The AI strategy that helped Nina Willdorf grow her business faster than she ever imagined

Nina Willdorf 0:02

I asked Claude to tell me, based on everything I know from the academy, what is not working here. I knew it wasn't working. I didn't know why I was able to get my consulting business to mid six figures in one year through AI, which is truly insane.

Leah Neaderthal 0:25

Welcome to Smart gets paid with me. Leah Neaderthal, I help women run more profitable consulting businesses, getting more of the clients you want and getting paid way more for your work without sacrificing your time. But I've never been a salesperson. My background is in corporate marketing, and when I started my own consulting business, I learned pretty quickly that it's about 1000 times harder to sell your own stuff than it is to sell someone else's. So I taught myself how to do it. I turned it into a methodology, and now I teach that proven methodology to my clients. So whether your consulting contracts are $10,000 $100,000 or more, if you want more clients you love, more work you love, and they get paid more than you ever thought possible, then you're in the right place. Let's do it together. Thanks for tuning in, and don't forget to rate, review and share. Hey there, Leah here, and thanks for tuning in. I hope wherever you're listening to this, wherever you are right now, I hope you're having a great week, making some good progress in your business, and taking some time for you. So raise your hand if you'd say you're a little impatient. I mean, okay, if you're driving, like, keep your hands on the wheel. But just generally, how many folks listening would say that you're a little impatient? I'm willing to bet it's most of us. I mean, I know, I definitely am. And it's funny, because when I had kids, I was a little worried that my tendency towards, you know, being a little impatient would cause me to be a really impatient parent. Because, you know, of course, kids can try your patience, but what I've actually discovered is that having kids has made me a more patient person overall, which I'm sure is better for everybody who interacts with me, but running a business has not cured my impatience one bit. And when you're the one responsible for making it all happen, you know the time that anything takes can feel really, really long, which can be hard when you're running a business, because things just take time. But some of that time, it's spent doing something you don't need to do, which is just spinning, you know, trying to think your way through something, second guessing yourself, starting over or, you know, just not quite getting there. And over the years, I've noticed something, you know, a lot of the women I work with, a lot of the women I talk to are incredibly smart, just deeply capable people, and they end up spending a ton of time trying to figure things out on their own, because, you know, as business owners in their own small business, they don't really have another option. They don't have a process to follow, or they don't have someone to think alongside. So they do what smart, capable women, do they work harder and just push through. And that works. I mean, it does work, but it's slow and it's exhausting and it takes way longer than it needs to, which, you know, as we've established, is not great for those of us who just want things to be done, like right now, or, you know, preferably, yesterday. And you know, one thing that's helping women consultants do things faster these days is AI.

Leah Neaderthal 3:28

And I know you can't go anywhere on the internet right now without seeing something about AI, you know, I mean, just go on LinkedIn for like, two minutes, right? It's like, AI is going to take all the jobs, or AI is going to make your job better. Or here's my infographic of 500 AI tools you need to start using today. And I think a lot of that noise can make it hard to see what's actually useful, like, concretely, practically useful for someone running a consulting business, and that is speed and really being able to build and grow a consulting business faster than ever before. So today, I'm going to cut through that noise a little bit, because the conversation I'm sharing with you is one of the most genuinely impressive examples I've seen of someone using not just AI to do techie things, but using both a clear methodology and AI tools together. And you're going to hear what's possible with the combination of those things. So today, I'm talking to Nina willdorff, who runs a consultancy called special projects, where she helps CEOs identify who their most valuable customers are and how to get more of them. Nina is a former magazine editor who went on to work at places like Coinbase and Airbnb and in venture capital, and when she decided to start her own consulting business. She came in with a ton of expertise and a lot of hustle, but she didn't have a system to actually grow her business. And since we've been working together, I have to say I've had a front row seat to how she's grown her business in just a year. And when we had one of our coaching calls a while back, she was showing me how she's using AI along. Alongside our methodology. And I was just blown away, because what she'd built wasn't just clever, it had actually changed the speed of her whole business. And when I saw that, I was like, you have to come onto the podcast and talk about this. So in my conversation with Mina, you're going to hear the specific tools and strategies that have made the difference, including how she's using AI in some really smart ways, and you're going to hear the mindset shifts underneath all of it, and hopefully ones that help you as well. So take a listen to my conversation with Nina willdorf, and at the end, I'll come back and share a lesson you can apply in your business, and then hopefully someday soon, you'll partner with us to help you build your consulting business, and you'll come back on the podcast and share your story. Enjoy, Nina. I'm so glad you're here. Thanks for being here.

