EP34 Natalie Lowe:A masterclass on building a business by CEO & Founding Partner of the award-winning Creative & Brand Agency that does "cool sh!t"

In Episode 34 , My guest is Natalie Lowe CEO and Founding Partner of the award-winning creative & branding Agency
What would you do if you found yourself at the helm of an award-winning creative agency, navigating a global expansion amidst a pandemic? You're about to hear how our guest, Natalie Lowe, CEO and founding partner of Orange Blowfish, did exactly that. This episode offers a deeply insightful look into Natalie's journey, from managing initial financial challenges to her strategic use of AI in creative work.
Ever wondered what Artificial Intelligence has to do with creativity? Natalie Lowe lends her expert voice to this intriguing question and more. She shares her take on the role AI can play in enhancing creative processes, and the edge human intuition still holds in the evolving AI landscape. Plus, you'll hear Natalie unlock the secrets of effective public speaking, a skill she strongly believes can wield significant influence in business.
 Natalie delves into the personal aspect of her entrepreneurial journey. She sheds light on how to strike a work-life balance, prioritize effectively, and navigate the complexities of a male-dominated industry. She also shares her thoughts on advocating for oneself in the workplace, managing hierarchical structures, and the pivotal role of mentors. This episode is a treasure trove of invaluable insights from an inspiring woman at the top of her game. Don't miss it!

0:00 Introduction
0:13 The Orange Blowfish
11:29 Starting a Creative Agency - Challenges
23:51 AI in Design and Public Speaking
29:13 Effective Public Speaking and Work-Life Balance
34:42 Balancing Priorities in Life
48:19 Challenges and Success in Male-Dominated Industry
52:38 Workplace Advocacy and Hierarchy of Needs
54:03 Trailblazer takeaways

Mentions
Personal Kanban Book https://www.personalkanban.com/
Mary Rezek
Follow Natalie Lowe 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalielowe/
My bio: www.about.me/chattynattii
https://www.theorangeblowfish.com

Listen : to the audio version Apple Spotify .Amazon Music Google Podcasts
Watch and subscribe to my YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/@Thetrailblazersexperience
Follow Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/thetrailblazersexperience/

Transcript

The Trailblazers Experience: 0:13

So welcome to another episode of the Trailblazers Experience podcast, and my guest today is the formidable, amazing Natalie Lowe, ceo and founding partner of an award-winning creative agency. If you haven't heard it, it's called the Orange Blowfish and she describes it as the agency that does cool shit. She's also an international business advisor and coach, and welcome, girl from Shanghai.

Natalie Lowe: 0:45

It's great to see you in Ntola and it's like what an amazing introduction. Thank you so much.

The Trailblazers Experience: 0:54

I know brilliant, I mean look, power of digital and connections. But I'm really excited about this conversation because you're doing some amazing stuff and we want some young girls you know some woman out there to be motivated to do some cool shit as well.

Natalie Lowe: 1:13

Thank you so much. I'm so honored to be on this podcast and I've looked at all the previous amazing people you've interviewed. So extremely honored and thank you so much for having me Brilliant.

The Trailblazers Experience: 1:26

So let's get started. I mean starting the Orange Blowfish. I'm interested in two things A, the name and just the story behind the inception of the agency. What was the driving force for you to even think about that as well?

Natalie Lowe: 1:43

Yeah, so the name is a longer story, but I think it stems from the fact that life is too short and we need to live the life that we want to and do the things that we want to do as well. So I don't know if you ever watched the Simpsons. Yes, I did, okay, so, homer, this is one episode. Homer, I don't know if you remember goes to a sushi parlor with his wife and the chef accidentally gives him a blowfish, a poisonous blowfish. Did you ever watch this?

The Trailblazers Experience: 2:15

True story. I'm sure I have. Yeah, true story, keep going.

Natalie Lowe: 2:25

So there's this episode about three minutes and it gets given. This Poison's Blowfish is diagnosed that he's only got 24 hours to live and the doctor tells him you got to go out and do everything that you've ever, ever thought of.

The Trailblazers Experience: 2:39

The Homer way.

Natalie Lowe: 2:41

Yes, and he goes and thinks about his bucket list and all the things that you want to do. So when I don't know if you know about, my husband is also my business partner, so we have always wanted to kind of do our own thing for a very long time and I think it came to an epiphany of whether it would be midlife crisis. A lot of people go out and buy Porsche For him. He said you know what? I'm going to swap my laptop and suit with a few cans of graffiti paint and then decided to open the creative agency of the orange blowfish. But when we came to decide what the name was, we wanted to make sure it was something that we believed in, something that we wanted to be doing all the time that we love and enjoy, and what popped into mind was the orange blowfish as a result of watching the Homer Simpson episode.

The Trailblazers Experience: 3:33

I mean definitely a good way to start a pitch as well, Isn't it a pitch deck telling the whole story?

Natalie Lowe: 3:41

So this is the short, yeah. So you know, our motto is, you know, just do cool shit. You know, really, it's just we want to do cool stuff, fun stuff, every day. And that's how we started the business. We had been working corporate all our lives. We had, you know, worked for agency and clients and it was just really, in all honesty, uninspiring stuff. And I think, coming from an Asian family, we were told, hey, you know, you don't own me, you got to like, be stable and blah, blah, blah. And I thought, you know, we just thought to ourselves, heck, it's been like 30 years. We were like you know, 30s when we started this, so we were just like, let's just go for it. What is the worst that could ever happen? And here we are, 12 years later.

