Blending Simplicity, Style, and Systems with Jia Zheng | Episode 93

This is an unedited transcript and the timestamps don’t match exactly with the final audio. Thanks for your understanding!

Hello hello and welcome back to the Purpose & Progress Podcast.

I met this week’s guest Jia Zheng (J-ung) of Simply Jia. She’s a self-proclaimed “Swiss army knife that brings your creative visions to life” and we unpack in the episode how that title spans across both the personal style and operations consulting branches of her business.

I met Jia via Cate from episode 51, but then we also put together that she knows Sara from episode 84. Both those interviews are linked in the show notes.

I’m personally in the middle of a borderline identity crisis in terms of my own personal style and interior design style and general life and business vision. I sort of touch on this and unpack the signs it’s time for a rebrand in episode 87. So talking with Jia about her take on the topic was really soothing. She has such a grounding presence and I loved that her approach to both style and business is rooted in “what makes me feel more like me?” And that’s based on her own personal experiences with burnout and pivoting, which she covers in the episode.

And while she promotes more of her personal styling online, and more of her operations coaching in-person, we both love that she chooses NOT to choose for now. She can be her multi-faceted self and bring all parts of her to the conversation while really reading the room to know which parts to reveal first and in what ways.

My brain is constantly drawing parallels and connecting dots, so it was really fun to have this conversation because we do really different work, but in sort of similar ways—with values-alignment, empathy, etc.

On the personal style side, definitely check out her mini video training and guide called How to Dress On-Brand for Your Event so you can represent who you are no matter where you show up. (Again, speaking my language here, but with a totally different medium.) I have it linked in the shownotes, along with the code PURPOSEPROGRESS to be able to download it for free.

Be sure to check out all the resources we discuss in the show notes or at ashleesang.com/episode93.

And come back in 2 weeks for another solo episode with me.

Now, let’s dive into the interview with Jia.

0:00 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
I am so excited to talk to you. As you know this is a podcast where we talk to women in business about purpose and progress.

2:00 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
who are wanting to achieve the same kind of goals. So that is what I would say is that trajectory. I feel like it’s quite simple. And I guess that is, it’s aligned with my brand as a whole, you know, Simpligia. And so I feel like community really is that one thing that comes to mind right now.

2:25 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Oh, okay, I love the community aspect. That’s actually a very common theme amongst both my clients and people on the podcast that either community or collaboration, sometimes we say one thing but me and the other vice versa. But that’s actually really surprising to me because personal style is so personal and operations is kind of like behind the scenes, of hidden, you know, at first blush. So I’d actually love to just know a tiny bit more about out how community gets integrated into your business vision or how and why community is so important in these kind of more personal or behind the scenes facets of business and life.

3:15 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah, absolutely. With style because you mentioned that first, with style, yes, I feel like it is so personal and that is what I work on with clients is really developing that personal sense of your taste. What is unique to you? What do you like? At the same time, there’s this community aspect in terms of building what that style looks like. So finding the right vintage shops, finding the right hairstylists, finding the right makeup artists, finding the right people you trust who have a similar style to you. And I feel like that is the community that I’m talking about when it relates to style. And then I do think about this one community I’m a part of that is focused on bringing together photographers and models and stylists any kind of creative that is related to really good photos or practicing their craft. And so without that community, there’s really I feel like what was missing in our area was this sense of ability to just go out there and practice what you’re working on. And so having that community really allows us to stretch our creativity and to also experiment with our ideas without judgment. And I feel like that’s what has been really important on the style side. On the operation side, I would say, you know, when people think operation, Asians, they’re not really sure what that really means.

5:03 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah.

5:04 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah. And it’s because it really touches on every aspect of your business. It’s really thinking about how your business functions day to day. And so it’s not something that is so zoned in, like your marketing or your your branding or your tech. It’s about how you pull all that together. So how does your offer connect to your sales pipeline, to how you market your offer, to how you run your team? And so how community comes into that is that I work with and talk to a lot of referral partners and different service providers like you in order to make the operations run well, because I’m not going to be your expert in doing all the things. But I’m going to be the one who can understand what you need and then find the right people to fit those needs.

