Scattered doubts and self-criticism can hinder women from achieving their full potential in business. Without action, these feelings can lead to missed opportunities and unfulfilled dreams. By taking small steps and seeking support, women can overcome obstacles and thrive in their entrepreneurial journeys.

Theresa Slater, known as Terry, is the president of Empire Interpreting Services, which she founded in 2003. With over 300 interpreters and a range of customer-centric services, her company has become an award-winning organization. Terry is also a speaker, author, and advisor to new entrepreneurs. Her new book, The Language of Success: An Interpreter’s Entrepreneurial Journey, is part autobiography and part how-to guide for aspiring business owners.

In this episode, Terry shares her inspiring journey from a challenging upbringing to becoming a successful entrepreneur. She discusses the importance of overcoming imposter syndrome, the value of self-care, and the necessity of hiring help to grow both personally and professionally.

What you will learn from this episode:

  • Understand the impact of imposter syndrome and how to overcome it.
  • Discover the importance of self-care and physical strength in empowering women.
  • Gain insights into the significance of listening to your gut in decision-making.

“Stop caring what other people think. Become physically stronger. And start to care about being respected and not being liked.”

– Theresa Slater

Valuable Free Resource: 

  • Check out Theresa’s book, The Language of Success, for insights and strategies on entrepreneurship.

Topics Covered:

01:48 – Understanding Empire Interpreting Services, Deep dive into what a language service provider (LSP) actually does and why it matters

02:48 – Terry’s Transformational Journey into Business

05:48 – Mastering Sign Language and Expanding Services, Terry’s journey learning sign language and building comprehensive language solutions

07:04 – Overcoming Critical Business-Building Challenges, Conquering personal obstacles, including the hidden enemy of imposter syndrome

10:19 – The Strategic Self-Improvement Journey, Why self-care isn’t selfish — it’s an essential business strategy

13:54 – The Story Behind Writing the Book, What inspired and motivated Terry to finally share her entrepreneurial blueprint

16:22 – Mastering the Art of Strategic Hiring, Critical importance of hiring support for exponential business growth and personal freedom

20:02 – Self-Care as Competitive Advantage, The devastating impact of neglecting self-care on health, performance, and success

23:08 – Continuous Growth and Adaptation, Why ongoing learning and adaptation are non-negotiable in today’s business landscape

24:54 – Essential Advice for Women Entrepreneurs, The power of listening to your gut instincts for better decision-making

Key Takeaways:

“You have to applaud how far you’ve come, especially when you come from a challenging background.” – Theresa Slater

“Self-care is not selfish; it’s essential for your well-being and success.” – Theresa Slater

“Listening to your gut can save you from making poor decisions in business and life.” – Theresa Slater

Ways to Connect with Theresa Slater:

Ways to Connect with Sarah E. Brown:

 

Full Episode Transcript:

(AI helped us put this together, so if you see any weird grammar or missed words—just know we nailed it during the actual chat.)

Theresa Slater 00:00

Stop caring what other people think. Become physically stronger, I found, is incredibly empowering, especially for women. And start to care about being respected and not being liked.

Sarah E. Brown 00:21

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the KTS Success Factor podcast for women. where we talk about challenges senior female leaders face in being happy and successful at work. I’m your host, Dr. Sarah E. Brown. 

My guest today is Theresa Slater, and we’re going to call her Terry. She’s president of Empire Interpreting Services, which she founded in 2003. She built her company into a respected award-winning organization with more than 300 interpreters and an array of customer-centric services. 

A speaker, author, and advisor to new entrepreneurs, Slater’s love for business drives her on her path. Her new book, which we’re going to be talking about, is called The Language of Success, An Interpreter’s Entrepreneurial Journey. It is part autobiography and part a how-to, or as she says, a how-not-to guide for entrepreneurs. Welcome, Terry. 

Theresa Slater 01:33

Good morning. Thank you for the invitation. I’m excited to be here. 

Sarah E. Brown 01:37

Well, I’m excited to talk about this because you’ve got quite the story. So first of all, let’s talk about what your day job is and what Empire Interpreting Services is.

Theresa Slater 01:48

Sure. So we’re what’s called a language service provider or an LSP. And basically we provide interpreters into the community, whether it’s medical, education, business. Anytime that you need that bridge from one language or culture to another. 

We also do written work, which is translation. People often get those two terms mixed up or use them, interpose them, but interpreting is spoken or sign language and translation is anything written or digital.