The Trailblazers Experience: 4:23

Yeah, I mean, you know, I think that's it. Sometimes it's just taking a leap of faith and saying I know 50 Cent says what is it? Get rich or die trying. But you just have to take a leap of faith and say we want to do something different, shake up the industry. I think agencies should be innovative, should be fun, should be inspiring. And then some amazing brands coming up, you know that are leading the way. And Orange Blowfish has a global presence. I mean teams in China, UK, australia. What motivated the expansion? Because it's one thing starting an agency, it's one thing growing it and then saying I think now we can do this on a global scale.

Natalie Lowe: 5:09

So the ironic thing about it Natola was in total pardon me was, when we went into COVID, we were only five people and what fueled our growth was literally COVID. We were at the, I would say, wrong place at the right time or right place at the wrong time, I don't know but we were in China. We have been in China for about 16 years now and we slowly watched all the borders close and people getting trapped out and we were one of the few boutique agencies who was in China and at the time there was a lot of people kind of retracting from talking about China. This is back in 2020, you know China kind of deassociate themselves from the China market because they didn't know what was going on and because we were one of the few smaller boutique agencies in Shanghai, I said to my business partner look, you know, we're on the ground here. We need to be reporting what's going on, because there wasn't a lot of foreign journalists. They left here. Everybody had left for Chinese New Year.

Natalie Lowe: 6:11

So I was speaking to a girlfriend of mine and she said you need to talk about what's happening on the business front on LinkedIn and prior to 2020, I wasn't active on LinkedIn, but she said you can be the voice, and that's what started it. So I then started talking about doing business in China, what's really happening in China, how you can succeed in China, all this stuff. And from that we grew year on year to about 20 plus and then I figured I couldn't travel abroad. I had a lot of people inquiring about business in China. So then I thought about different ways to engage partners, engage full time staff, to actually be the voice and also represent us on the ground. So here we are today, and that's really what fueled it was because I was stuck, you know, in Shanghai and couldn't travel and I had to think of innovative ways to kind of break the mold of expansion.

The Trailblazers Experience: 7:09

That is brilliant and, you know, big up to the friend for saying use LinkedIn as a platform to amplify your voice and and talk about what's what's going on. There's so many social platforms and channels and I think it's engaging on the right ones, whether it's a catalyst for your personal brand or your business, or just getting a message across that you know will resonate with consumers and business partners as well.

Natalie Lowe: 7:34

Yeah, absolutely. I think China is a tricky one and I think for anybody, putting a brand out there, especially in a risky situation or in a sticky situation, is very tough. So, when we think about founders and businesses, there isn't a direct split, there's not a clear split. You are your brand, so you are putting your own personal brand on the line by speaking up about a topic that you really really believe in, and prior to that I was quite I would say, quite reserved about giving my point of view of certain things, but it's just become something that I really really believe in and I think founders should all be doing.

The Trailblazers Experience: 8:17

Yeah, I think that's interesting. I think giving a point of view should always be measured. You have to think about your audience and the fact that you actually take the time to think about what's the message I want to convey, how important is it, what are the facts behind it or the research, and also what are my core principles and values that are driving these information posts that you're putting on? I think is really important.

Natalie Lowe: 8:45

Yeah, absolutely.

Natalie Lowe: 8:46

I think right now it's hard not to solicit a response, whether it's a good one or a negative one or what you might deem as malicious.

Natalie Lowe: 8:58

I think it's engagement, and I think social media conversations have taken over real life conversations, and I miss real life conversations. But I think it's also how the world is going right now, that people are very vocal about how they feel, and the only way that they could use it is potentially through social media. The good thing is, linkedin is quite respectful and there is a lot of platform I mean a lot of, I would say, measures that will be able to stop keep a lot of malicious responses, and you've just got to remember that, end of the day, you represent your business. So I always take the stance of when I'm talking to somebody on social media, I'm being respectful, as though as how I would react in a business situation, as though they would be sitting in front of me, and I think that that is the level of respect we have to keep when we're talking to people on social Exactly A really, really valid point.

The Trailblazers Experience: 9:50

Definitely, if they were in front of me, how would this conversation actually go? How would I articulate myself? Who are the people in the room? Are they coming from diverse cultures? What are the age groups? So many considerations, and I think when you're on a keyboard typing away or on your phone getting those 200 characters in, it's really important to think about that.

Natalie Lowe: 10:12

You have to write a message and then write it Six times and then like come back to it. I'm like that all the time. So, even though my post might look short and succinct, I've spent like 30, honestly, 30 minutes or more of it. You know, just putting it through Hemingway app, looking at what's the best word everything.

The Trailblazers Experience: 10:34

You're leveraging AI in the best way possible, isn't it? Yeah?

Natalie Lowe: 10:38

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we've just got to. I mean, a written message can be interpreted in so many different ways. It's not like Altona voice, you know, looking at you, smiling, and everything. You can have so many different ways of just saying one sentence, which I'm always quite concerned and careful about.

The Trailblazers Experience: 10:57

Yeah, yeah, definitely. So just talk about the early stages, obviously, of being a founder. You said you started off. It was just the five of you. What are some of the entrepreneurial challenges that you faced that you know? That still stick in your mind is how did we even manage? How did we do that?