6:04 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Oh, okay, I’m so glad I asked that. know that wasn’t one of our pre-selected questions, so thank you for running with me on that one, but that just goes to show how the way we define our own values is essential. It’s like the most important part of the puzzle because community to you and to be to someone who runs a membership or I know you know Sarah who is local to you and has literally a networking community that’s a very different manifestation, although obviously there are some true lines, those referral partners that being in shared space, that being able to have that collaboration over competition sort of vibe, so thank you for explaining and packing that, I feel like that’s so powerful and also just as you were talking about operations, first of all I heard a little bit passion which I love, I feel like you get excited about options. which so many of us who are non-ops people do not get excited about so that is why we bring people like you in but for me that values question comes through so centrally in what you were explaining of how it’s how you show up I always say that our values are the how mechanism in our business they bridge the people and the what and the vision and I talk a lot about making decisions that our values align both in your marketing and your operations and the way you explained operations is it’s all encompassing it’s the entire sort of brand experience it’s the behind the scenes and customer facing and that’s exactly how I feel about messaging like it is both the things that are informing your ops and it is the things that are informing your content or your static line in your newsletter tomorrow or whatever it is so I think the through line for both the marketing the messaging and the operations is that values align business thinking about out what you care about most, what your perfect fit people care about most, what your team cares about most if you have one, and connecting all those dots. So you do it in a very different way, or like a very different medium, but we’re talking, we’re talking about, you know, maybe apples and oranges, but they’re both fruit, right? So that’s always really exciting to me. I love it.

8:23 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
I love it. It makes me smile ear to ear listening to you talk about it in that way.

8:29 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
So okay, lovely. So I would love to know why was the one decision or experience that changed the trajectory of your life, related to your business or not?

8:45 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah, I would say when I thought about this, particular moment, the style part really came through, and that was in one of my previous jobs where I got promoted to senior leaders. your ship. And at that point, you know, on paper, it was like, I was doing great in life. But I still felt like, well, why do I still feel so incompetent and that I don’t deserve to be in that room? And that I still feel like I am not living up to that expectation, even though I already got the promotion. And it was because I had this long journey figuring out what is my style. And so at that point, that same year I got promoted, I also decided to go deep into learning about my style. So that’s really where I would say is my personal start, my personal style journey began. And I thought that it was shopping so I worked with Nordstrom, that personal shoppers, and I didn’t a lot of expiration in terms of the shopping side, but I realized that wasn’t the solution. so then I became obsessed with style and really what fit me. And so I feel like that moment in time was when I realized that what I was doing wasn’t working. And so then over the years, I continued researching, doing a lot of self study and finding resources that really actually solved that problem. And when it comes to business in general, I would say it was in 2021, where I had a personal low. That was like my most extreme low where I personally was toxic. And I had really unhealthy relationship with work at that time. And I wasn’t doing any self care. And I realized, okay, something needs to change. And so, So from that moment, I slowly started thinking about, okay, what makes me feel more like me, started with yoga and journaling, and came back into what was important to me before work. And that’s, you know, end of 2021, 2022 was then when I would say I had a creative renaissance or a creative rebirth. And I started realizing it was because I lost, I took a break from creative projects, and I’ve always been in this creative space that I just wasn’t doing for a little bit. So when I went back into creative projects, then that’s the idea of the business starting and I started the business in 2022 and the rest is kind of history.