Nina Willdorf 5:45

Thanks for having me. Leah, I'm so happy to be here.

Leah Neaderthal 5:48

So let's start at the beginning. Why don't you tell us who you are and what you do?

Nina Willdorf 5:53

I'm Nina willdorf and I run a consultancy called special projects. We help CEOs identify who their most valuable customers are and how to get more of them.

Leah Neaderthal 6:06

Yeah, well, what were you doing right before you started your business?

Nina Willdorf 6:11

So right before I started my business, I was working at a venture capital firm, helping them with marketing and communications and platform and helping their CEOs also identified their growth and their opportunities at the early stage. Before that, I had worked in house at Coinbase and Airbnb, and before that, in v1 I was a magazine editor. So I was a magazine editor in New York, and that was so much about helping identify where the story is in a moment, and what makes things inherently interesting, and connecting people to stories.

Leah Neaderthal 6:49

I do love the through line of story and and connecting to what really matters and and using that in service of companies and or founders or CEOs that can't quite get

Nina Willdorf 7:01

there on their own. And I think the thing that that I've always really loved doing, it's usually a game of translation. So people are building something or they want something to manifest in the world, and then it's about figuring out, like, who actually needs that? Where is there actually a market, and what do those people care about and what matters to them, and then really connecting those dots, helping kind of bring those two forces together, is the way that I think about it, and it is incredibly gratifying when you kind of get to that unlock. And so a big part of what I do is a lot of qualitative research, and I get on the phone with people, and I talk to them, and I use those interviewing skills of like, just really listening deeply and then using that to drive the translation. And so that's just been, you know, I've been designing, the practice of, kind of getting to that unlock has been, really what this first year of special projects has been about. And I could not have predicted truly, I know people say that all the time, but it is true that things kind of would have happened as quickly as they've had, in terms of, you know, the business forming and coming together.

Leah Neaderthal 8:15

Yeah, well, let's start sort of at the beginning of our story, you know, in terms of the business, like, take me back to when we started working together. Like, what was going on in the business of special projects?

Nina Willdorf 8:28

So I remember very clearly the first time we had our first call. I was randomly at a business in New York, and I kind of pulled myself into a conference room to take that first call with you. And so what was happening with special projects was it was an idea that I had, so I was a little earlier in the process than generally, you tend to work with people, but I've always wanted to be an entrepreneur. It's in my family. My dad always had his own practice. He was a lawyer. And I've always loved going in and out of things. And there were times at which I always felt like, you know, I would get docked when I was like, in corporate or working for companies where they were like, you're you're jumpy, you move around a lot and and I realized later that I'm like, wait, no, no, that's actually the point. I want to go in and out of things like, that's a feature, not a bug, and I just want to be there at a certain time and then hand the baton to someone else. So I had kind of come to this, like clarity in my own head that I was ready to do something more formalized. And I was at a point in my career where I was like, okay, you know, whatever. So I had, like, a couple sort of proof points. I'd worked with a couple people on the side and used the sort of without knowing it, like, make it. So I would just tell people, like, well, you can hire me to do X. And they would say, Sure, great. Where do I sign? And I was like, Oh, crap, I need, I need a contract. I need, like, you know, and so what happened was, I had heard some, I mean, a bunch of women network communities, and this woman. That I had come across in one of the communities I'm a part of, posted on LinkedIn about a podcast that she was on, Catherine Janice, and she posted on that about her podcast on smart gets paid. And I was like, What is this podcast? And I started listening to it, and I was like, Oh my God. Everything that this woman is saying really resonates. And I think I listened to two or three episodes, and I was just like, signed me up. So I emailed you, and I was like, here's the deal. I have not made as much revenue as your people have made. I have not really launched this business, but I want in, like, I'm ready. I want to do this. And then you just, you ran a great process. You, I mean, there's, like, you had just a very now, I know what it is. It's whatever the comfortable sales conversation, the whole thing, but it was, like, at the time, I was like, this is fantastic. And I think by all measures, I wasn't really ready, like, I think I had, like, I don't know, $50,000 in revenue in the business of that time, which was very catch as catch. Can you know random founder here, and there was no pattern to the business that I was taking on. There was no pattern to the offer. But I could see that there was a way. I've always been a fan of hiring people to help me that are exceptional at what they do and additive to things that I know. So could I have figured this out myself? Yes, maybe not as well and not as quickly. And also, like, Why? Why would right?