Natalie Lowe: 11:17

Yeah, Well, when we first started, it was just one of us, it was in our study, and then we grew to two, three and then, I think in 2020, we were already like eight years, I believe 2012. Yeah, we started in 2012. So eight years, but we were very small to begin with and I think the biggest issue was cash flow. It was making sure that when we took on employees was the fact that we would be able to sustain and be able to pay our salaries. So the first, I would say two to three years, we were one person. We had freelanced or hired freelancers on a project basis, so ensuring that we would have that cash flow and we didn't have any expenses. So really, from day one, we've been quite profitable, which is great.

Natalie Lowe: 12:05

And then what we found was, as we moved on into hiring more people and I'm sure in America or even in the UK, you've got to pay for superannuation or 401k and then the costs start to, you know, pile up. And back in the day you had to have an office in China. Everybody wants to see that you have a presence. So then it got to a point where we were getting bigger businesses, but then we were having to bring on the staff to be able to accommodate and deliver. And then on top of that just came this expensive kind of list of items that we overhead costs that we had to pay on on a regular basis.

Natalie Lowe: 12:44

I think so cash flow is definitely one of the first things that I've been very mindful of, but there was a time when we ran out of money because my business partner at the time was just one person trying to do everything from accounts to BD to website, to paying salaries, etc. And it got to a point where I just don't think it was top on top of the finances and he went to withdraw money or he went to the bank to pay and realize that he didn't have any money in the business to actually pay for salaries. And that's when we really set down, thought, okay, well, you can't be doing everything. Have we thought about getting a business manager? And so we started really mapping that out, and that was very early on.

Natalie Lowe: 13:30

I think there's one thing about starting your own business and doing what you love and then, when you get into your third, on your fourth year, you think about scale, you think about who you bring on, but you're so engrossed in and loving what you do that, you don't think about what it really takes to run a business, and I think that's. Being a founder is really hard. You know being the CEO, being the face of the company, then doing this, you're a counts person, everything. So it's finding again the right people to bring that on that will be able to complement your skill set, so you can still continue to enjoy what you love doing.

The Trailblazers Experience: 14:02

Do you know what? We know? That many, there are many aspiring entrepreneurs that that burn out and you've just shared some really practical things that in the early stages, like you know, like cash flow and hey, can we afford to pay ourselves, then can we afford to pay others.

Natalie Lowe: 14:19

I mean, how many times have I told people and also listened to founder story that for the first how many years that they didn't pay themselves a decent salary period?

Natalie Lowe: 14:29

It was just kind of keeping the books going and you've just got to inject in a lot of money. I mean, really, we've been through that, we understand it and, and you know, got to a point where it took us a really long time to find that rhythm. We had to hire, you know, consultants to help us get through that. Because in the first few years you're just worried about do I have enough in the pipeline, do I have enough to pay other people? You're not even worried about paying yourself. You're just making sure that you can pay for rent and you can pay for other people to do your work. And, and I think one of the things that you know we did was we made sure we had six months of our own lifestyle savings in the bank so that we knew that we wouldn't be able to pay ourselves. And clearly we thought, oh, after six months we'd be able to pay ourselves you know, and we just kept on rolling.

Natalie Lowe: 15:17

We're like okay, well, better start churning in those big dollars you know, six months goes by so quickly.

The Trailblazers Experience: 15:24

This is a thing. I mean. It just burns through. You're like we're in the fifth month and I was going to ask you actually, Natalie, so you're a creative agency and obviously you want to do cool stuff, but was there a balance between where building our portfolio, doing some great projects, but the money just wasn't what it was? To, like you say, manage the cash flow in the business?

Natalie Lowe: 15:47

Yeah, so I don't think we ever thought about that up until up until about two, three years ago, to be honest with you, where we grew to like 15, 20 people and right now our motto is still doing cool shit, because I think when you think about the money, that's where the passion, the drive, ends. So all along, we really wanted to make a difference in our lives. To be honest with you, we were tired of just going to work and being uninspired, you know, having to write these reports for your boss and blah, blah, blah and reporting into headquarters and, more importantly, we were in the. Well, I was in agency, but also I came from a marketing background where I really wanted to do something that was different.

Natalie Lowe: 16:33

In Shanghai, and when we went into the business, my husband, my business partner, said that he wanted to do graffiti because everybody was digitizing their marketing, whether it be WeChat, whether it be on, you know, an eFlyer that you put around, that we were lost in the digital world, that we weren't living in the real world. Everybody was just worried about their own selfies passing on, then getting on Instagram. So the change that we made, or the unique opportunity that we saw, was that you would go to a beautiful restaurant and a lot of the walls were white. Beautiful restaurant, no brand experience. It was just such a plain vanilla type of a brand. When we went in there to decide on our strategy, we said we're only going to be one person, two people, for the next few years. I want to make a mark and I need to do it quick. I want people to see what we do and be able to remember us.

Natalie Lowe: 17:36

When you think about a digital E-Flyer, you look at it and you go yeah, I'm going to pass it to my friend, but it's not memorable. We live in experiences where we touch, we feel, we smell, we give each other hugs and stuff like that. That's the response that we wanted to solicit. We started doing graffiti at restaurants, looking at wall art murals, looking at bridging the world, between the artistic world and the corporate world. That's how we got started. To be honest, we didn't have the luxury to choose. We had to grab everything, but luckily, because of the service that we were offering, we were offering what we called wall art. At the time we didn't even know it was called consumer experience, what it calls now experiential. I mean, there's all these beautiful fancy words.