11:49 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Oh, beautiful. I always love a lemon salaminated story. I know some people almost view silver linings as like toxic positivity, but I am such a silver linings kind of person. Um, so I really love that you realize you had the self awareness, um, which is also a very common theme on this podcast is I had the self awareness that something was not working. I needed to change something. I had to experience that low to do something about it. Uh, and I love that personal style was that outlet for you. It is both creative and also a little bit of science too, right? And you can sort of, um, systematize it with, you know, outfit formulas or three word formulas. just did a podcast episode number 87. I’ll link it about, um, a three words exercise. And I specifically cited how, how useful it is for personal style, even though I mentioned to you before we started recording, I am in such a, uh, identity crisis, mostly with motherhood, but also just sort of like phase of life. Age, uh, just like so many factors, so three word exercises or little things that can make a big elusive concept that’s quite abstract, like, oh, my personal style. And I like that in offspring, like yours could probably bring it down to earth a little bit, make it a little bit more progressive, right? on the progress. Okay, so we know it’s not this. Let’s try this. I can imagine how working with you would be this very cool blend of let’s make this a creative exercise, but also let’s ground it in something. Is that part of your process or did I just make that up for you?

13:51 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
No, I feel like I could go in so many tangents with everything you said here. So the grounding, I’m so glad you bring that up, is that is what I feel like shows up in both the operation side and the style side. So in style, sure, a face value is about looking nice and feeling good in the clothes, but really it’s about what I like to focus on is really the body image aspect of it and the self confidence that comes through. And so when we talk about style, it’s not so much look at this fun top I found or these shoes, it’s really about what fits you, what do you like, and how can we bring it back to your own values. so the three word approach that you mentioned, it’s funny I’m going through, so I should probably say this, I’m going through my own personal style revamp. And I set my intention of how I want to look with my current style right now. so my three words, actually, I went through this exercise right now are simple, approachable, and subtle detailing. And so to make it less overwhelming, I have narrowed down to those three things for now and see how my style is evolving. From the previous time I did this exercise, which was, I think it was like simple, timeless, and classic, which still, you know, classic and timeless still come through, I feel like I’m being a little bit more experimental now. And so that’s why those three words have changed. So I’m curious about the time. I want to hear what your three words are. Yeah.

15:45 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Okay. So first of all, I mean, we don’t know each other very well, but I totally get all three of those words coming through, both in just like experiencing a conversation with you, but then also in any Instagram content I have seen. So Thanks, working on that front that the perception and the attention are matching, which is not always the case. And then so I the three word exercise I did was more for like life vibe showing up as a human and less personal style, but the words that I landed on were vibrant, centered and expansive. And yeah, I did a bunch of unpacking what those were for me and what those weren’t for me. And yeah, I have thought about my style words because yeah, both in home design and close fashion, personal style, I’ve been a little bit all over the place. And we mentioned before we started recording that you also love thrifting and for me thrifting has been such a fun creative outlet. It’s been a way for me to be a conscious consumer without having to research to all end like to. all ends of the earth at slash websites to feel good about my purchases. sort of know well it’s secondhand so like it’s already less impactful environmentally and in terms of labor and in terms of all the factors that I care about and but because I am such a little freaky queen I also sometimes just get lost in like oh well this was free here like this was five dollars and lose but do I actually like this what do I actually like is this the perfect fit oh it’s it’s absolutely not so I’m trying to balance with the extremely limited time that I have both creatively and then just research wise okay what what do I actually like and it sounds like that’s exactly what you are both going through personally and what you are guiding your clients through yeah absolutely oh that’s such a great example you brought up of getting

18:00 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
lost and excited in the moment of finding something and then being like, well, you know, it’s free or it’s such a great deal. But then, every step of the process of going through your closet of finding the right new items to add to your closet, know, we ask those questions of, well, does this fit your style? And would you actually wear it, right? So, yes, I can definitely relate to that. And I know a lot of other people do.

18:34 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah, I mean, it’s common in, yeah, for so many reasons, right? we get in ruts and, yeah, again, just identity shifts and lifestyles shifts and all the things. But yeah, I just, I love that you’re doing the work you do. So, to the that end, I’d actually, I’d love to know your current elevator pitch, something that you would say on a networking event or in the chat.

