In this episode of High Velocity Radio, Stone Payton talks with Executive Coach Britt Hunter with Focal Point. Britt discusses her mission to empower servant leaders, emphasizing the balance between empathy and business acumen. She shares her decision to join Focal Point for its structured support, her use of AI tools like ChatGPT for marketing, and her plans for free webinars and an eight-week leadership program. Britt also reflects on her journey, the importance of mental health over job security, and her passion for continuous learning and cultural experiences. The episode underscores Britt’s commitment to fostering leadership growth and personal development.
Britt Hunter is a dynamic leader, speaker, and executive coach dedicated to empowering future changemakers. With a background that spans elite athletics, education, and corporate leadership, she brings a unique perspective on resilience, mentorship, and innovation.
As the former #1 basketball recruit in the nation, Britt played at Duke and UConn before an injury abruptly ended her career. Facing identity loss and depression, she discovered a new passion—mentoring and leadership.
This led her to education, where she spent seven years shaping young minds before transitioning into the corporate world, now thriving as a leader at Microsoft.
Britt is known for her candid storytelling, humor, and ability to make complex leadership lessons accessible. She speaks nationally on topics like innovation, self-leadership, and team dynamics, delivering engaging, interactive sessions that leave a lasting impact.
Through her executive coaching practice, she helps corporate leaders, educators, and student-athletes sharpen their leadership skills and navigate their careers with confidence. 
A Vanderbilt MBA graduate, Britt is also the creator of the podcast “Thanks But No One Asked You”, where she and her guests offer unfiltered insights on leadership and career growth.
Whether in the boardroom, on stage, or behind the mic, Britt’s mission remains the same: to equip leaders with the mindset and tools to inspire, innovate, and make an impact.
Connect with Britt on LinkedIn and find out about upcoming events and workshops here.
This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.
TRANSCRIPT
Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.
Stone Payton: Welcome to the High Velocity Radio show, where we celebrate top performers producing better results in less time. Stone Payton here with you this morning. You guys are in for a real treat. Please join me in welcoming back to the Business RadioX microphone executive coach with Focal Point, Britt Hunter. How have you been?
Britt Hunter: I’ve been good. Well, let me not say that, um, my kids used to say I’m doing good. You don’t. Superman does good. You’re doing well, so I’m doing well, Stone.
Stone Payton: I am delighted to hear it. And I’m so excited to get caught up on your activities. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed our on air conversation. I don’t know, it’s been months now, I think, and knowing you, you’re probably up to all kind of new stuff. Have some exciting news. But before we go there, uh, maybe let’s get grounded in fundamental mission. Purpose? What are you really out there trying to do for folks as an executive coach?
Britt Hunter: Yes, yes. So I want to pour into servant leaders, period. That’s the tweet. You know, servant leaders. You think of servant leaders, think of executive directors of a nonprofit. Think of a head of a school. Um, think of an empathic leader of an organization. These are people who are constantly pouring into others, and typically no one’s pouring back into them. And it’s it’s not something that they think about. People who are empathic are typically thinking about themselves. Last, but when you’re running an organization, you’re going to need coaching because you have to balance so much. You know it’s not enough to care. You do need to have a little bit of acumen. And so that’s where I come in to say, you know what? I’m also an empathic leader. But there’s a business to run here, right? And you want to stay a leader. So let’s get back to the basics of running this business. Delegating work, um, giving people the empowerment to do their best job all the time and also make some money for your foundation and your school, you know? So that’s what I do. I pour into servant leaders.
Stone Payton: So why focal point you could have just hung out your your shingle right. Yeah. But you decided to go with a, with an outfit that has some discipline, some rigor, some structure. Yeah, yeah. Say more about that.
Britt Hunter: Yeah. So I found out last year, the last time we were on the show, I was kind of doing my own thing. I built three workshops and two keynotes, and I delivered those across about 10 or 12 universities. Talk to college students. And it’s fun because I’m storytelling and I love to story tell. Storytelling is just storytelling. Sometimes you need like a framework, sometimes you need some data. You just need a little bit more concrete stuff. Some people need that, and I wanted that structure and focal point had that. Brian Tracy is called to the point, you know, focal point get to the point because it’s simple, simple, basic. You know, here’s a short story and here’s the point. And I love that. You know, just be clear. Keep it simple silly. You can’t say stupid anymore. Maybe we can keep it simple. Stupid. Um, keep it basic, you know, and it just fit perfectly. And talk about talk about collaboration. I’m already starting to collaborate with other coaches, and that’s in me to do naturally. So, um. Yeah, I mean, I think even day one of meeting somebody in my cohort, they reached out right after the call and said, we got to work together. And I said, great, let’s set it up.