Leah Neaderthal 11:37

Why would you well? And it's interesting. You say, I mean, I do remember that. And you were like, listen, here's the deal, like, I don't meet what you typically have as your criteria. And first of all, you brought so much heart and, like, so much passion. But also, I do think that, you know, we talk for quite a bit, you know, before we invite somebody to join the program. And there are certain things we sort of listen for, but also we make exceptions for people who like being an editor, right? Like running your own thing before shows that you've been responsible for something, and you've really had to make it successful. And so those are some of the things that I was listening for. You know, in that process, and you have, you have, like, a phrase, because I've heard you say this phrase,

Nina Willdorf 12:21

of my phrase that is not my superpower?

Leah Neaderthal 12:23

Yes, that's your phrase. I've heard you say that multiple times, but it shows up a really good awareness of what you are best at and what you're not best at, and what you can supplement with other resources or people or

Nina Willdorf 12:36

what have you. Yeah, and I find myself, you know, you get to a phase in your life and career. I mean, we try to where we just get a little bit more self aware. This is a life's journey. My life's work of like, trying to be self aware. And I would find myself getting incredibly cranky when doing tasks or doing things in the business, and then I'm like, oh, that's because, like, that is not my superpower. I really that is not my zone of genius, whatever Great. Let's find other people to do that. And in the case of, like, the academy and figuring out how to market and sell, which, by the way, I mean, it's like, ridiculous, because that's actually what I help other people do, but it's impossible to do it for yourself. And there are people that are great at it that I want to learn from, and I've always been a learner, so I'm like, Okay, let me see. You know what I can do here. I will just say, I know that you know you're gonna get embarrassed. But like, to me, like I have an allergic reaction to the idea of sales and marketing, which is ridiculous, because that is what I do. But I'm not like a salesy person. I mean, you can hear it in the way that I talk, I'm just like, I will be very honest about you know what I know and what I don't know. And I feel like there was something extremely logical about this approach that felt very clear and in some ways, like mathy to me, in a way that I really liked. And every time I've gotten to different parts of the academy where I'm like, Okay, now it's time to do this, whatever the next thing. And I would say, Yeah, I know all the other people in the Academy are doing this thing and take, you know, whatever it is. I remember this came up when I was like, LinkedIn, and okay, now weed out your network. I'm like, I'm we're gonna do that. There's no way I'm going to do that. Like that doesn't make sense. Whatever. Then I would, like, watch it all, and I'm like, Okay, fine, I will do it. And then it works. It always frickin works.

Leah Neaderthal 14:30

So where were you hoping to get to? Like, what did you want this work or this investment in yourself? Where did you want it to bring you?

Nina Willdorf 14:39

I had a really clear revenue goal, because I'm at a stage of my life with my family where that is just the reality, like, you know, the bills must be paid, and which I think is like, everybody's,

Leah Neaderthal 14:51

yeah, you know, reality. But also, are your your kids are going to college soon. And yeah, I've one

Nina Willdorf 14:56

applying to college and one applying to high school, and we'd. Of in a very expensive city, and I like nice things, and we like to travel and and I'm also like, you know, why not? And so the way I had structured it, things kind of worked out really nicely because of whatever intentional kind of I had built good relationships. So the company that I was working at, the venture firm, I'm very close with the GP, the general partner. And I went to her and tried to, you know, I brought this to her and said, I want to start this business. And she was like, That makes great sense, based on kind of what you're great at and what you should be doing more of. And we figured out a way where I would, they would essentially become a client,

Leah Neaderthal 15:39

which is often what happens, you know, it's a major business, yeah,

Nina Willdorf 15:42

and the other thing that I think people don't realize enough is that VCs love a good negotiation. And so, like, for her, it was like, Okay, we're sitting on the two sides of a table, and we both want something. And like, how do we get there? And so we kind of structured it in a way that would work well for me and work well for them, which was them being a client, and I was sort of moved to a part time kind of model, and it was beautiful, because it was kind of like I could still do help them also have, like, some income that was guaranteed, essentially. And then I wanted special projects to pick up whatever the rest was in me. So I'd set a revenue goal, which was the rest. And the nice thing about that was that it gave me a couple months to really learn and invest in the educational piece and just carve out space. And so I took on a bunch of stuff at the beginning of the year that, in retrospect, was very random, but also just every single time, just gave me a ton of data. It's all data. It gave me so much data about the type of work I like doing, the type of clients I like working with, the stage of companies. I like working with these sectors. I like where I was just taking all kinds of random stuff. How long do I like working with people, like, when do I get bored? Like, just all of it and, and so in the past, I had decided, like, when I've worked with people and coach, which I don't do anymore, but I would sort of do this retrospective analysis with them, of like, looking over the course of their year, and, you know, helping understand the revenue and what revenue was really gratifying or not. Now I can do that for myself. And so at the beginning of the year, I would say nine out of 10 were not the people that I think I'm best equipped to serve. And so where we are now is, you know, I ran an analysis at the end of 2025 and it's incredible to say this, but did double the amount of revenue than I had planned for in 2025 and it has gone so much better in some ways than I had expected. It's also been harder in a lot of ways than I have expected. And there's still so much to resolve, but I'm here essentially year plus in the business is rapidly growing like I am the constraint, you know, business, yeah, and just the velocity I never could have expected. And I will say I might be getting ahead of myself. There's no way I could have built this business without two things. One is the academy, and I knew that at the beginning of the year, when I signed up, I was like, I'm gonna I'm gonna learn. I need somebody by my side. I need people by my side that I can learn alongside who I trust and I value their opinion. And two, I didn't even realize at the time, because this was early 2025 AI, how important that was going to be to me. In building this business at every single touch point of the business, building the business, working with my clients, it has completely enabled me to build something that would not have been possible even a year ago.

