Plan Your Work and Work Your Plan E14
Collaborative Connections Radio Show and Podcast features entrepreneurs, local businesses, and community organizations to bring people together and foster collaboration in our community.
In this episode, host Kelly Lorenzen had the pleasure of featuring special guests Dena Patton, CEO of Dena Patton Coaching and Training, Marisa Benoit, Ph.D. Founder of Corinthian Spirit Consulting, and Suzanne McDonald, CEO of Angels & Insights, ROIinU, and Newport Interactive Marketing.
If you are looking for sales and marketing tips, entrepreneurship insights, and/or coaching for your business or college-age child, you won’t want to miss this episode of Collaborative Connections.
Here are a few of Kelly’s takeaways from the show…
1) Sales is different from marketing
2) Plan early and often whether it is for college, a new career, or growing your business
3) Work on your business, not just in it if you want to grow
4) Set short-term and long-term goals for schooling and in business
5) Hire people/Outsource for the things you are not good at
6) Stay in your brilliant lane to grow
7) Growing your network one of the keys to growing your business
For the past 20 years Dena Patton has been a leading coach and speaker on the topic of greatness mindset and business growth. Her unique Greatness Methodology has changed the lives of thousands of leaders who are building epic things they never dreamt were possible.
She focuses on working with business owners to take their sales, leadership and systems to new epic levels of success. She also coaches executive leaders in their mindset and leadership to help them elevate their results to become the leaders they were born to be.
When it comes to training programs she is the ‘un-corporate’ trainer who takes teams to NEW levels of communication, innovation and greatness. She is passionate about companies winning with their culture, their teams and their bottom line.
She opened her coaching and training company in 2001 in NYC and moved to Phoenix in 2002. Since then she has worked with clients from every industry from tech, hospitality, construction to education, including celebrities and top founders.
Dena Patton started her first business, a PR & marketing company serving the entertainment industry, at the age of 24 while she was living in New York City. In 1999 at the age of 27 she experienced a minor stroke, and during her recovery had to learn how to speak again.
In her year of recovery, Dena realized her calling was much bigger than her marketing company. So she sold her business to a start-up Internet company and became their Director of Marketing as she recovered. It was the first year of the internet and they built a community of 70,000 subscribers which has since become the #1 global leader in its industry. In 2001 she left that start-up to start her coaching and training company and has been helping people do epic things ever since.
She speaks about greatness mindset and leadership nationwide and has garnered 9 business awards and over 90 media stories including CNN, Entrepreneur magazine, First Women, NBC, and Business Journal.
Her book, The Greatness Game, hit #1 on Amazon Best Seller list which support people’s greatness mindset while pushing them out of their comfort zone to accomplish their biggest goals. She spends her extra time traveling with her family or helping her nonprofit The Girls Rule Foundation 501c3 that offers empowerment and leadership programs for teen girls.
Connect with Dena on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram.
ROIinU, a skills-packed, live-interactive course to guide aspiring digital marketing professionals to career success.
ROIinU enables more students to learn from experts and is built on the successes of the digital & social media courses Suzanne launched & taught at several universities as well as Angles & Insights’ Student-to-Employment program.
Listen to Learn from Suzanne’s podcasts, including: Digital Marketing Career Success: Experts Tips to Guide You Learn from experts to grow your career faster with fewer struggles. From job-searching to career growth, your success doesn’t have to be a mystery. Listen in for unique opportunities, insights & tips from top industry experts & more.
Hosted by former Boston Globe journalist and serial entrepreneur Suzanne McDonald, connect with a wide network of pros from the Interactive Marketing Insights podcast & beyond. Brought to you by ROIinU.com.
Suzanne McDonald improves lives: from her clients’ customers and colleagues to her students and vast network of expert partners.
As CEO of Angles & Insights, the former Boston Globe journalist and her team customize digital marketing solutions for brands, from solopreneur to corporate sales-marketing teams.
Suzanne also founded and curates Newport Interactive Marketing networking-learning community — bringing expert speakers’ insights to local businesses, agencies & nonprofits — and has developed & hosted 120+ in-person and virtual events, backed by an intern.
Connect with Suzanne on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
The transition between high school and college, and then college and joining the workforce or further education, can be difficult and it often feels like there isn’t an adequate roadmap. 
Corinthian Spirit Consulting works with students and parents to develop a passage plan through these uncharted and often turbulent waters by focusing on clear communication of goals and accountability.
Using a personalized approach built on the Oxford model of tutorial teaching, Marisa Benoit works with students to develop time management, goal setting, writing and presentation skills, and improved communication. Building confidence and honing executive function skills equips students to successfully navigate through the challenges of higher education and life itself.
Corinthian Spirit Consulting has recently branched out to include translating expert knowledge into teachable material for online course design and delivery. Working with solopreneurs and small businesses, CSC identifies and bridges the gap between expert and novice in order to make subject expert knowledge teachable and accessible for students.
Marisa Benoit, Ph.D. grew up in a in a small town on the coast of Maine and attended Yale University, graduating with a B.A. with Honors in History in 2005. After Yale, she worked as an analyst and consultant for a healthcare company while saving for graduate school. She then moved to the U.K. to pursue her dream – a M.Sc. in the History of Science, Medicine, and Technology and Ph.D. in the History of Medicine from Oxford University.
While at Oxford, she taught undergraduates and devoted much of her time to strengthening relationships between current Oxford students and alumni societies in Europe and North America.
Marisa has worked in different industries, but her true love is education and working with young people, which led her to start her own business, Corinthian Spirit Consulting. Her time at Oxford made her realize that she was interested in helping her students make a plan for ‘what’s next’, whether it was their first jobs or graduate school.
Learning from her personal educational journey and work history (always intertwined), she works with students to articulate their goals and make detailed plans about how to achieve them. A lifelong sailor, her own journey towards her goal of a Ph.D. included ‘shipping out’ for two years and living and working onboard yachts in between degrees. Marisa learned how to adapt and adjust to challenges along the way and make changes in her plan but not lose sight of the overall goal.
Connect with Marisa on LinkedIn.
About Collaborative Connections
Kelly Lorenzen started the “Collaborative Connections” show to bring her clients and favorite charities together to meet each other, connect and collaborate in life and business. She hopes to build a stronger community one show at a time. 
About Our Sponsor
KLM Consulting is a business concierge and project management firm. They help small business owners and non-profits build, brand and brag about their businesses.
About Your Host
Kelly Lorenzen, CEO of KLM Consulting, is an award-winning entrepreneur with over 15 years of business-ownership experience. She is also a certified project management professional.
Kelly’s expertise is in business development, customer service, marketing, and sales.
Connect with Kelly on LinkedIn, and follow KLM Consulting on Facebook.