Stone Payton: Sweet. So yeah, that is one of the benefits of, uh, of of an organization that has that kind of brand equity, that kind of reputation. There’s a what would you call it, a community of practice that, uh, and if you, if you run into something, an opportunity or a challenge. Chances are one or more people in that system have been there and can really help, either formally through a collaboration or just, I don’t know, over a beer and a sandwich or a phone call. Just.
Britt Hunter: Yeah, that’s that’s how I did it. That’s how. Oh, Stone, you’re speaking my language. So having most recently worked at Microsoft, you know, you learn very quickly. It’s a behemoth of a company. And no matter what great idea you have, somebody probably already had it in another org. So we always say don’t reinvent the wheel. Go find somebody who has it and just leverage their work. That’s actually a core pillar of Microsoft is part of your review is whose work did you leverage and who leveraged your work? Those are two of the three core pillars. So, um, it came it came natural for me to say, hey, you did this already. Can I have it? I’d like to. You know, I’m happy to give you credit, but I don’t really want to do this from scratch. Um, and so a perfect example, Todd Masters, if he’s not been on the show, he’s got to get on the show. I’m going to get on him about it. I said, Todd. Todd is a ChatGPT whiz. He has created about eight different chatgpt’s. One for marketing, one for time management. I mean, and he’s just he gave him to me. I said, Todd, I will buy you beer if you sit down with me for 90 minutes and explain it to me. And we sat down for about almost three hours and we, you know, he shared his, um, his skill set. And I said, okay, great. I’m going to run these workshops and I’d love to funnel people to you if they’re not a good fit for me. So let’s, let’s, let’s do work, you know. And so it’s really just that easy.
Stone Payton: So what are you learning about AI like ChatGPT? Is it helping you frame up a conversation? Is it helping you in the sales and marketing? Is it like, where are you? Where are you choosing to use it so far?
Britt Hunter: So I have um, I’ve the first thing is just doing my LinkedIn posts. I have a very specific tone. You know, I’m I like to be. I like to be candid. You know, I don’t I don’t if you ask ChatGPT the free version and you say, hey, write me a post, it’s going to sound like, um, I don’t know, a commercial from 1995. No offense to 1995, but I am not a commercial from 1995. I speak a certain way, I talk a certain way. And what I love about the AI is, you know, once you pay for it and you start training it and you start talking to it and, um, it, it starts to absorb how you are and it makes some of the more administrative things much easier. Right? If you’re thinking of the best way to frame an intro to an email, you kind of sit there and think, oh, how do I want to do this? Oh, I don’t want to say that. Oh, is that weird? Those questions that you’re asking yourself, just ask ChatGPT. I tell my friends this all the time. They’re like, well, I was wondering if like, this sounded bad. Ask ChatGPT. It’ll just do it for you. And takes a lot of the guesswork out of some of the more mundane tasks. So you can start thinking about, like, bigger fish.
Stone Payton: Well, and speaking of paying for it, our experience so far has been we’re not talking about a crazy investment either.
Britt Hunter: It’s $20 a month. Yeah, $20 a month. And it is. I mean, you got to use it. Yeah, but I think it’s that it’s that reflex. I don’t know that a lot of people have that reflex of I’m going to ask ChatGPT. Um, I think people need to kind of shift to, I don’t know if I’m allowed to do this, but I’m doing it, people. I’m not going to say don’t use Google anymore. But those questions that you used to ask Google once you asked ChatGPT, you’re going to get a more comprehensive answer that’s going to answer the questions that are behind the question that you that Google wasn’t going to give you. It was going to give you links. Chatgpt is like, look, here’s the thing. You know, I know what you asked me. So I’m going to answer all the five questions that you didn’t ask me that I know you’re asking. And that’s that’s super helpful.