Leah Neaderthal 19:04

Yeah. Well, I want to dive into both of those things, the tools and strategies that you learned, and then also what you showed me, we had a prep call before this, what you showed me about what you're doing with AI is so cool, and I know it's just gotten you where you are so much faster. And just to be clear, we're not going to say, like, hard numbers, but your goal was significant. Your goal was, like, not

Nina Willdorf 19:25

a hedging goal. No, I was like, if I'm gonna do this, I'm going to do this, it needs to be meaningful. And, yeah, this was not, it was not chill, right, right,

Leah Neaderthal 19:37

right, right. This isn't like, let's see how it goes. No, maybe it was, maybe we'll get there. This is, like, this is my goal. Sometimes on early calls with people, I'll ask, like, What's your goal for, you know, the coming year? And some people are like, Oh, well, maybe, you know, and they name a number that's like, I don't know, 10% higher than what they did this past year or something. And I'm like, is that? Is that a number that you can get really. Excited about, like, let's choose something that you can get really, really excited about. And I remember your goal was something that we could get very, very excited about. And I remember

Nina Willdorf 20:09

saying to you, Leah, I like to make money. I love making money because to me, making money is about having agency and independence and resources to give. And it will also be a measure and a yardstick for me that this is working and that I can help people, and that they find it so valuable that they want to pay me a lot of money, and over the course of that, I'm going to help them make even more money, and that will mean that their business is successful, and so I am not embarrassed about it at all. I mean,

Leah Neaderthal 20:44

no surprise, you know, that dovetails perfectly with, like, how I feel about money and women and all that stuff. But I think it's such a, like, deeply ingrained programming that it's so hard to overcome. You cannot overcome it just by, like, snapping your fingers, you know, and being like, I'm gonna talk about money. Now, it's just there's so much that goes into it. And we do talk about money in the academy, you know, people are like, I'm not sure if I can, you know, post when you're asking for feedback on something, for example, like what I'm actually charging.

Nina Willdorf 21:13

I found that to be so incredible. Like in the academy, when people were posting, the first times I saw people post their actual proposals with actual numbers. It was such an incredible eye opener to me. It was so valuable. I'm like, Oh, my god, does that say $90,000 Whoa. Like, I was just like, Yeah, that's amazing. And, you know, I think it was just gave me permission to think in a different way that I just didn't understand was available. And so now you know, and I love now I share my proposals with people inside and out, and I think it's just such an important part of the process, more

Leah Neaderthal 21:58

about growing your consulting business quickly. With Nina willdorf right after this. So let's sort of split this in two. I want to hear about what are the things that really moved the needle for you on the approach right, like the in your marketing and your sales and this methodology. And then we'll talk about how you applied it, you know, or Accelerated it using AI. But so what are two or three of the biggest like game changers that move the needle for you?