Sarah E. Brown 02:23

Well, I want to talk to you about how you got into this particular business, but I think for the purposes of this interview, it’s important for our listeners to understand your backstory, how you got into business at all. So tell my listeners a little bit about your upbringing and how you got into the business world at all. And then we’ll talk specifically about how you got into language services.

Theresa Slater 02:48

Okay. In the book, it is kind of a how-to for small business owners or entrepreneurs. However, I really felt it was important to tell the backstory of leaving home at 15 and being on my own. So without going into too much detail, I found myself on my own at 15. My education was backburnered and replaced with survival mode. So there were a lot of minimum wage jobs. 

There was a lot of just being motivated by where am I going to live and how am I going to eat? And along the way, I ended up becoming educated in a very non-traditional way, first going back to school and getting my GED. And then later in my early thirties, going to college and getting an undergrad in deaf culture and interpreting. 

So, I did that for several years as a freelance interpreter. But prior to that, some of the non-traditional education had come from a car dealership that I worked in as a receptionist. And I was just taking money, answering the phones, and the office manager became ill. And in lieu of replacing her, they decided to have their accountant come in and teach me how to do the books. 

That eventually led to an opportunity in that business to go to, it was a Porsche Audi dealership, and that led to an opportunity to get some education through that franchise. So I had this kind of buttoned up business background. Back then, selling those high-end cars, you went in a business suit every day. It was more formal than it is today, obviously. 

So when I became an interpreter, and I saw who was providing services, I had approached it from the same kind of corporate buttoned up background. And I was so appalled at the way that interpreting services were handled, the lack of vetting, the lack of professionalism, the lack of customer service, that I probably do a lot of complaining to my dad. 

He said to me, if it’s not working, then you need to start your own business. And at the time, my response was, that’s crazy. I left school at 15. I’m a nobody. I just scraped my way to become an interpreter. And there’s no way I could start my own business. And unfortunately he passed away the next year and having a lot of time on my hands and grieving my dad, I decided that I was going to try and start my business and the rest is history.

Sarah E. Brown 05:41

So, were you bilingual from an early age? 

Theresa Slater 05:45

No. 

Sarah E. Brown 05:46

So how did you learn the language?

Theresa Slater 05:48

Well, I actually first learned by a deaf pastor coming to our church and offering sign language classes. And we were in a rural area. He came from a bigger city about a half hour away and explained that deaf people run in to attend church, but there just weren’t enough interpreters. So I went to this free class in the back of the church for a year. 

And I just fell in love with the language. I obviously wasn’t an interpreter by just going to this class. So that’s when I decided to start looking for formal opportunities for education and got my undergrad at RIT in Rochester and started working as an interpreter.

Sarah E. Brown 06:32

So you started with sign language? 

Theresa Slater 06:34

Yes. 

Sarah E. Brown 06:35

But do you have other language interpreting services as a part of your company?

Theresa Slater 06:39

We do. About 40% is still sign language. The rest is spoken language. So we provide right now around 300 different languages, spoken languages, whether it’s over the phone, virtual or on site.

Sarah E. Brown 06:55

Wow. So what was the biggest challenge you had to overcome to get this business up and running? Just talk about getting it up and running first.

Theresa Slater 07:04

Yeah, I think honestly the biggest overall challenge to me was myself. I suffered from imposter syndrome. I didn’t even know what that was until someone endorsed my book. And this was a Syracuse University professor who knew me and mentioned it in the endorsement. I had to literally look it up and I’m like, oh my gosh, that was me. 

So this imposter syndrome of always feeling like I didn’t deserve to be where I was, or my education wasn’t traditional. So it really didn’t have the same weight as someone who went to a traditional college at 18, left at 22 or 25. I felt like I was always covering up my history. I didn’t want anyone to know I left home at 15. And I think there’s so many women out there that suffer from the same syndrome that holds them back all the time. 

There’s so many examples I can give of how that stymied me. And I still push through overcoming that. This book is the first time that I’ve really told my true story. People would say, you know, where did you go to college? I’m like, oh, I went to RIT. I didn’t tell them I went when I was 34 and that most of it was done off site because when I went to school, virtual learning was just very new and it just wasn’t, it was kind of a little bit, it felt a little bit sleazy. 

Like, did I really earn that degree? Should I really be walking across the stage? Because I wasn’t sitting in a traditional classroom. 

Sarah E. Brown 08:42

So how did you overcome imposter syndrome? 