Stone Payton: Well, I have very high hopes for it and for our Business RadioX Academy, because we have a community of practice around people who run studios like this. And we, you know, we’ve got 21 years of, you know, thought leadership and IP that I want them to be able to tap into. And it’s one thing to go search in a big pile for how to conduct a pre-call conversation. It’s another because it’s our understanding we can make one that just, uh, like a large language model, I think.
Britt Hunter: There you go.
Stone Payton: Lm and it just talks to our stuff if we want it to.
Britt Hunter: That’s exactly right.
Stone Payton: So it’s it’s an exciting time.
Britt Hunter: That’s exactly right. Todd Masters did just that. He put the focal point material in it so that I can say, hey, hey, ChatGPT. Well, actually, it’s called Marketing Masters because this last name is Masters. I can’t believe we’re talking about Todd Masters this much, but.
Stone Payton: Yeah, I’m gonna send him an invoice.
Britt Hunter: But, uh, he he put our focal point information in it so that when I want to build a workshop, I can say, hey, these are the three things I want to talk about in my workshop. Where is this material? It tells you the name, what folder it’s in, where to get it, and what you can draw from it, and it’ll give you some other options in case you don’t like those. It’s like it just cuts down your time of sifting through, you know, just sifting. And it’s especially great for people who are who are typically CEOs or CEOs and had administrative assistants. You forgot how to schedule stuff on your calendar. You probably forgot how to write an email. You know, you that’s not something you did. And now if you’re going out on your own, you have an administrative assistant right here. You just you need to upskill and learn it. But I mean, spend two days in it. You’ll be hooked.
Stone Payton: So talk about workshops. So this is one expression of your work. You’re doing probably one on one work maybe group work workshop. Tell us about the work a little bit. And then I’d love to hear a little bit about what one might expect if they participate in a in a workshop.
Britt Hunter: Yeah. So I’m going to do a few things. So first I’m going to I’m going to host a series of three free webinars okay. Because one you know we talked about this stone I like I like to share things. And sometimes even in spite of my wallet, I will share things for free because I just like, you know, I don’t I don’t a lot of people share things with me. That’s how I got to where I am is people seeing potential and pouring into me. So it’s only right that I pay it forward. So I’m hosting three free webinars starting next Wednesday. Oh my. And so they’re going to run concurrently on Wednesday Thursday. Same topic the following week Wednesday Thursday same topic. So we’re going to talk about a few things that I think are very timely. One is time management right. It’s called Master Your Minutes. It’s not a Todd Masters reference. It’s called Master Your Minutes. The next one is Command the Room. So I love public speaking. People always say oh you have a presence. And yes, I’m six three. So I do have presence. But I also have have studied a lot of really good speakers. A lot of really great storytellers. Um, and there are some things that they do that make them impactful. And the last one is disk decoded. And this is a yeah.
Stone Payton: That’s the assessment thing. Right.
Britt Hunter: Assessment. And I’m going to show parts of my assessment. You know, um, there may be people out there like me, but it’s not so much just my assessment. But it’s like, how do you leverage this to figure out how to work better with people who are a little different than you or people who are just like you, right? And so I’ll show, uh, how I leverage the disk to think about my business moving forward. And so in case people want to also get curious about their disk, they should. So those things will happen, um, for three weeks in a row. And what I want is to build a cohort. And so I’ll start to host a eight week long program. Um, one is called Executive Essentials. And so for eight weeks we’re going to talk about those same topics and a few more in depth across eight weeks. So once a week for 90 minutes, a cohort of ten people will come together virtually on zoom. You’ll get worksheets, you’ll get an assessment. You’ll get two, one on one calls with me and you will walk away. One if not being more confident about your abilities, but you’ll walk away with some tangible next steps. How do I get Ahold of my time today? How do I trust people to start delegating more? How can I ensure that when I show up in a room, I’m respected by how I sound, by how I look, by how I move, right? Things that are very important to a leader.