Nina Willdorf 22:28

The first one, I would say, is it's right back to the very beginning, the painkiller statement. You know, I have a ton of respect for editors and writers as as a whatever recovering editor or writer, and the process that we went through to get very clear about what it is that I do that is actually fundamentally valuable to the people that I want to help was so incredibly difficult and iterative. It's still iterative. I mean, I mess with it all the time, but that piece was just foundational. And I'm a very impatient person. I like to say that I like working with impatient people too. There's good impatience and bad impatience, or helpful and not helpful impatience. It was hard for me to sit with that. It was hard for me to sit in that moment where it wasn't clear and not just be like, Okay, this is good enough. Let's go because it wasn't good enough for a while. And I remember putting things into Slack, you know, and having you and your colleagues kind of continue to kind of push me. And the feedback was always incredibly insightful. And, you know, focusing on this word versus that word, and this structure versus that structure, and there are also really smart comms and marketing leaders in the academy who would also jump in and share their perspective, and even on the coaching calls, like people kind of kind of help. So I would say getting that right was a real unlock for me. In fact, yesterday, randomly, somebody came onto my LinkedIn that I don't know. I posted something again. I post all the time now because I force myself to per the instructions in the academy, and some person I don't know sent me a note that said, I don't know who you are. I saw your post, and I love your bio. And the bio incorporates my painkiller like, right at the top, and it was like, just like, that kind of thing, you know, this just like, Oh, thank you. Like, what a nice thing to hear. And so that's number one. Number two, I would say, one of the things that I wanted to get right, I wanted to spend a lot less time getting people to a yes. So if we know who I want to help, and if you know we can if I'm going to have these calls with people, how do we understand if I'm right for you and if you're right for me? And so there's a process called the comfortable sales. Conversation, and it is essentially a templated flow for a conversation that gets people to really open up and and open up and be curious about themselves in such a way that helps you determine what they actually need, and if it maps to what's valuable. And so I use every single sales conversation I have. I have a version of that template that you created, and I go through it, and I write into it, I record it, and I force myself to do what I think is the most uncomfortable part of it, and I do this in interviewing, just generally, but to just keep asking follow up questions, not talking, really trying to keep my mouth shut and not pretend that I know the answer, which is hard for me sometimes, and to just keep asking them why,

Nina Willdorf 26:00

and if A year from now, if this were true, what would this do for the business? And, you know, just kind of keep going in and being like, Well, why is that hard, and what have you tried? And why is this important? Why now, like, just and getting all that data, and then that moves to the third thing that I've found most productive and helpful, which is the way of writing a proposal. Actually, I want to say a fourth thing too, if I can. The third thing is way of writing a proposal, because there is a very clear flow that gets people to say yes. So the three things in the proposal that I think are really working, one the situation appraisal. So I take all of that information that we have just unearthed out of the comfortable sales conversation, and this is where we can talk about AI in a second. AI is literally my partner in crime through this entire thing, but the write up of what I heard from them and why this matters. I've had two people in the past three months, my biggest projects to date, come back to me and say, the way you wrote about where we are at and your understanding of our business. People have been in this world for years and years and years, and aren't able to play back to me in such a way what they heard and what that does. Why that's important. It establishes trust and that we are partnering in this from the beginning. And by the way, if they disagree with my situation appraisal, then that is totally fine. I'm not the right person for you, right So, but here's what I am observing, and here is what I think the opportunity is, and if you agree, then I can help you, right? And here's how I can help you. And if you don't agree, then there are going to be other resources that you can go find, and I'm happy to introduce you to some of them. So that piece, I think, is really good. I will say this is small one, but it has really worked for me. I know everyone loves this the back fact I just ran the fastest process I've ever run, in terms of somebody texting me saying, I think I have somebody that needs to know you do you have time to take on a project? Within two weeks, I was on a proposal follow up call that I had booked through the back fact, wait, because

Leah Neaderthal 28:25

define that. Define that for folks

Nina Willdorf 28:27

book a call from a call. So I had been on a call with the CEO that I'd gotten introduced to. We had a great conversation. I told him what my rates start at for projects like that. I kind of mapped out, brief, like, loosely, how I thought it could work. I asked him if he was interested in seeing a proposal. I only create proposals for people when it seems like there is interest in moving forward, because it's a very detailed process. And this call was on a Friday. I said, I can have a proposal to you on Monday. Do you have your calendar available? Why don't we just set up time right now for us to review? You'll have time with the proposal. And why don't we set up time for Wednesday so you can have a little time to digest, and then you can bring your questions to me. So we booked time for Wednesday, the back Fact Book a call from a call, and I wrote the proposal over the weekend, using our process and also some AI, which I'll get into, how I use it. I don't use it to write I use it to poke holes. And in another world, I would have been like, oh my gosh, I'm spending my weekend. This could be such a waste of time, like, Who even knows if this is going to go anywhere. But I knew it was going to go somewhere, because we had a call on the calendar on Wednesday to review it. And so, you know, I had my three options in the proposal. Don't just put one option in, put into because then it gives somebody, the agency to choose. And by the next Friday, one week, we were on this I had been on. Call with him the Friday before. By that next Friday, he had said he wanted option two, amazing. That's insane. And this was, this is not a small project, and this is a really cool founder that I'm really excited to help.