The Trailblazers Experience: 18:20

Yeah.

Natalie Lowe: 18:21

We've expanded and evolved our service over time, but at the time it was just can we look your space, look amazing and make it Instagrammable? Instagrammable was really the indirect result. We started off with cafes that we would go and visit, and then it was friends cafes and restaurants, and then one of them that put us on the map ended up being acquired by ABI, and it's still one of the most, I would say, iconic brands in Shanghai. It was just one of those things where we wanted to take projects that people weren't taking, or it was the underdogs where we could make a difference. It was really important to show our creativity rather than money was important, but I mean, it was really hate. We just really want to make a mark. I think it was two years when we did liquid laundry, which was the whole group was acquired by ABI, that people then started noticing us. Number one we have a really strange name. They can't. They're like who was it? Don't forget you.

Natalie Lowe: 19:22

Yeah, the what is like. But you know, then people started inquiring about hey, what do you do? Have never thought about that. Then that's when the real conversations started coming. But I would really recommend that people just start thinking about what they love doing Just every day. You feel like giving up. Just keep on going, just keep on going, keep on going and it will happen Really. Never, ever give up.

The Trailblazers Experience: 19:48

Yeah, there is really something to be said about the power of resilience and pushing through, being consistent and knowing what your USP was and is, and the power of just creativity in creating, like you said, experiences is sort of what's been the catalyst and the backbone of the business. I mean, for everyone who's listening, of all the interesting war arts that we can see that are probably your brand USP worth looking at.

Natalie Lowe: 20:19

Thank, you yeah, I think you've got to find something that people are going to turn. And I say, no, that's not going to happen. And that's when you know you've got a business because no one's ever done it before. And I remember when we first started my business partner was a headhunter. He didn't even want, he had no artistic training, he learned everything from scratch. And everybody said to him just go and enjoy your six figure salary and so you can buy a couple of toys, because he was such he's still a Marvel fan. Go buy a few transformers and just enjoy life. And people thought that we wouldn't last six months and 12 years later, here we are. Just you just got to keep on going, just keep on going.

The Trailblazers Experience: 21:00

Exactly so, would you say, if we talk about a milestone project. Was it really that project that you talked about in terms of the war, art and people getting that recognition, where you're like, yeah, we've hit it. Now this is it. Our agency is on a roll.

Natalie Lowe: 21:15

I think there's been a couple of milestones, and that was definitely one of them, because the founders of Liquid Laundry really took a chance with us and we not only created the branding, the logo or the consumer touch points, but we got into the EGD, the wall out as well, throughout the entire space, and that, for us, was massive. We just really wanted to do something fun without thinking this just blew up. It literally just blew up and then from there, I think we've done a couple of more really interesting ones. Like we ended up creating the brand experience in the office for Google in Beijing, then we also did it for LinkedIn and then from LinkedIn, we grew from Shanghai to Beijing and then we ended up doing some of the work in Asia Pacific.

Natalie Lowe: 22:09

It's so many, there's just so many different incidences that make me think, wow, I think we're on the right track here, like we're doing something great and the projects just continue being more interesting. They keep on getting bigger and they keep on getting more challenging and it just allows us to grow bigger as a business and also our organic growth in services and also geography as a result of people wanting to see more of us, and that's just really, really special. But, yeah, definitely liquid laundry in terms of putting us on the map and subsequently, just even today, I think that large brands that have always been my aspirational brands want to work with us is just super, super awesome. Yeah, I still pinch myself every day.

The Trailblazers Experience: 22:53

That's amazing, really good. Let's talk about technology and AI. I mean, you are, first of all, in the midst of having been to China a few times. They are always, I believe, 10 years ahead of any other industry or sector in terms of development, and it's always accelerated. How is AI influencing the creative process and probably with the way brands connect with their audience, from what you're seeing as well in the market?

Natalie Lowe: 23:21

Yeah, it's a strange one, because I know that everybody is quite nervous about job replacement and there's a lot of different camps about it. But at the end of the day, I see it as technological advancement. But it's like the time when we had email and then we moved on to WhatsApp. People don't want to embrace it because it is change and people are fearful. But at the end of the day, if it makes your life better, then why not?

Natalie Lowe: 23:51

We're still quite fortunate in design that it will only right now, complement our executional work. So, whether it be storyboarding, whether it be fixing up certain design work, but the input is important. So you still need a human, whether it's mid-journey or something else. Even with Hemingway App or even ChatGBT, you need a human behind it to input the strategic thinking, for it to give you something that is good, and then have that thinking to refine it and redesign it. So in terms of AI, I think it's something that is inevitable.

Natalie Lowe: 24:30

People would need to jump on that bandwagon very soon, otherwise you might be left in the dark. But I think there are ways that you can work to complement it, where in our line of work, we could use it as a storyboard, because it could have taken three weeks to draw out and illustrate, but we've come up with the concept, we've come up with the design and we've come up with the style. So everything is it that is spitting out. It's something that we've designed. It's not like it can think on its own. So we talk to a lot of different industry peers about this and I don't think it's there to replace jobs. I don't think that was ever the plan. It's really to complement how we can make things a little bit more productive and efficient and I think once we embrace that and see how we're able to leverage it rather than see it as a competition, I think a lot of agencies and designers in the creative world would see that as economies of scale.