Britt Hunter: And then we have a signature series. Now this is going to be for people who are in the Georgia area. And I love a signature series because at the end of the eight weeks we have an on hand, a hands on experience, and this one will be a cooking class with Chef Zach. So Zaza’s kitchen. She is an incredible chef. I met her at the Cooks warehouse where I volunteer. We got to talk about that. You should volunteer at the Cooks Warehouse. It’s amazing, amazing chefs in there. And after eight weeks, that cohort, we’re going to get together and we’re going to do a cooking course. Everybody’s going to get a hands on experience cooking something that Chef Zach has prepared for her. So, you know, I’m a very experiential person. Um, maybe that’s because I like field trips from my teaching days. But, you know, I want people to be able to come into a group, be surrounded by like minded people, and get it done. We don’t need to spend 18 months learning a new habit. You do need accountability, which is where I come in, but you just need a few weeks of consistent communication about and drilling the same thing. And you can’t change everything all at once. But you can change at least one thing.
Stone Payton: Now, these initial webinars you’re describing, you’re doing those at no fee. Is that accurate?
Britt Hunter: That’s 100% true because it’s 100% free. Wow.
Stone Payton: Because the reason I ask it strikes me as this easy entry opportunity that you’re providing is. And with the objective of creating a cohort that then wants to go in and do deeper work. Number one, it certainly is living into your mission, um, of, of of wanting to, to pour into servant leaders. But it also strikes me as a very savvy, uh, sales and marketing strategy to do that, build the cohort, do the work with the people who want to do the the work. And I mention all of that because I am interested and continue to be fascinated and try to be a student of the business side of coaching as I’ve been doing this series. I think a lot of coaches, at least in the early going, really struggle with the getting that first handful of clients. The the whole sales and marketing thing. Do you agree?
Britt Hunter: Yeah. So I think it’s it’s a few things. Right. I think it’s putting yourself out there. Um, I think when you become a business owner and I say this to my, my black owned businesses on the west side of Atlanta, you know, I’m on the board of the Northwest Business Association. And I tell them, when you become a business owner, you are chief of marketing and sales. Just to be clear, I know you have a passion. I know you have a vision. I know you have this dream you have to be selling. You have to be selling, right? You’re in charge of sales. That is your job now. And, um, I just I have no fear. You know, I’ve embarrassed myself enough times. Um, I’ve seen myself flop enough times, and I’m still here. I’m still surviving. And so I really want to just kind of inspire people and share my story as I go through this journey of, like, listen, I’m going to do this webinar, okay? Five people could show up, right? It better not be five, y’all. Somebody better show up to this webinar. But if five people show up, five people show up. I hope those I hope that those five people really enjoyed their time. I’m not going to be bogged down by numbers because it’s a long game, and I know that just from life, you know, nothing is built in a day. We say that and we agree with that sentiment. But then when we don’t see immediate gratification, we we kind of falter. No no no no no no no. I’m going into this assuming the number will be low. I’m always blown away. But I want to go in humbly saying, you know what? No one has to come to this. There’s a million people offering services. There’s a lot of noise out there. You could go on YouTube University. No one has to come to this. But the people that do come, I’m going to make sure that they leave satisfied, because that’s more what I’m concerned with. And if I’ve done my job right, they’re going to tell their friends and someone else is going to come.
Stone Payton: Absolutely. So what else are you learning about the the whole the business side of being a practitioner? Because, I mean, you’re out there, you’re practicing your craft, you’re learning different ways to serve even more effectively. And oh, by the way, to your point, you got to run a business. Yeah. So, uh, anything else surprise you or something that you’ve learned about? Just the business side of the coaching business?
Britt Hunter: I would say, you know, I think when it comes back to the selling side, I am not a sales person. I don’t want to force anything on anybody. I know that, you know, ABC always be closing. Always be closing. But what I have found is it’s much easier to sell something that you actually care about. So if I’m, you know, I don’t know, selling a workshop on how to get rich quick, it’s not going to go very well. It’s not going to go very well. I’m going to feel bad for charging you for that, you know, because I’m not going to fully believe in that. I don’t really believe in getting rich quick. I don’t know, and I don’t really know how you define rich. Right. And so there’s levels to it. I care about what I’m talking about because I care about, um, those kind of servant leaders. Because I’ve been one. I’ve been a vice principal. I’ve been a dean. I’ve been a teacher in Harlem. And it’s. You need people to pour into. You need people to develop you. And if you don’t have access to.
