I’m allowed to take a quick break, and then I come back and increase the time do the same thing until I can get up to several hours without needing to take a break.
Doris Nagel
That’s a very interesting technique. I think I’m gonna give that a try, Ashley!
Looking back on your journey these past six years, what advice would you give to other entrepreneurs or those who are thinking about starting their own company, maybe especially women entrepreneurs, but maybe just in general?
Ashley Moy 42:54
For women entrepreneurs, specifically, I would say, don’t be afraid to ask for help. I think as women we are so tasked to overcome so many different challenges, and it can feel inadequate or scary to ask for help or making us feel like less than and that is certainly not the case, what I have learned in my 10 year cast 21 is how wonderful some people can be when it comes to offering help and taking you up on your asks for help. I’ve met some of the most fantastic, wonderful, generous people through cast 21. And I credit a lot of what I know and what I can do to their assistance. So certainly be courageous when asking for help.
And then generally for any entrepreneur, don’t be afraid to define success for yourself. It can feel very scary, I guess is the best way to say that when you have outside investors or you’re looking at your competitors and how the market is evolving to use external benchmarks to define success for yourself. And I think when you’re working for your self, it’s probably the first or maybe only opportunity one has ever had to define their own goals. You don’t have a boss, you don’t have a professor or advisor telling you what you need to do by when. So instead of looking at it as a scary or daunting challenge, enjoy it.
Doris Nagel 50:16
I think it’s about taking risks, and being comfortable with taking those risks, right? I think one of my other guests put it this way: Get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Because if you don’t feel uncomfortable, you’re probably not taking enough risk.
I thought that was a very interesting observation.
If people are interested in learning more about cast 21 Or maybe looking for advice to start up a company or a similar company or just want to get in touch, or learn more, what’s the best way for them to do that? They can learn
Ashley Moy
They can learn more about Cast21 or request a product for themselves or someone they care about on our website, Cast To one.com or learn more about us on our social media channels. We’re everywhere at CAST 21 official, and they can reach out to me on LinkedIn. Ashley sh Moy
Doris Nagel
Ashley, thanks so much for being with me today. It was really fun to learn a little more about you and the story of caste 21. What a terrific product. Thanks for coming on the show and sharing a little bit about that.
Ahsley Moy
It’s been a joy.
Doris Nagel 45:45
Likewise.
Now in the few minutes we have left together, I want to return to a theme we’ve talked about on this show a couple of times in the past, and that is the disparity and sel- confidence, or self-promotion or whatever you want to call it between men and women entrepreneurs.
I was thinking about this this past week as I once again got ghosted by a female entrepreneur who was supposed to be a guest on the show.
Now, for the record, I only have anecdotal information. But in the now three-plus years that I’ve been doing this show, I have never been ghosted in a conversation about appearing on the show or been ghosted, really in any way by any male entrepreneurs.
But I have been several times by women entrepreneurs. I’ve had lots of conversation with potential women, entrepreneur guests, where it’s clear, they’re very reluctant to be on the show. We have an introductory chat, but we never managed to get the interview on the calendar. They don’t get back to me they scheduled but they cancel at the last minute, or they say they’re just too busy.
Too busy to talk to the media for a few minutes, too busy for free publicity, or the chance for free to showcase your business and your story.
Now, understand we’re talking about entrepreneurs here. And that’s a pretty unique mindset or set of personalities, however you want to look at it. But I’ve not had a single male. Well, that’s not quite true — I had one — a venture capitalist– tell me that now was not a good time. He didn’t say no, he just said he had too much going on at the moment.
So the disparity between male and female entrepreneurs has been really striking to me.
What the heck’s going on here? Clearly, either women lack confidence, or they fear or are apprehensive about the spotlight. Or don’t think it’s important to self-promote? I’m not sure what’s going on here.
So I did some research and came across a pretty interesting study by the Women of Influence, out of Canada. And it suggests that at least part of the problem is the underlying fear of negative consequences.
The study documented that this really is a thing. They’ve even given it a name: the Tall Poppy Syndrome. The term started out in Australia, and referred to anybody who stood out too much. The idea being you want a nice uniform field of poppies. So a poppy that gets too tall needs to be cut down. And since then, it’s kind of been taken at least in North America to be used by women advocate, to refer to highly successful women who get cut down.
Anyway, in this Tall Poppy Syndrome study, which surveyed more than 1500 high-performing women, more than 87% of them felt that their successes had been undermined in some way in the workplace, either by their boss or by their peers.
And note: this study only looked at undermining that took place in the workplace. It did NOTlook at all the other places that women can be undermined for their success. And as someone who has personally experienced this, I believe this undercutting is even more painful and memorable because work can just be work but if you have you’re undermined by little digs, or comments or things that you hear through the grapevine, things that you’re not invited to, whether it’s your spouse, it’s your family members, neighbors, people at your church, your friends, this kind of undercutting that happens in the workplace happens everywhere.
The undercutting really, I think you’ll start to see, is really about our society in general and women standing out. It’s not about just the workplace.
I think it’s like putting your fingers on a hot stove and you get burned. You do it a few times and get burned — you feel intense shame, you feel pain, and you stop trying to stand out.
And I have to tell you that I personally, on a number of occasions, have found myself downplaying a success, because I was trying not to be a tall poppy.
Interestingly, in this study — and again, I have to say it personally jives with my own experiences — men and women were found to be equally guilty in the undercutting.
The most common reasons that high performing women were cut down? The highest ranking one was jealousy. Second, were sexual or gender stereotypes, meaning women should be seen and not heard – that kind of thing. They need to be hard-working, but put their family first. And the third reason was feelings of insecurity or inadequacy on the part of the person doing the cutting.
As you can see, most of the cutting down that happened at work is more about the person doing the cutting than about the high achiever. But, you know, that doesn’t make it any less painful. It doesn’t make the digs, the ignoring, the behind the back gossiping and negative watercooler talk any less painful.
I think this is really tough to overcome. How do you fix someone else’s jealousy or feelings of inadequacy? That’s a big one.
I guess one thing that can be done is for managers to receive more awareness training of ways that maybe they unwittingly, or even willingly permit or tolerate some of this activity, in the hopes that it will slowly change our culture over time.
As for gender or sexual stereotypes, those are slowly changing over time, as my daughter reassures me. But this, too, has been very slow and difficult.
Just look at the national debate in the US that’s raging about abortion. It is clear there is still a very large segment of the population in the US who believe women should have less rights, they do not have the right to control their bodies. People can go on and on about right to life, but if you take that whole thing towards its logical end, I don’t see how you get anywhere except women are less, at least to the business world. The implication is: women are intended to bear and raise children, and that’s their sacred duty to do so. And it’s their duty to raise the next generation of women to do more child raising and to raise strong boys who can rule the world, which is the rightful order of the world, apparently for many.
So what can we high-performaing, high-aspiring women do at a personal level to combat some of that pain? That knee jerk reaction to lay low and not make waves?
Well, one thing I found helpful and really well-done is a blog on a site called Refinery29. I love the name, but I don’t know why it’s called that.
Anyway, the female author wrote a blog about her experience trying 30 different things to boost her self-confidence. She polled all of her women friends and colleagues and asked them for their best tips for things that had helped them boost their confidence.
I can tell you that hers is kind of a wild list. I gotta say: I need to know some of her friends! On the list were things like trying naked yoga, daily affirmations, stand up comedy and skydiving.
You can try some of the things on this list, or just for funsies, you could even do your own poll of your friends and colleagues and come up with your own list to try. I think the key is to keep trying different things until you find things that work for you.
I thought it was interesting — but probably not surprising– that all 30 of these things I think could pretty much be put into two buckets: one, continue to do things that are out of your comfort zones — sometimes pretty far out of your comfort zone, and two, do things to better identify and control negative thought patterns.
Doing things out of your comfort zone definitely builds confidence, even if you aren’t very good at it with every activity you do. You have overcome the uncertainty, the speed bump that makes you say, “Ah, no, no, I’m not sure I want to do that.” Well, once you do that, you know, you can do it. You did do it, you lived to tell about it.
Second, there is so much research out there that shows that this the cycle of negative thoughts that we often have, that swirl around in our brains, often without our thinking about it really does affect our reality. Thinking becomes reality.
And it is possible to change your negative thoughts, your lack of self confidence, your self doubt, and substitute those thoughts with something more positive.
I tried a bunch of things on this lady’s list. And the blogger found– as I did — that the daily affirmations do really help. I have all these ridiculous post it notes all over my office and my friends tease me about him. But it’s good natured. I don’t feel like they’re cutting me down. And if they do, they don’t get invited back.
And the post it falls off from time to time, and so that’s my signal, it’s time to change it to something new. So that way as I walk through the house — I work from home — I am reminded to think more positive thoughts about life and about myself.
Another one that worked for me — and this is super easy. It was surprisingly not on the Refinery29 lady’s list, but it came from another friend. And that was to simply smile more often. So a customer service rep is driving you crazy. Smile. Make yourself smile, find the humor in it.
You read something in the news that upsets you turn it off, find a funny cartoon and smile. Just try it. It might work for you!
Check out my new YouTube channel that’s dedicated to the show called The Savvy Entrepreneur Radio Show. Listen to some of the past shows, download episodes, like or comment on them. The channel is chock-full of amazing guests that are sharing their best free information and stories from their heart.
I guarantee you will be inspired and you will learn a new tip or two. Be sure to follow the channel, too, so you’ll be notified every time I post a new interview.
Again, the YouTube channel is called The Savvy Entrepreneur Radio Show.
Now don’t forget to join me again next week at the same time.
But until then, I’m Doris Nagel, wishing you happy entrepreneuring!
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