Theresa Slater 08:46

I’m still working on it. I think imposter syndrome and self-doubt are kind of the same thing. I learned the hard way that I have to, one, look at how far I’ve come and give that credence. 

So when you come from minus zero, and you get anywhere, you have to applaud that you have to take time to celebrate. I celebrated the first five years I was in business, but I never celebrated past that. 

We would get awards, but there wasn’t much celebration because I just still had that imposter syndrome. So looking at how far you’ve come, stop caring what other people think, become physically stronger, I found is incredibly empowering, especially for women, and start to care about being respected and not being liked. That’s very difficult for women.

Sarah E. Brown 09:40

Okay, so I want to emphasize this. So the first one is to look at how far you’ve come so far. The second is to stop caring what other people think. The third is to get physically stronger. That’s the first time I’ve heard that one. That’s pretty cool. And what was it? Tell me what the fourth one was.

Theresa Slater 10:02

And the other one was to learn to want to be respected and not want to be liked.

Sarah E. Brown 10:07

Yes, there is a difference between being respected and liked. But what great advice. So how long would you say it took you to learn the basics of that to start powering through?

Theresa Slater 10:19

It took me more than a decade being in business. I found myself apologizing to the point where my bookkeeper said to me one day, who’s now my CFO, she said, will you please stop apologizing? If I ask somebody to work late, I apologize. If a customer was upset about a bill, I apologize. If an interpreter had to work over on the job, I apologize. 

Instead of saying to a customer who would call and complain, for example, a medical, say a doctor’s office, well, why should I pay the interpreter? Because the patient didn’t show up. It was a no show. And I would start out by saying, oh, I’m so sorry this happened. And I would go into this big, you know, empathizing, trying to make them feel better. Instead of saying, as it states in your contract, you’ll be billed for this service because we paid the interpreter for their time. 

And there were a lot of other examples where I was constantly apologizing and I literally took a sticker, not like a sticky note, but a physical sticky and stuck it on my computer so that all day long I would look at that, stop apologizing. And then it kind of led into my personal life too, that I stopped apologizing for things that I shouldn’t be apologizing for.

Sarah E. Brown 11:40

Do you think that stems from imposter syndrome? 

Theresa Slater 10:43

I do. 

Sarah E. Brown 11:45

Well, I’ve noticed that a lot of women do this. Why do you think they do it? Is it just imposter syndrome or are there other factors? 

Advertisement 11:54

Hi, this is Sarah Brown again, the host of the KTS Success Factor Podcast for Women. I hope you are enjoying this episode and gaining some tips and inspiration on how you can be happier, more successful, and experience less stress at work. If you would like to learn more about how you can take control of your career and do it your way, visit sarahebrown.com. 

There you will be able to download a free chapter from my book, ‘Let Your Personality Be Your Career Guide.’ It contains information and exercises on how you can identify your unique interests, strengths, and needs, and translate that into career goals that are just right for you. Now, back to this informative episode.

Theresa Slater 12:52

I think, we’re kind of wired to be caretakers and we tend to worry too much about other people’s emotions instead of caring about ourselves. Whether we’re a wife, a partner, mother, a daughter, fill in the blank. I think a lot of it comes from that. I don’t want my customers to feel bad that they have to pay for a service when somebody didn’t show up. 

Or I don’t want an employee to feel bad because I tell them, you didn’t give me enough time to ask for a week off. And I’m sorry that you just made reservations with your husband to go to Mexico for a week, but I’ve got two other people out and you can’t go. I would always say yes. I mean, for 15 years, I was the best boss ever because I don’t think I ever said no to anybody. 

And then I would put myself and the business in a really bad position because I couldn’t say no. And God forbid that somebody get mad and not like me. 

Sarah E. Brown 13:52

So why did you want to write a book? 

Theresa Slater 13:54

My whole life I’ve had people come up to me and say to me, you should write a book. It’s like you’ve lived four different lives. You should write a book. 

And when I moved to Philadelphia, where I live now, I joined the business union league, which is primarily business leaders. There’s a lot of people that are high profile in the community that go there. Something that I really wanted to join to be around other entrepreneurs and to just meet people because I didn’t know anyone. One of the groups that I joined was looking for speakers. 

Now, I will speak about my business anytime, any day, anywhere, because I love my business and I’m proud of it and I like to promote my business. So I said, sure, I’ll talk. And when I got up to speak for the first time ever, I thought, you know, these people already have accepted me. They already respect what I’m doing. I’m going to tell the true story. I’m not going to blast over my background. 