Britt Hunter: That that can’t be the reason you don’t get better. That cannot be the reason you don’t get better. Especially if you’re serving children. If you’re serving elderly people, if you’re. If you’re serving vulnerable populations, as you say you are, you have to get better. Period. Full stop. There’s no exception. And I feel passionate. I’m doing it now, Stone. I’m selling now it’s selling, but it’s actually I’m just excited about it. Yeah. And so I would I would tell people, you know, if you’re not like, really excited about it, you’re actually not going to sell, you’re going to withdraw from it. You’re not going to want to do it. So maybe it’s it’s not that you need to get out of the business. You need to pivot it and really find your why step. Take a step back and think about what is my why here? And I know it sounds corny, and I hate to sound corny, but it is. Um. It’s just true. You know, it comes much easier when you. When you wake up thinking about it.
Stone Payton: So you got to tell me more about this. Cooks warehouse.
Britt Hunter: Cooks warehouse. Okay, so I’m just marketing everybody else’s business, but my own. Apparently, Cooks warehouse has this incredible program where you can volunteer. You have to go to little training for, like, 90 minutes, and then you become, um, you know, a chef’s assistant. And so about eight of us will be in a kitchen, and the chef is going to teach a class. It could be eight people. It could be 30 people. It holds up to 30 people in this kitchen, man. And complete strangers could be date night. You know, it could be a corporate team. And they’re coming in. Now, I will say there are some people who I’m looking and I’m like, I don’t think this person has ever held a knife before, and I’m concerned, but I can’t say that out loud. You could just observe, but you go in and, you know, you help, you help the chef prepare the food. You cut things up, you put them in the bowls. You. You also assist the people who are learning to cook that day. You’re following the chef’s guidelines. Now, the reason I like it is because I don’t have to do any of the cooking, but I can watch and learn, um, how to use a knife properly. How to cut. I did not know how to cut a bell pepper properly to remove the seeds in one one fell. Just one cut.
Stone Payton: I’m pretty sure I don’t either.
Britt Hunter: No one does except for the chefs. And so you have all these different chefs coming in to teach, you know, sushi making steak night, uh, pasta from scratch. Oh, wow. And it’s it’s fun. It really is fun.
Stone Payton: So as you, as you practice starts to unfold, are you going to focus primarily locally, regionally, or are you going to have that effort going and some national stuff, or have you have you mapped all that out yet?
Britt Hunter: Oh honey, I’m all over the place. So I’m only thinking nationally and I need to be thinking internationally. Stone I need to think bigger. But right now I’m aligning some some keynotes. So I have a keynote in Denver with Forte Foundation that is a women’s focused MBA prep program. So women who are going to get their MBA, it’s a it’s an accelerator to get you started. Right. They’ll help you get an internship before you go to business school, which is so important because when you go to business school, you’re going to drown. You haven’t been to school in a in a while, and it’s intense. And the objective is to get a job. So they give you that mental support you need to get back into it. So I’ll be doing a keynote there in Denver. Um, and I’m going to continue to do that. Right. I definitely want to still reach out to my colleges and universities with their student athlete programs. As a former student athlete, I, I definitely want to pour back into those people because I remember being lost thinking, well, all I’ve done is my sport. Am I good at anything else? And the fun fact is, y’all, you’re the best at a lot. Turns out you have the most amazing soft skills that you can’t you can’t pay for. And they don’t know that. And so I like to go around and prove it to them. Given my experience in education and corporate. Um, I also want to focus, you know, on the D2 and D3 schools. The D1 schools have resources. Yeah, they can bring in, you know, a Dale Carnegie somebody, somebody. Um, I want to go in and, and also a lot of student athletes look like me anyway. So I want to go talk to them and and let them know you got it. Just get focused. But you got this. So yeah, I want to go all over the country and run my mouth as much as I can.
Stone Payton: So in, in the local market, where I have every confidence that you will own your backyard, as some marketing folks say, uh, it have you, have you kind of landed on a descriptor or set of descriptors for an ideal client like this is really the person I want to work with, you know, here and here in the local market. Yeah.