Leah Neaderthal 30:14

That's awesome. I mean, especially in this, in a universe where typical B to B sales cycle takes anywhere from three to 18 months, and is even longer, 25% longer, is what the studies show these days. And then you do this in two weeks. Yeah, I've been taking a bunch of notes so painkiller, comfortable, sales, conversations, proposal and book a call from a call, and a couple things I just want to sort of pull out there. I mean, these are, like Keystone things in our system, but they do all work together. I think you said earlier that it's like, it's kind of mathy, right? Like, yeah, the comfortable sales conversation. You take that information, it goes directly into the proposal, right? The painkiller is how we ensure that the people who even get on the phone are the right people and then book a call from a call is simple and powerful, and means that you're not clawing people back, right? And what I love about all of this is one thing that's sort of buried in here that you didn't mention, is leading the client book a call from a call is sort of one application of this pillar concept that we use called leading the client. It is up to you to lead this process. The client's not going to lead the process, right? And so all of these together. I mean, the speed at which you were able to do these things, that's how you were able to capitalize on this opportunity. I mean, it's really totally great. So we talked about the strategies that really moved the needle for you, but I think the through line in what you've been able to do this year is how quickly you've been able to do it. And I know that AI has been a huge part of that journey. Can you talk about, like, how you started to, you know, sort of use that, and how are you using it?

Nina Willdorf 31:56

Yeah, there's not a day that goes by that I'm not using AI, I'm using it in ways that aren't necessarily super obvious. And so I'm really excited to share some of that today, because I love having more people kind of get empowered in building their businesses. And also we can talk about some other reasons why I want people to use with AI, but anyway, and ways that it makes sense. So to be very clear, I was able to get my consulting business special projects to mid six figures in one year through AI, which is truly insane. Okay, so I will give you a couple scenarios in which I use it that have been really additive and complementary to some of the strategies that we've talked about. So the academy trainings often have workbooks or resources sheets that you fill out. I've downloaded all of those. I've downloaded all of the trainings. I've downloaded all of my notes to myself, and I put them into a project. I use Claude primarily, though I do use other tools for different things, but so my go tos are Claude, chat, GPT, Gemini, increasingly. And then I take my calls when it makes sense, using Finola, which is a note taker. And so what that project does is allows me to have a corpus of knowledge that I don't have to dig through. So there is such a wealth of resources, it can almost be overwhelming in terms of, like, all of the trainings. How do I think about this? How do I think about that. So whenever I'm in a bind, I'll just think, like, how should I be thinking about the situation? How should I respond to this email? How should I I can go into that project? And it's also connected. Claude is connected to my email and my Google Drive. And I will just say, do you see that email that just came in, using the academy, using the best practices that I've learned in whatever, like, how should I think about this? How should I follow up? And it'll just give me kind of back and forth. The other thing that's really been impactful is we talked about kind of writing proposals. That's a very challenging thing to do, and it can take a lot of time, if you're like, writing a proposal that you know you're putting a big price tag on, like you want to be incredibly thoughtful about how you're approaching it. All of that. I took some proposals that other people had shared in the academy. I took the outline that we learn. I take proposals that have been successful, that I have done, that have worked, and then I created a different project that is a proposal generator. So when I get off of a call, I will take the transcripts of that note. I will take any briefing docs that I have, that I kind of use to go. Into the call, and I will drop it into the proposal generator, and I will say I would like a first draft based off of the model of x, y, z. And one of the things that's really important here is that this is like a conversation. Usually I'll end up talking to AI for, like, I don't know, 10 rounds to get it working right, and I'll give a lot of feedback. We'll go back and forth and all of that in my proposal generator. And it's not like a bot. It is like a thought partner. It is like a partner in crime. For me, as we're thinking together, I'm like, that option two doesn't really make sense. I feel like there's not a big difference between option two and option three. Or I feel like, you know, something about this isn't working in terms of the pacing of how I would approach this. Or, you know, I think that we're not really being clear enough in the I use we we're not being clear enough in the situation analysis about why this moment is so important for this business. So we'll just, we'll have a conversation, and we'll tweak it, tweak it, tweak it. One very interesting thing that I did in the most recent one is I wrote a proposal. I then slept on it, and I woke up and I was like, I really don't like this proposal, it's not it's not working yet. And so then I dropped it in, and I asked Claude to tell me, based on everything I know from the academy, what is not working here, I knew it wasn't working. I didn't know why. You just know,

Leah Neaderthal 36:37

like, what felt off?