The Trailblazers Experience: 25:31

Definitely. It's like you said. It's all about leveraging and artificial intelligence is artificial intelligence, but it's not artificial intuition, consciousness. That's all comes from us as humans and being able to pivot. The AI won't know that. The creative, the brief has changed, For example, or events happening in the market that makes you have to look at the storyboard and say we have to redefine and think different, or a consumer moment that's emerged that can influence that campaign. So it's literally like you said, the efficiency and leveraging the tech to take away maybe admin heavy tasks that could have just put down the timelines.

Natalie Lowe: 26:13

And then it is tasks that you know. You can then leverage and upskill your team to do something a little bit more strategic, a little bit more higher ranking right, and when we think about digitization, I mean we used to write a lot of things on paper. Now you can record. Now it's the advancement of life and also with work and productivity, and I think that's something that really scares people and I completely understand that and it's just fine, and I think it's a responsibility of companies and agencies, employees like us, to say hey, you know, when we're just hoping that we'll be able to help work with the economies of scale and productivity, rather than I'm going to replace you with AI system, because, at the end of the day, I still need people to be able to explain this to clients, refine it as well as look at it and, you know, just make our company culture a little bit better with work as well.

The Trailblazers Experience: 27:05

Yeah, for sure, natalie. You're a woman who wears many hats wife, mother, ceo, and also you know you are an international business coach. You code senior executives and also TEDx speakers on public speaking. So what lessons have you learned through the coaching experience and how does that influence your own approach to public speaking?

Natalie Lowe: 27:32

I learned through, I would say, speaking in the boardroom from a very, very young age. I was very lucky to work in a Fortune 30 company in my early 20s and actually just see how people are able to present a presentation in like less than three minutes and on the spot, like just really really sharp. I've had the opportunity really really lucky to work with some of the smartest people in my industry and through that I was able to be given opportunities to do public speaking and I would say one of the best things that I volunteered for was in TEDx, becoming a speaker coach. And again, it was the girlfriend who encouraged me and I'm going to just call her out there because she'd be very happy Mary Rezik. Mary Rezikcom, excellent executive coach and TEDx speaker. But I watched her in action and just her strategies, her tools and the way that she sharpens in on being able to extract the right level of point as to why people would care about what you say really had left an impression on me.

The Trailblazers Experience: 28:48

That's so true. I mean. They say the top 10 tips for becoming a better public speaker is studying great public speakers, relaxing your body language, practice voice and breath control. Prepare talking points. Like you said. What's your message? Know your audience I mean knowing your audience is so key. Rehearsing. Record your speeches I mean listening to your own voice. I know it from the podcast. The first ones I did. I was like okay, there are certain things that I need to stop saying because they're very repetitive in a way. But it's a learning curve, isn't it?

Natalie Lowe: 29:23

Absolutely. I think every day, every moment, you get to speak to somebody, that's an opportunity right there that will just build you for the center stage. And I think it's really important that you rehearse what you want to say so other people can interpret the way that you intend it to be. Otherwise it's just lost. And I remember when I was first teaching public speaking in the first place, I studied all of Steve Jobs presentations all of them, because it was like a magic show. It was just you come on. I remember the most famous one was when he pulled a Mac out of an envelope and just watched it slide out and you just words right there. You know it is storytelling, and I think it's really, really important that when you get on stage or whatever you're saying, you have a point, you have a story to tell, and once you kind of figure out your own style, you can study everybody. But you've got to be able to find that style that works for you.

The Trailblazers Experience: 30:25

Yeah, we also know that the attention span. So when you're talking about death by PowerPoint presentation, you know, short to the point, what's the message you're trying to get across and then engage your audience as well. You know, engagement is not just in the digital, but it's in the physical as well.

Natalie Lowe: 30:40

Yeah, and I remember I think it was Mary who said to me Mary Rezik, I'm just going to repeat her name once again but she said to me technology, if you rely on the presentation and technology fails, you still got to deliver your presentation.

Natalie Lowe: 30:54

So you need to make sure you were there, you know what, you own it, so that if anything fails then you're still ready to give it. And that really resonated with me because even though I'm quite a good public speaker, I was still relying at the time on the presentation, on my notes, and it just dawned on me that, hey, I've got to be ready for anything. And it's when you go through that level of training and you realize, yep, I've just got to own it and I've got this and a lot of it is the practicing, the rehearsing and listening to your own voice and tones. And often I would give my speech to my team or somebody who doesn't know the topic. So if I explain it to them and they understand, I'm like, okay, well, obviously then other people who are in the industry will be able to understand that as well.

The Trailblazers Experience: 31:43

Yeah, there's a Forbes article that said your audience tunes out after 10 minutes of a presentation, so working hard to keep their attention span is really important. Introducing characters, so storytelling, show videos, use props. You know you talked about the Mac coming out of the envelope. You know, give demonstrations, invite questions where necessary and mixing it up so that the human element is engaged from all cognitive areas, isn't it of the brain?

Natalie Lowe: 32:16

Yeah, I think one part is to when you're up there. Why do people want to listen to you if they're not engaged? You know, I see so many presentations where they just start statistics. There's no context, I didn't even know what those mean. So if you're unable to relate to the information, it's really really hard. But story, like right now, it's all about storytelling, all about that point of carrying through the climax and you know the challenge and you know the solution and the failure and the successes. That's really really important. And I think presentations have really come a long way from when I first started working many, many years ago and it's just so much more interesting I find.