Britt Hunter: So, um, it’s so funny when I introduced myself. People see me and they see a six foot three black female who’s, you know, pretty confident, pretty confident in how she speaks, sounds. And so they immediately go, oh, you must be working with women owned businesses, women, women leaders, black leaders. And I’m like, look, if you met my friend group, it’s a rainbow. Um, and the only thing that ties us together is our mindset. We all want to get better at something. We’re all striving to get better at something. That’s the only commonality that I’m looking for. I when I go to a university and I’m working with student athletes and the ad says, well, who who’s your audience? I said, kids that want to be there, please don’t volunteer for any student athlete to come hear me speak, because it’s not going to go well. I might change their mind, but that’s not. That’s not my focus. My focus is to pour into people who want to get better. So that is my ideal client. I don’t care how old you are. I don’t care where you come from. I don’t care what you look like. You could be shorter than me. You could be taller than me, I don’t care. Do you want to get better? Because if so, I’m your person. That’s my ideal client. I hope that’s clear.
Stone Payton: And since you don’t really have enough going on, you decided to go ahead and get a get get a radio show up and running as well. Right.
Britt Hunter: I got a podcast coming out, y’all. It’s coming out in May. Um, the podcast is called thanks, but No One Asked You, and there’s an eye roll in there in case you didn’t see it. That’s after the thanks. And it’s where storytelling meets unsolicited advice. And I am a professional advice giver. Um, unsolicited specifically. My friends know this. You know, I like to tell people I’m not the person you call day one after your breakup. You know, you want someone to, like, coo and rub your back and say, it’s okay. I’m the person you want to call when it’s seven weeks in, and you kind of are just tired of lamenting and you want to get over that hump. Call my phone. I’m going to get you there. Let’s, let’s let’s move forward. You’re absolutely right. This has gone on too long. None of that made any sense. I’m glad you’re here with us. Now let’s move forward. So, um. Yeah, I’ll be giving unsolicited advice about just my experiences. Right? Working in corporate, working in education, being a student athlete at Duke and UConn, um, all of the things. And I’m really want to target my early career people, my early career people have a lot of advice coming at them. Unfortunately, most of it is on TikTok.
Britt Hunter: Um, some of the things that people are telling me, I’m not on TikTok or Instagram, by the way, y’all, y’all can’t find me there. You can find me on LinkedIn. But, um, I got off social media in 2019 because I did feel like I didn’t have any control over what I was taking in, and I felt overwhelmed all the time. And I’m like, why do I feel overwhelmed? Like my life is fine? Why am I feeling like this? Well, I didn’t have any real control over what was coming into my eyes because I’m constantly picking up my phone. So I want to just be the person that’s like, listen, listen, listen here, shut it down, okay? This is the real skinny. There’s no get rich quick schemes. There’s no feel better tomorrow it’s you got to go through it period. Full stop. You have to go through life and no one can tell you how to do that better than your own experience. And so I want to share my experiences to prove that I’m excited about it. It’s going to be fun. I’m going to have some animations so that people, you know, I know our I know our attention span is a little low. So I got some animations I got going on. It’ll be fun.
Stone Payton: Well, I can’t wait to see it. It’ll be fantastic. So, speaking of advice, what do you think is is maybe one of the best pieces of advice you’ve ever received and maybe one of the worst. Does anything stand out?
Britt Hunter: Honey, you know, I’ve been thinking. I thank you for asking me that question, because I have been thinking about the worst advice that I recently got. Um. Some of the. I’ve had a lot of really good advice, um, especially from my coaches growing up, but some advice that I’ve kind of gotten here and there that now I share with everybody is, I call it the power five. And when you get older, as you get older, you things happen, right? You could come from a small town and you go to college and then four of your closest friends don’t. That’s fine. It doesn’t really matter, but something shifts. You’ve been exposed now to a whole new world of people in this university because that’s colleges. That’s what college is about. It’s not really about the credits and the schoolwork. It’s about acclimating to other people that you otherwise would never meet. And so your your mind has expanded in a different way, but your friends from back home are still kind of doing the same things, and that’s okay. But you slowly start to see that rift. That rift is going to happen over and over and over again in your life, especially if you continually want to do more and more and more. If you want to travel, if you want to climb the ladder, if you want to own a business, and there are people that you know and have known for a long time but aren’t necessarily on that same wavelength. So the advice that I like to give people is find a power five.