So I’m looking at these Wharton MBAs and this judge and these attorneys and these medical doctors. And I said, I started out by saying, undoubtedly, my journey is much different than yours. And I started as that 15-year-old kid out on her own. And I told the story and then I talked about my industry and what we do. And I got such an overwhelming response. And at the end, people came up to talk to me. 

There was a woman who said, you should write a book. And I thought, yeah, here we go again. And she said, no, I’m a book editor. You should write a book and I will help you. And so, that happened three years ago, and she did.

Sarah E. Brown 15:37

Well, you glossed over your story about your beginnings at age 15. So I will leave it to the reader, to your perspective reader, to go get all the details on that. But you touch on some other important topics in the book that I want to get your perspective on right now. And one is how you recognize that you need to hire help. 

And I think that’s important for entrepreneurs who are getting started, but it’s also important for women that are in corporate roles and recognizing when they need to hire help in all aspects of their life. So can you share a few words about that and why that was an important topic to get in the book?

Theresa Slater 16:22

Absolutely. So in the beginning of my business, I learned very quickly that my business was not going to grow unless I hired someone to help me with the business. So it started out with that. Six months in, I hired my first staff, and then the business started to grow, and then I hired someone else. So on the entrepreneurial side, as far as growing the business, I think if you want to be a one-person show or a one-woman show, don’t hire anyone. 

But you’ve got to take that first step in order to grow. As far as the help that you need as an individual and a woman, I found probably five or six years in that I was spending all of my free time doing things like, you know, typical things you do around the house, whether it’s grocery shopping or cleaning or whatever, gift shopping. And I went to a luncheon and one of the women at the table was taking notes And she was sending up, she kept texting someone. 

And I said, can I ask you what you’re doing? And she goes, yes, we’re talking. I’m texting them to my assistant. She had an assistant, which I was fascinated with this whole concept. She was literally sending her a task that she needed done. Take my car to get the oil change, pick up my dry cleaning, get my groceries, take the cat to the groomer, whatever it was. And so I just thought that was the most fascinating thing, but I also thought, and it almost felt selfish. 

And she said to me, how much money do you make in an hour? And as an entrepreneur, sometimes we don’t think about that because sometimes we don’t pay ourselves. And other times we take money when money’s there. So I figured it out. And she said, and then how much is your time worth? Say you make $75 an hour. What are you going to pay somebody to grocery shop for you? Now we have Instacart. This is before Instacart. 

But things like Instacart, things like TaskRabbit, where you can download an app and you can basically get someone to do anything for you. I think all of those things, cleaning your house, definitely somebody to come in and clean your house. My daughter-in-law is a young professional and they got married and I could see that she was very overwhelmed with trying to do everything. 

She was a professor at a college and she was a psychologist who had a small practice and she was having a baby and she was trying to do everything. And I was like, oh my gosh, hire a cleaning service. You can’t do all of this. And I think it’s hard to sit here in my office and have my cleaners come in because I feel like I should be grabbing a rag and cleaning, but you have to do that. 

Or, of course, we all clean before they come, right? Which is also kind of crazy. But just having somebody run those errands, having somebody take her car to get filled up and the oil changed, you know, whatever it is, is so important because these are hours that you’re taking away from your business. 

You shouldn’t be answering the phone and be the only one in your business answering the phone when you can hire someone $20 an hour to answer the phone and you’re answering the phone and you’re costing the company say $75 an hour. It just doesn’t make sense and it shouldn’t make sense in your personal life either.

Sarah E. Brown 19:45

Well, there’s a related topic and that’s self-care. And why should entrepreneurs or mid-career professional women prioritize self-care in your opinion? And I’m curious about what that looks like for you.

Theresa Slater 20:02

Yeah. I didn’t do that for a long time and I paid for it dearly. I was working 10-12 hours a day sitting at a desk. I ended up with pinched nerves in my back. I ended up gaining a lot of weight. I could see that physically I was just kind of falling apart as my business was growing and growing and growing. So self-care for me, number one, means that I’m physically taking care of myself. So when I moved to Philadelphia, the first thing I did was I looked for a trainer. 

And I found a wonderful young man who does private training and works around your lifestyle and what you do, but also keeps you accountable for things like your nutrition, your sleep, and those kinds of things. So self-care in that sense, being that physical part and being empowering is so important. And I will say that a couple of years ago, I had a very serious health crisis. 

