Stephanie Skryzowski wanted to be a lawyer from the time she was 12 years old. She read every John Grisham novel published, went to her undergrad thinking she was going to be a lawyer, and went so far as to take the LSAT.
She eventually got a job as a legal assistant at a top firm in New York City. However, it didn’t take long for her to realize that she hated everything about it. She hated the work and wasn’t connected to any of the clients or what they were doing in the world.
As she began to explore other options for what she was going to do with her life, she got connected to a partner at her law firm who had founded a nonprofit in Afghanistan. This organization helped farmers rebuild and revitalize their land and rebuild their farm businesses so that they could then sell their trees, fruits, and vegetables in the market to support their families.
Stephanie started working with this nonprofit and had a lightbulb moment when she met a woman the nonprofit has helped. She realized at that moment that she wanted to do that kind of work for the rest of her life.
Now, she brings that moment into all of the work that she does now. She creates an impact with her clients by making sure that they have a strong financial foundation. She gets to make connections and see the impact her clients are having on the world because they have strong financial management.
How to Master Your Money
All of the work that Stephanie does with her clients is does in three pieces. The first is making sure that they have a really strong foundation. Business owners in the early stages need to make sure that their business is registered with the IRS and with the state they work in. They also need to have a business bank account and keep track of their revenue and expenses.
To start mastering your money, you need to make sure that you’ve got those foundational elements in place as well. None of the fun stuff or the dreaming big can happen if you don’t have those foundational elements in place.
The second piece of what she does with her clients is look back. Your financial statements for your business are really helpful for pulling out the patterns over time that can help inform your decisions in the future.
Finally, the third piece of what she does is forecasting or looking towards the future. When she first starts working with her clients, they come up with 12 to 24-month forecast together. They talk about their big goals and then work backward and figure out what steps they’re going to need to take to get there. They look at this plan every single month and update it as time goes on. This is the piece that will also help you make good financial decisions.
If you want to learn more about how to understand your numbers, check out Episode 064: How to Understand Your Numbers and Make a Greater Impact with Stephanie Skryzowski.