Britt Hunter: These are five people that are running faster than you. They’re smarter than you, and they want to achieve a lot more than you do. One person at the top should be your mentor. The two people to the side should be your peers, right? They don’t manage you. You don’t manage them. They’re just your peers. They work alongside you or they’re just your friends. And then you should always be mentoring two people below you. Now these are going to be really I have two mentees that are beyond impressive. Right. And one of them goes to Georgia Tech. And Georgia Tech kids are so impressive. It’s crazy. They think I’m impressive. And I’m like, honey, you’re you’re at Georgia Tech doing biomechanical whatever. I don’t know what. And you’re 21, like, you’re so far ahead of where I was at 21. You’re incredible. But they they keep me eager to do better because they’re watching me. And so get a power five so that when you’re ready to do the next thing, you’re already surrounded by that energy. You’re already surrounded by that energy. Let’s talk about the worst advice that I most recently got stoned because wow. So I was at, um, I just recently left my employer, Microsoft. Um, And it’s not quite public knowledge why I left, but a lot of people are like, oh, she wanted to do her own thing. I left a toxic. I left a toxic manager, and it was toxic for a very long time. Um, over a year, I did all the things that I needed to do to handle it, and it didn’t work out.
Britt Hunter: And so I kind of just got to this point of like, all right, no one’s coming to save me. You know? I got to save myself. So what am I going to do? And so here we are. Um, but I reached out to a lot of women who, you know, some I, some I confided in and a lot of I didn’t confide in too many people, but one of the women who I wasn’t really friends with, you know, she was just newer to the team. She kind of gave me her rendition of. Listen, you know, I do what I do because I like my lifestyle. I like, you know, pretty much I like the money that I make. And that’s my reason for putting up with the nonsense. And I was just kind of like, well, that’s weird, but okay. Like, immediately I said that, well, we’re not aligned because I don’t I’m not going to do too much of any of that for paycheck. And her suggestion was to just put my head down, figure out my why, and keep going. And I thought, that is the worst advice I have ever heard. And I hope that she never gives anyone advice like that again. I you should never feel disrespected and depraved at work. Never never never never. My parents. Your parents. Right? Sure, they they felt like maybe that was the option that they had. Maybe it’s a little bit of entitlement on my end, but there’s just a level of respect.
Britt Hunter: And I’ve had harsh managers. I mean, I played for Geno Auriemma, so I know what harsh looks like. I know what nurturing, no nonsense nurturing looks like. This was different. And her advice to me was like, yeah, these things happen. Keep it. Keep it going. Uh, no, I’m not going to do that. I’m going to leave because no. And some people will say, well, that’s a very privileged thing to say, you know, leaving your job. Sure. I mean, sure, I think there are people who have less than me, though, who have left their job because what’s more important to you, your paycheck or your mental health? How you show up around your family, how you show up around your friends because you’re just so drained. And I was I was drained, I had I picked up a smoking habit. Shout out to the smokers out there. No offense to the smokers, but I just, I don’t smoke. I picked up a smoking habit. I, you know, have an anxious tic where I pull my hair and I was pulling, I created a bald spot like, I’m sorry, no, I don’t need to stay anywhere where I’m causing myself harm to get through the day. So that was the worst advice. I would never tell anyone to do that. I would actually say, what is your plan to get out? Let’s talk about action Step. Let’s not sit in it. Let’s talk about what’s your plan to move out of this situation. Um. That’s it. That’s the tweet.
Stone Payton: Well, no, you kind of. And now I’m beginning to believe it was a little bit tongue in cheek. You talked about early in the conversation about giving unsolicited advice, and it’s like, I don’t know that you really do on a day to day basis. I think you created an environment where someone can kind of discover the next few steps in their path. The more I’m hearing you talk.
Britt Hunter: Yeah, I do both, I do both. Okay, okay. So, you know, I try to do a little breadcrumbing. Let’s talk about how you want to get there. And then there comes a point where it’s like, all right, cut it out. Like, let’s let’s stop. You know, this is the pattern I’m hearing. This doesn’t make any sense. Don’t do this. Sometimes you just need to be told, don’t do this or this is not helpful for you. And I’ve had a lot of mentors do that for me and I’m so appreciative.