And afterwards, I felt like I really needed to do something more and kick it up a notch. So I started running. My son, who lives here, runs ultra marathons. And I thought, if he can run 50, 100 miles, I could run a half marathon. And I spent six months training and really pushing myself with my trainer, doing Pilates, doing everything. And the thing that was so incredible to me is I felt more self-confident. 

I felt so empowered that I was doing something that so few people do. And just as an aside, that’s something that women need to think about. If you’re an entrepreneur, or if you’re even a woman on the fast track, think about how few people do that, how few people start their own businesses. When I ran the half marathon, my son said to me, do you know how many people in the world run a marathon? 

It’s like less than 0.3%. So you’ve done something that most of the world never does. So that’s something we have to think about. I think the other thing that’s so important, and I have a chapter in the book, and that is taking care of yourself. 

Getting your hair done, making sure that you have clothes that you feel good in and look good in, whether it’s getting your nails done, having facials, taking care of yourself, because it totally changes not only how you perceive yourself and feel, but how others look at you. 

And then lastly, I would say, for me, self-care is carving time out to be with family and friends, whether it’s vacations or spending an afternoon with my granddaughter on the floor, playing with Barbie, whatever that is. That is, to me, a big part of self-care.

Sarah E. Brown 22:47

Ok, so we’ve talked about hiring help and committing to self-care. There’s another topic in your book that you spent quite a bit of time on, and that’s called self-improvement. So what do you mean by that? You make the statement that it never ends, so why do you think it’s so important and why does it never end?

Theresa Slater 23:08

It never ends because the world constantly changes. And as a businesswoman, we have to know what that is. And so, AI is a great example. When everybody started talking about AI, I was rolling my eyes, this is the last thing I need to be spending my time worrying about, whatever this is over here. 

But I pushed myself and I started going to more and more events where I was learning about it. I started to incorporate it into my business because we have to keep current and relevant, whether it’s just as a woman in business or whether it’s an entrepreneur. So looking for those things and very strategically looking because I’ve done a lot of self-education. 

It was just either I could have taught it or it was totally irrelevant. So I think we have to be very careful about where we spend our time. But I do think that that’s so important to constantly be improving yourself, whether it’s physically, whether it’s socially, whether it’s just knowing what’s going on in politics and the world, because that all affects our businesses.

Sarah E. Brown 24:16

Okay, so we have covered a whole bunch of challenges for entrepreneurs and they’re also relevant for mid-career professional women in business as well. We’ve talked about self-doubt, overcoming the imposter syndrome, stopping apologizing, how to look for when you can hire help so that you’re in a position to grow or to have time for self-care and self-improvement. 

What should I have asked you that I didn’t that would help a woman succeed as an entrepreneur or overcome obstacles to growth in business?

Theresa Slater 24:54

The biggest piece of advice that I wish I had given myself years ago is to always listen to your gut. It sounds simple, but the biggest mistakes I’ve made in business, the biggest mistakes I’ve made in self-growth and in personal relationships was not listening to your gut and then making bad decisions. 

When people talk about being, someone gaslighting you, that’s pushing aside everything that you feel in your gut and just saying, oh, well, it must be me. It’s the same thing in making decisions in your business life, especially as an entrepreneur, is not listening to your gut and either shortcutting things and not taking the time or just feeling people aren’t going to like me. But I just, I lean on that constantly when I’m interviewing new interpreters. 

I can tell now after 21 years of doing this, I have a phone call that I do, an initial phone call with them before I ever bring them in for an interview. And I can tell now the red flags, whatever they are, it might seem fine on the surface. But my guts telling me this is someone that’s going to fit. This is a great person. Or my gut says there’s just something wrong. And when I don’t listen to it, I always, always am sorry. So listen to your gut.

Sarah E. Brown 26:21

Great advice. Well, Terry, thank you so much for being with me. And for all of you listening here, I really commend the book, The Language of Success, An Interpreter’s Entrepreneurial Journey by Theresa Slater. 

Theresa Slater 26:36

Thank you so much, Dr. Brown. 

Sarah E. Brown 26:39

Thanks for listening to the KTS Success Factor Podcast for Women. If you like what you are hearing, please go to iTunes to subscribe, rate us and leave a review. And if you would like more information on how we can help women in your organization to thrive, then go to www.sarahebrown.com. You can sign up for our newsletter, read show notes, and learn more about our podcast guests. Read my blog, browse through the books, or contact us for a chat. Goodbye for now.

Sarah E. Brown
Sarah E. Brown