Michelle Mullins, 30

Senior Project Manager

Simply Home / Austin, Texas 

 Rebuilding After a Major Gut-Punch: 

We learned the hard way that if we don’t take care of our team and they’re not healthy, then we have nothing. Our president, Ashley Wainscott, and I did not take care of ourselves back in the day. It was pitch black and we were still in the office. We were sending emails out at 1 am. We were working weekends. We didn’t eat lunch, sometimes we didn’t eat dinner. We only worked. We were so unhealthy that we didn’t realize that we created the team we didn’t want, and it wasn’t their fault.

We were working weekends. We didn’t eat lunch, sometimes didn’t eat dinner. We created the team we didn’t want, and it wasn’t their fault.  

We were like, what is going on? It’s gotta be the system; it’s gotta be a process that we’re missing. When we hired our coach a couple of years ago, we realized, no, it was us. That was a hard gut punch. I didn’t want it to be me. It took us a couple of years, but when we made that shift we realized how healthy our team is now because we’re healthy. It’s just a breath of fresh air.

We’re all doing whatever it takes, but we’re doing what it takes within expectations and boundaries. The shift has produced so many referrals that it’s now a majority of our business. That couldn’t have happened if we hadn’t changed from the top down.

Read other rising stars' stories by clicking the icon below.