The Trailblazers Experience: 32:59

Oh, natalie, you didn't have two years of lockdown. And the stats where they were saying, slide two, please, statistics, slide three, please. And then they have the slogans for lock. Oh my God, the pandemic in the UK. That's another podcast.

Natalie Lowe: 33:16

Yeah, how to survive zoom. How does it work? Yes, absolutely.

The Trailblazers Experience: 33:21

Let's talk about self care. What routines or practices do you find for yourself to maintain a healthy work life balance? And I say healthy work life balance in terms of what it means to you, Natalie?

Natalie Lowe: 33:35

You know it's so funny. I just recently just got back from Sydney and I'm going to share this with you. I'll send it to you is because I found I found this in my journal from 2001. I kid you not, and it's the same goals that.

Natalie Lowe: 33:53

I have today and I'm going to read it out to you. I swear to God, 26th of August 2001,. You can see it and I literally just took a picture of it, and it says goals by 2002. And I can tell you how many years is that 21 years. I don't know if I've achieved any of them, but let's try one of them. It says be content with myself. Really, on top of it, see the positive side of others, you know. Spend more time with family, devote more time to myself, eat healthy, keep fit, run three or four times a week. And it's so funny because these are still the same goals that I have today.

Natalie Lowe: 34:32

And I think you've just got to have three really, really clear goals that separate you from going insane. And for me, it's running, it's exercising, and I know that the day that I don't run, or the data that I don't exercise, my mood's dropped. Something's wrong. I can't think properly, I can't react, I'm a little bit more negative or maybe I'm a little bit more short fused, but when I devote 30 minutes a day to myself, it could even be having a cup of coffee, waking up early, 20 minutes before the kids wake up. It could be going for that run after I drop the kids off at the school bus, or it could even be just sitting down and, you know, maybe just reading some gossip, but that is all it takes for me and I need that in the morning and I know it's different for everybody and I love a glass of wine, so I'd always come back and I'll have a nice glass of wine with dinner and that's me time With.

Natalie Lowe: 35:34

Women do so much, and I think business owners I wouldn't say just women, but I would say business owners do so much. You're everything to everyone and on top of that you have your personal life. There is no perfect balance if there is any balance, you know but trying to find that one thing that I can do a day for myself is something that I'm just really, really happy with.

The Trailblazers Experience: 36:00

That is so true. Setting priorities that are effective and, like you said, that are tailored to you. Picking three things to focus on. There's a book that I've read called Personal Kanban. It's by author called Jim Benson, and he talked about how limiting work in progress allows us to focus, work quickly and just remain calm. So picking things that mean something to you. So, whether it's that week, it's a glass of wine, if it's that week, a walk, if it's time with family or meantime, just really honing in Well A you'll be less overwhelmed, but then your subconscious even knows I'm getting something done, and that resonates through every inch of your body as well.

Natalie Lowe: 36:46

And I think what's really important is being present. I think that's a really, really big one for me is we can get distracted so easily. That WhatsApp message, that email that comes through, I've seen it. I would be having a conversation with a friend in a business meeting and they'll suddenly ding, ding, ding, and then they get distracted and then you know, and then I'm sitting there waiting for somebody to message back and I think for me, balance is all about trying not to overwhelm yourself as well.

Natalie Lowe: 37:17

So something for me is being present. If I'm here chatting to you, I put my phone away. When I go home, I try to be a present mother. I don't look at my phone for two hours until they go to bed or whenever it is, and then I just really want to carve out certain things and do things well, rather than multitasking. And I think on top of that, that makes me feel like I've accomplished something, rather than trying to do 10 different tasks and then realize at the end of the day, oh, I haven't sent that email halfway through this and I mean we've all been through that. Yeah, that's what I mean by you know, wearing different hats and kind of do so much. It's literally just simplifying. It's going back to what is important, what you can achieve, and there's always tomorrow, like that's what I think I need to remind myself every day that there's always still tomorrow or later if we can.

The Trailblazers Experience: 38:12

And there's always that saying that if you work matter in five years, then don't spend more than five minutes on it as well.

Natalie Lowe: 38:20

Do you follow the 3Ds, which is do, do it yourself, delegate or delete?

The Trailblazers Experience: 38:29

I'll just do it myself because it's faster. Delegate, especially in leadership. I think that's really important because trusting your team there's a reason why you have an amazing team around you, because they're really good at what they do and trusting them and yeah, delete is a very big one.

Natalie Lowe: 38:45

Oh yeah, I remember there was a friend of mine who said to me because I had been carrying these books for years from place to place, apartment to apartment, for I would say about 20 years, and one day I threw them all. I threw all of them. It was one of those things where you're thinking you're just going to get to it, you know. And she came into my house one day and she said you know what happened to your books? I said I got rid of them. She goes why? I said because it kept giving me stress after 20 years and I hadn't read them.

Natalie Lowe: 39:18

You know, I kept on getting books that were given to me, or I bought them at the airport, thinking, oh, you know, I'm going to read it, it's never going to if 20 years later you're not going to read it. You're just not going to read it. And I just did it and I felt so amazing, it's like it's not even going to, it's not even going to like, bother me next. Yeah, and I just got rid of it. It was great, best thing ever. So delete is a big one.