Nina Willdorf 36:39

See, yeah, something about it just it felt, honestly, too salesy. It felt like rah, rah. It didn't feel like there was like substance in it. Something wasn't working. And I have to tell you, it came back to me with like, such a high quality Zinger. It was like, your proposal has solid bones but violates several core Academy principles. You're writing like a consultant, explaining your process, rather than a partner helping X person see his inevitable future. The proposal is too long, too plot heavy, instead of future focused, and doesn't follow the proven structure that helps clients fall in love with what's possible, and

Leah Neaderthal 37:23

I want to hire this person,

Nina Willdorf 37:26

and then it gave me lots of ideas about how I could improve it.

Leah Neaderthal 37:30

Oh my gosh. I love this. And having seen how you do this, I am so impressed. I mean, before, like the advent of AI, we have examples of people going from like you taking hours and hours and hours to do proposals, to doing it in about an hour, right, using some of the other tools that we have. But this is beyond just the speed of it. I love what you said about having a thought partner to sort of poke holes and stuff. And you said something to me the other day that was like, What did you tell Claude? You're like, Please be honest. And I said, I don't like

Nina Willdorf 38:04

toxic positivity. I wanted like, so I like, you know, I want Claude to build on my ideas, not to just affirm them. So generally, what happens is, I'll put in something and it'll say, Okay, this is this is good. But here's what I see, that you could do better. And so that's kind of how I like to work with it, is that I'm not looking for it to tell me just all the great things. Though, there's one other scenario that I think is really valuable to share, because it can feel really lonely to be a consultant, you know, running your own business, et cetera. And one way that I've found AI to be incredibly valuable, you know, you get off these calls sometimes, and you're sitting in your house, or sitting in your closet, office, whatever, wherever you're sitting, and you're just thinking that didn't feel very good. And I don't know why it didn't land. I don't know why. And so if you are using a note taker, you can drop those transcripts in. And I've done this so many times, and I'll just say, like, you know that conversation felt really off to me. Like, what about it? What happened there? What could I do differently? Like, why do I feel uncomfortable? Or, Why do I feel? And it's like, okay, here are three reasons why that conversation didn't land. When you said this. They said that it's like having a girlfriend, like, be sitting there, like, but like, a really intuitive and kind of, I like my girlfriends to kind of tell me, like, what I could do better too. And so, like, they'll just like, poke holes and be like, Yeah, well, and you know what? By the way, this is not the right person for you.

Leah Neaderthal 39:44

Like, I love it, telling you you violated the principles, which, PS, harsh in a good way, but also affirming. Like, yeah, you're not off track here. Like, this felt weird. The ick you were feeling was not unwarranted. Yeah, these. Are really sophisticated things. I mean, what you've built is, like, sort of a knowledge engine to be able to do this at a level and a speed that's just really fast. I mean, you can't sort of talk about AI without acknowledging some of the criticism of it and the way people are using it. What would you say to somebody who's, like, hesitant about using AI in their consulting business, you know, like, what do you hear the criticisms are? And what would you say to that?

Nina Willdorf 40:25

Yeah, I hear those criticisms, and I agree with a lot of those criticisms.

Leah Neaderthal 40:29

And we're talking about things like, it makes you, you know, less sharp. It makes you, I don't know, dumber over time, or reduces critical thinking.

Nina Willdorf 40:37

Or Lazy, Lazy, exactly. Yeah. It sort of makes the brain blur out, whatever. Okay, so that is all possible, and that can all be real. Here's the thing, though, if you are running a consulting business, there are 100 jobs you can be doing in a day, and you are probably really great at two of them. And the reality is, am I great at negotiating contracts? I am not. So guess what I use AI for help me understand what's standard in this contract, you know? And so what do I not use AI for writing? I don't use AI for writing because for me, my voice is really important and my clear thinking is what my clients are paying me for. And so so much of becoming a grown up in business is knowing where you spike and where you can be supported by other people, communities, tech, whatever those things are, and it is a buffet of options right now, is the way I think about it. And so it's about choosing where you plug it in to help you be more successful and have time to do the thing that you are uniquely great at. That's the way I think about it. And I

Leah Neaderthal 41:56

totally agree I think about it in terms of, like, I think where it can make you lazy is if you use it to do something that you can do, but where I think it's really powerful is help me do something I could never do, right? I mean, one thing we didn't really get into, but you showed me about your business analysis over the year and sort of where the opportunities are and whatnot. I mean, looking across all those data sources and client experiences and whatnot. I mean, that would have taken who knows how long if you had ever had the time to do it, right? So help me do something I can't do having now these tools, both strategies and tech tools, we talked about how the business is different as a business owner, how are you different through this