Stone Payton: So I got to know. I don’t even know where it would be on your calendar, but I’m interested to know what, if anything, do you do when you’re not assistant cheffing doing webinars? You know, building cohorts, doing one on one coaching, anything like just out there that you do that we might not? Or do you still play a little basket, a little sandlot basketball?
Britt Hunter: I can’t play basketball anymore. Um, but I do, I like running, I go to the gym a lot. I play with my dog a lot. I’m a regular at fetch. Um, I don’t think people at fetch know my name, but they know my dog’s name. His name is ace. They’re like, oh, that’s Ace’s handler. Um, I don’t I’m not a dog, mom. Y’all didn’t have puppies. Um, I’m ace handler, and, um. Yeah, I go to all the fetches. The fetches are amazing. Alpharetta. One is beautiful. If you’ve never been.
Stone Payton: I’ve not been. But I’ve heard dog owners talk about these places. And apparently, in the last time I heard someone talk about it was at a young Professionals of Woodstock gathering. Believe it or not, I’m in the young professionals of Woodstock. But someone was saying, we need to fetch out here in Woodstock.
Britt Hunter: You do? This would be the perfect place. You could just open up, you know, a fake. Fetch a stone, fetch or something. A stone’s throw away. All right. That was bad. Edit that out. Um, yeah, I, I, you know, I like to also, my friends know I like to just go to completely different things, so I, I love going to the symphony. The symphony is actually has some of the most incredible shows. We also have the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra also has one of the only female principal conductors in in the world. Oh, um, don’t ask me her name because I’m going to say it wrong, but look her up. Um. Pretty fascinating. Um, I love going to the high museum. Of course. Um, any kind of any kind of thing that’s just like, a different cultural experience. That’s not something that, you know, I would wake up and just naturally do is something that I want to do.
Stone Payton: I believe that about you. I think I feel like you are the kind of person that is you just ready, willing and able to jump into another culture for a little while. A different arena. Something foreign to you? Immerse yourself. Take it in. Not be judgmental, but. But be observant.
Britt Hunter: Yes.
Stone Payton: You’re that person, aren’t you?
Britt Hunter: Yeah. I think it should be mandatory in high school that every high schooler spend 60 days in another country.
Stone Payton: Amen.
Britt Hunter: 60 days?
Stone Payton: Yeah.
Britt Hunter: You know, and then come back home and tell me what’s hard.
Stone Payton: Yeah.
Britt Hunter: Come back and tell me what’s challenging. You know, like, just. I love traveling solo. You learn a lot. And then when you travel solo, you’re forced to talk to strangers. When you travel with your friends, you only talk to your friends.
Stone Payton: Oh, that’s a good point.
Britt Hunter: But when you go out, I mean, and for the first day, I don’t really meet anyone because, you know, it is a little awkward. Um, and I realized for 24 hours I’m not talking. Wow. Because I have no one to talk to. I’m not going to talk to myself. Um, but by day two, I found a group and I’m running my mouth. So, yeah, I think people, you know, take a risk, go do something new. Go somewhere new.
Stone Payton: So what’s the best way for our listeners to continue to tap into your work and reach out? And it’s going to be a long list because you got a lot going on. I gotta make sure that people know how to get to all of this stuff. Or maybe there’s a hub that’ll that’ll help them.
Britt Hunter: There’s a few hubs, so the first place you should definitely find me is on LinkedIn. I’ll make sure that stone has stone. You have that link. That’s my only social media platform for now. I will eventually be on YouTube in May, but the next thing is I’ve created a collection of events on Eventbrite. And so through that collection you can find the free webinars, you can find the cohorts that I’m building. I’m building several at a time. And yeah, I want to make it super easy. And of course you can go on my website and all of those things will be there. So, uh, Britt Hunter, Dot focal point Coaching.com that is my website.
Stone Payton: Britt, I so appreciate you coming to the studio. This has been a blast. I knew it would be because of our earlier conversation, but no, you just you you just have an energy about you and I’m sure it comes across over the airwaves as well. You just want me to go experience more and do better and pour into more people and all of those all of those things. Thank you so much for coming in.
Britt Hunter: Thanks for having me.
Stone Payton: My pleasure. All right. Until next time. This is Stone Payton for our guest today, Britt Hunter with Focal Point and everyone here at the Business RadioX family saying, we’ll see you in the fast lane.