The Trailblazers Experience: 39:40

Delete is a big one and also change the mode of communication based on the technologies available. So I'm the same as you. When I was young I used to read a month three or four books, you know, nonfiction, fiction, different authors, and we just, and now life just took over. So I've I've moved on to using apps such as Audible. I'm sure there are others out there where I listen to the books. So whether I'm on my commute into London or on a flight or walking or running, I will read. Well, listen to a book, but it's being read to me and that's a way that I've sort of gotten back to that feeling and not feeling guilty for not having all those books lying around that I haven't read Totally.

The Trailblazers Experience: 40:20

So, I just have the bandwidth to do it Totally so.

Natalie Lowe: 40:23

For example, my husband likes watching movies and, to be honest, I don't have three, four hours to sit there and watch a movie. I'm a mom and a business owner, so you know what I do. I wait until there's 10 minutes to the end, so I watch the beginning and then I'll watch the end. I go oh, so that's what happened. Oh, that's great.

The Trailblazers Experience: 40:40

Oh, amazing. So you join in. At the end bring the wine.

Natalie Lowe: 40:45

And he'll, like you, kind of fill me in on what's happened and then watch the ending. So then I don't have the formal effect. I'm like okay, there you go, just fast forward.

The Trailblazers Experience: 40:55

It's very efficient, natalie, very efficient. I'm loving your style. It's a good thing to to leave in because it just shows the reality of life. You know, we're all living fast paced lives. Whether you have a partner spending time with them, it's finding how to spend that quality time, children, etc. There's a lot going on. So, yeah, circling back, so you featured in lots of publications on various topics and I want to hone in on women leadership, because this is a podcast where we're looking to inspire women. And just what are the tips that you know? Thinking about your amazing, colorful career that you've had very dynamic, what are some tips that you would give women on that you advise women on, even in your coaching, to guide them in the new normal post pandemic, being a woman, a founder, a wife, a mother. There's a lot going on there, but what are the things that resonate with you, your nuggets that you'd love to embed on people?

Natalie Lowe: 41:59

So when I speak to young professionals, regardless of their gender, and also aspiring founders or new entrepreneurs, they always ask the same few questions. And women is how do you balance between being a mother and aspiring career woman? How do you? Do you have to give it up? What do you do? There's always that emotional struggle. And then, after you give birth, it is the mother's guilt of going back to work. And then with men, it's the same thing how do I be able to put my career first but also show that my wife, that I'm there for her. So it's the opposite. So a lot of people have the same questions and it doesn't matter whether you're an executive, you're a junior or you're a founder. We all have the same struggles in life.

Natalie Lowe: 42:56

Which is doing what you love, while being considerate and including the priorities that you want to be, that you want to include in life, whether that be running, whether it be your wife, your kids, and I think it's and I say the same thing is is understanding your priorities in life, and that would be family, it could be career, it could be your health, it could be money, and you can't have everything at the same time. Something has to give, and I know that when I was a mother, or when I chose to become a mother, I knew that I had to be there for a few years before I would be able to go back into a career of my choice, and that's why we decided to start the Orange Blowfish Working in Asia. I would say that employment laws are not very conducive and favorable to women, especially to new mothers, and I know that I would have had an APAC job. I know that once I get into it, you're just in there, you're just in the moment. So I think it's really, really important to look at your life circle and what you want to achieve out of working and how you can balance that with life, rather than the other way around.

Natalie Lowe: 44:12

A lot of people go to work for a paycheck but after going through COVID right now, you realise that you can't be loyal to a company, or a company would like to be loyal to you but then doesn't have the financial means. There's a lot of these kind of heartbreak moments where you think, why did I attend that event when I could have been spending time with my father? Just all these moments that I've heard, and I think it's really important at the end of the day, to realise that we are humans, that we are employing humans to do a job, and there are moments where we just can't do it because we're not in that mindset. And I think even for myself, my girlfriends tell me all the time that you'd cut yourself some slack net, like I mean, you're trying to operate four different countries, trying to grow the business and be an active mom and taking care of your, but they're being present. I just went to Sydney to see my mom and just trying to be there.

Natalie Lowe: 45:05

And even for me I'm working China hours and people like slow down, you know. So even for us, every day, we just got to remind ourselves that we can't be everywhere all at the same time and we have to be very clear about what we want out of the moment that we are trying to achieve that particular thing, whether it be six months or be a year, or even the long term goal and then chunk it down. And whether you're 15, 25, 40 and growing order, we're all in that same boat of trying to find happiness. But happiness is right under our nose. We just need to realize that it's there.

The Trailblazers Experience: 45:48

That is so amazing and so inspiring. So there was a report conducted by Mackenzie in partnership with the Lienian organization and really was about women in the workplace and very interesting, Natalie. So they talked about the state of the pipeline Since 2015, the number of women in C-suite position has increased from 17 to 28%, but the representation of women has improved significantly, but it's still small. But there are a few myths that they talked about. So one of them, the biggest myth, is oh, women are becoming less ambitious, but the reality you talked about it is women are more ambitious than before the pandemic, but flexibility is a really key thing for women.

Natalie Lowe: 46:33

I really just like how they kind of just polarized the gender because women have come to their senses and they don't have to prove shit to anyone. That really is a myth. You know what I mean? I know.

The Trailblazers Experience: 46:47

I know it's just ridiculous what crap is that.

Natalie Lowe: 46:50

I'm sorry, this is what it means society, I'm sorry. I mean, I'm not meant to be emotional about this, but it's stuff like that that drive women mad, that we have to continuously live up to these standards. And who wrote that article? A male, I mean. The worst thing is, it's most probably written by another woman, which is you're just like man, support your own tribe. I'm just like what. Well, that's it.

The Trailblazers Experience: 47:14

I mean, we've been flexible between before even flexibility became a thing. So it resonated with me when you talked about, honestly, when I had because my kids are 18 and 16, so they were born before all this work life balance, hybrid, remote and it's been really tough to rise into senior leadership positions because there is that unconscious bias where, within organizations, you weren't put up for the promotion because they thought you couldn't do it because of the child, and there's so many things and we are constantly in that battle. But we push through. I think yourself being a coach, a public speaker, podcasts where we can listen to other women talking about the experiences. You've mentioned your amazing friend who's giving you some brilliant tips on how to do things really well. I think we are in a space where there's so much knowledge out there and communities and circles for us to excel as women and I find that, if anything, one of the best things about living in this day and age.

Natalie Lowe: 48:18

Yeah, I think. You know, when I was growing up, I worked in a male industry, so I was very lucky that I was not polarized and I actually had a lot of mentors male mentors who looked after me, and it was strangely enough that I got. The complete opposite of what people might experience right now is, you know, had exposure into the boardroom. I was actually put in front of male executives and other executives about, you know, trying to get promoted. I was transferred from country to country within this aviation firm. I was very, very lucky, but I didn't realize that it was one in a million that that happened. And when people started approaching me you know, about mentoring and talking about leadership, I didn't realize how lucky I was to have that opportunity and I didn't know who to turn to at the time when I was growing up, because I didn't have a female boss that I would be able to have these conversations with. So now that people are opening up and talking about all these challenges, it's great that we have this support network and the podcast that you're doing. That can encourage women. It's okay.

Natalie Lowe: 49:31

You don't have to be everything. You know I was raised to try to overachieve and, coming from an Asian family, an immigrant Asian family in Australia. You know you got to be the best all the time and it puts a lot of pressure on you. And now, even for me, being a mother and when I'm talking to other people, do your best. As long as you've tried your best. You don't have to overachieve, you can't. You got to walk your own path. You got to walk your own journey and just be happy with it. I think what eats us inside is we look at the Joneses, we are trying to keep them up with the Joneses and oh, they've bought a Mercedes or you know they got that promotion, or I. You know your time will come and when that time comes it'll be the best feeling ever and just live life. Life's too short right now. It really is too short.

The Trailblazers Experience: 50:20

I think, natalie, one of the things is you've said is you have a high self awareness of people would consider them, the privileges that you've had and the way you're giving back and saying, right, I want to be a voice for, for change, talking about you can't have it all. You are sharing all those nuggets that are so helpful for women. And the point about having male allies I mean, most of my bosses have been male and they've been brilliant, lifting me up, pulling me forward, teaching me and giving me all these lessons that I didn't think about I needed at the time. But now, looking back, I'm using those pieces of these words of wisdom to even guide my spirit. That's where I can as well.

Natalie Lowe: 51:01

Yeah, I remember there was a lady who came up to me, I would say maybe about a year ago. She was approached by her boss saying how great she was and she needs a promotion, but she won't get the title or the pay. I mean, how does that work? And I remember the situation right, and I'm just like, okay, that doesn't. But you know, I would have not been able to give that, the advice that I did, if I was not in that situation.

Natalie Lowe: 51:32

So I was in that situation 20 years ago where they wanted to move me into a role which was a more expensive country to live in, give me a higher title but not give me the pay or the recognition for that in terms of a natural promotion, so to speak.

Natalie Lowe: 51:50

And so I told that to a male mentor of mine and he said, no, if that was a guy, I bet you any money they wouldn't take it. And so he taught me how to write my email to say, no, I will not take this job if I don't get these. You know, conditions met, and that's what I said to this lady as well, and I said listen, if you were in a position where somebody tells you you are capable but they're not willing to pay you, then something's not right. And don't just sit there and say thank you very much. I think I'm going to trial it out for six months. You go back in there and you tell them that you are the leader that they're looking for and that you deserve this amount of pay, given that you recognize me you see me. Anyway. She got the job and the promotion afterwards, so I was very, very proud of her. Amazing.

The Trailblazers Experience: 52:38

How they not heard of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. That does exist, you know it's like.

Natalie Lowe: 52:45

I know, but I can't imagine, if it's just one person, how many other women, young women are going through that.

Natalie Lowe: 52:52

And I'm sure that if I didn't get that level advice from my senior, would have just taken it because I thought, oh, what a cool job, what a cool gig, I'm sure.

Natalie Lowe: 53:01

But then you realize, yeah, this person or this company is taking advantage of me and no, I don't want to do it. So I think it takes a lot of guts, really a lot of courage, to really speak up and try not to be thinking that you'd be ostracized for it, because it does happen in the workplace, unfortunately, and that's one of the things that we at the Orange Blowfish and that's why we started our own company as well is, you know, don't want to work too late, want to do really fun stuff. I don't want to be in a position or have my team being a hierarchical, you know, company where we've got to think about what does my boss think that? You know, speak up, you know and that's something that we're trying to be better at all the time is have a safe environment for people to come in, enjoy what they do and also feel so confident and also feel success at the same time.

The Trailblazers Experience: 53:55

Natalie, this conversation has really been all about cool ship. So, from business to personal advancement, to lessons learned, it's so refreshing and you've been so open, you've been vulnerable, you've been yourself and they will be women that will take.