Nina Willdorf 42:40

process, it's actually inspired me to start another basis. I've become so excited about all of the ways that it's helped me that I've joined forces with another woman consultant, and we basically are trying to open source all the ways we're learning and sharing ideas, and we've called it aged intelligence society, and we started a subset just to share ideas. And it's honestly just giving me so much energy. I'm trying all these things all day. I want other people to try them. And just, you're saying fun,

Leah Neaderthal 43:17

you're saying these things like

Nina Willdorf 43:19

aI strategies, yeah. Strategy, like, how to use AI, actually. So an example is, you know, we're navigating our lives. We have very full lives, like, what is actually a way that AI is going to help me?

Leah Neaderthal 43:31

Yes? Oh, I love it. So, aged intelligence, AI, right? But age intelligence, how can I use AI beyond our business, but for our actual life? So yeah, genius Nina, where can people find you?

Nina Willdorf 43:44

You can find me at special dash projects.io, or on LinkedIn, and I won't be hurt if you don't like my posts, I'll know that you're seeing them. I'd love to connect with more people and really share more ideas. It's been so much fun to talk I so loved having you here.

Leah Neaderthal 44:01

Thank you so much for being here.

Nina Willdorf 44:03

Thank you for having me. Leah,

Leah Neaderthal 44:08

all right, what a great conversation, right? I hope you found that as energizing and inspiring as I did, and if something in that conversation spoke to you, be sure to post about it on LinkedIn and tag Mina and me. So I always like to pull out one lesson that you can apply to your business. And I think there's a lot we could cover here, but the thing I want you to take away is the perspective shift around using AI that Nina shared. So just to sort of paraphrase, you know, as a consultant, you're wearing like, 50 hats, and the reality is you're probably really excellent at two of those things. I mean, maybe three, and the rest you're doing, because they just have to get done. And look, there's nothing wrong with figuring things out yourself. You know, there's something that feels really good about it when you finally figure something out on your own. And you know, for women like us, who are used to being, you know, high performers, that feeling is real. It's like a dopamine hit, a. Mean, I get it, I know that feeling, but that feeling can also keep us stuck in a pattern that's slower than it needs to be, because just because you can figure something out doesn't mean that's the best use of your time and energy. And I know the women that I work with. You know the women I work with, women consultants. You don't have FOMO. You know fear of missing out. You have F, O, W, t, fear of wasting time. You know, you're wondering whether the things you're spending your time on are actually going to move the needle, and when it comes to the things that really matter, you know, building your pipeline, landing bigger clients, growing your business, that's not the place to go slow. But you know, it's a hard habit to break, trying to do everything yourself. I mean, Take me, for example. I actually have a post it note on my monitor that says, literally, what can you ask for help with and I put it there because even my tendency is to do things myself. But you know, it's not the fastest path, and it's not the most sustainable one, either. And as your business evolves and you move from the startup stage to the messy middle, it's the time to start asking yourself, Is this something I need to figure out on my own, or has somebody already figured it out, and I need to borrow what they did and what Nina showed and I think is the real lesson of this episode is that the transformation she was able to make in her first year wasn't just about working hard, it was about being really intentional about where she spent her time and energy and finding the right support for everything else for her, that looked like following a methodology she trusted so that she wasn't reinventing the wheel at every step. And it also looked like using AI as a genuine thought partner, not to replace her thinking, but to extend her thinking into the places where she'd otherwise get stuck or maybe slow down. And here's what I want you to notice about Nina. Nina is so sharp and very capable, she didn't look to a methodology and AI because she couldn't figure things out. She did it because she knew that the smart thing is doing it faster with help. You know, figuring things out wasn't the point. Getting where she wanted to go quickly. That was the point. So my question for you is, where are you still trying to do it alone when you don't have to? You know, what's sitting on your plate right now that's draining your energy or slowing you down when there actually is a better way and a faster path or a tool or a system or a resource that could help you get there. I mean, borrow my post it note. You know, what can you ask for help with? That's the question. Because when you start answering it honestly, things start to move a lot faster. All right, I'd love to hear what stood out to you from this episode. Take your biggest takeaway, your biggest aha, and post about it on LinkedIn and tag Nina and me, I know we'd love to see it and give you a signal boost. And one more thing, after we had this conversation, I invited Nina to do a live behind the scenes walkthrough on AI in one of our academy skill sessions. So if you're already in the academy, you can find that in the system booster section in the portal, it's definitely worth checking out. All right. Thanks so much for listening, and I'll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai