Do You Have a Leadership Voice?
For women in business, finding a leadership voice can be daunting. Our podcast guest, Rachel Braun Scherl explains how she had to develop her own leadership voice when looking for venture capital. She had 11 opportunities to change her pitch when the audiences were male and the product was a manufactured item for improved women’s sexual health. We discuss why a leadership voice is important as it is reflected in your company’s culture, the way you hire & fire and how you develop your teams. You aren’t going to stay a solo entrepreneur forever, therefore, finding your leadership voice early on in your entrepreneurial life is very important.
Rachel Braun Scherl’s Bio
Growth strategy consultant, marketing expert and sought-after public speaker Rachel Braun Scherl is a trusted authority on leadership and entrepreneurship. Over the course of her career, Rachel has achieved countless gains for her clients as well as her own business. As co-owner and principal of SPARK Solutions for Growth, a consulting firm advising businesses on strategic growth and partnerships, product development and marketing, Rachel has built an international client base that includes multiple divisions of Johnson & Johnson, Allergan, Pfizer, Merck, Bayer and Deloitte. Her firm’s client retention rate is more than 90 percent. Clients typically retain SPARK as they move to other companies and roles.
Rachel launched SPARK with business partner Mary Wallace Jaensch in 1998, and drove its growth for 10 years. In 2008, she partnered with healthcare investment firm Quaker BioVentures to create Semprae Laboratories. As President, Rachel and her team built a company that developed and marketed sexual health and wellness products for women – creating a new category in the process. Semprae attracted significant media attention and industry interest, and was sold to Innovus Pharmaceuticals in 2013.
Rachel then returned her attention to SPARK, with a focus on companies and start-ups in the female health and wellness space. As a Vagipreneur™, a leader in the business of female health, Rachel works with companies developing and offering products and solutions for a range of women’s reproductive health, sexual health and wellness.
As an accomplished speaker, Rachel is featured at leadership and entrepreneurship events at colleges, universities, corporations and conferences, including Stanford University Graduate School of Business, Duke University, The Fuqua School at Duke University, Yale School of Management, Barnard College, and Entrepreneurship Week as well as many of the leading universities in New Jersey. She has appeared on ABC’s Nightline, CBS News and MSNBC, and been interviewed for major platforms including The New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Forbes, The Huffington Post and CNN. Rachel writes a blog for The Huffington Post on leadership, communication and the business of sexual health. She also contributes to INC.
Rachel is currently at work on her first book, Orgasmic Leadership™: Profiting from the Coming Surge in Female Health, for which she has interviewed dozens of entrepreneurs building female health businesses to highlight the challenges, successes and drive required. The book is scheduled for release in Q1 2018.
In 2015, Rachel was recognized as one of Best Fifty Women in Business by NJBiz. In addition, she is the recipient of SmartCEO’s BRAVA Awards honoring top female CEOS. Rachel was honored as one of JWI’s 10 Women to Watch in 2016. She serves on the Duke New York Women’s Executive Board, the Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation for Fuqua School of Business at Duke University and Formula XO, a specialty beauty company.
Rachel earned an MBA from Stanford University Graduate School of Business in 1992 after graduating Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Duke University with a B.A. in Psychology and Human Development.
Website: SPARK Solutions for Growth
Twitter: RBScherl
Facebook: Rachel Braun Scherl
LinkedIn: rachelbraunscherl
Instagram: rbscherl
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