18:59 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah, how do you introduce yourself? This is such a great question, especially with what we’re talking about right before this recording is, it really depends on the context, and I like to, if we’re in a larger room, I like to listen to what the room is saying and how they’re introducing themselves to see what I say and how I would introduce myself so that it relates best to the room. I say that because I do have two distinct services, and so if I think that the style side is more relevant, then this would be my elevator pitch first style, which is hi, I’m Gia, I’m a personal style coach, and I work with career-driven professionals to find what fits so that they can look into feel good no matter what season or life phase they’re in no matter what trends come through. And I feel like that changes like I don’t have, you know, a formula of what I say. It’s, that’s probably like the bare bones of it, but then I always like to change it up a little bit depending on who I’m seeing, who’s in the room, all of that. So that’s a later pitch with a style side and then the operation side. I like to typically say hi, I’m Gia. I am a coach focused on small business operations and I help creative businesses get organized so that you can create more streamlined back end processes so that you can focus more on what you’re good at and less on the mundane day to day.

20:56 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
I love the idea of reading the room. Even if you don’t have to very, very distinct and different business offerings and services like you do, I love the idea of what does feel most relevant. Am I in a room full of women? You didn’t specifically cite women, but you said professionals, right? So if you’re in a mixed room, great. Or fickle, it would be meeting people where they are. Or yeah, I just really love that. Perceptiveness and that flexibility to be able to straddle both sides of what you can offer. And I also, I’m just curious, I don’t even know if there’s an answer to this, but I’m curious about the context where both might be relevant or sort of 50, 50, or it’s a bit of a mixed bag. And how you could combine both the options. and the personal style and regardless it’s Gia and yeah that would be a really cool experiment too.

22:09 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah I have experimented with that and I would say when I can see how both sides relate then I actually lead with operations because it is a room full of businesses most of the time and I feel like people see more of the ROI first with operations and then style comes through. Even though style is easily a part of personal branding but I do think that when it comes to investment when it comes to priority is that operations is probably what they think of more as a need although I beg to differ right but I yeah I’ve tried that in the past to answer a question and I typically lead with operations and then for those who are interested in the style they will ask about that side.

23:00 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah I almost feel like personal style and brand messaging are a little bit in the same camp of oh it feels like a nice to have or if you know you know or if you’re seeking it if you’re you know very quote-unquote problem aware then you’re actively looking for you us but something like ops sort of everyone knows they need that so that is a really interesting dichotomy and yeah I do think that pretty much any offering any anything that allows us to show up as our fullest self to be our most confident to be our most clear and direct to be our most relatable whether it is the way we look or the way we speak or anything in between the way we run our business or do our books or whatever it is it’s all valuable it’s all needed and yeah I think finding that perfect fit person to guide us through that is Is what we’re all kind of waiting for that magic moment to happen for and sort of when it when the time is right when the budget is right when the personality and the values and everything align that’s that’s when it’s just useful and the most impactful as well.

24:16 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah, absolutely.

24:18 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
So to that end, I would love to know. What do you tell people just kind of when you’re out and about, or as I like to call it your dinner party description. What is the not in a room full of business owners way that you introduce yourself.

24:35 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
I feel like this is where I then combine it pretty succinctly where I’m like, I have my own business and I’m a business coach, as well as a personal style coach and then they’ll probably ask, Oh, what do you mean by that right and then I’ll expand into the operation side. Or if they are more interested in the style side I’ll talk about. that first. So it’s quite brief and then they’ll usually ask for more details.

25:08 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah and that’s what we’re going for right when we introduce ourselves is that lean-in moment. I think it’s so funny how sometimes being as succinct as possible is so much harder than the big long three-sentence, oh I have all these things and do all these things but sometimes also when we live and breathe online business speak it’s hard for us to do that than a party description so I love that you’re able to oscillate between the two.

25:35 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah and it’s so funny you mentioned that because being an entrepreneur and being in these kind of spaces and having these kind of conversations you feel like everyone runs a business at the same time when you are having those narrow party conversations away from traditional business networking it feels rare for someone outside of that space to run into a business owner so yeah I’m glad you mentioned that.

26:02 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah, and I mean, it all comes down to our messaging, right? And my whole goal is for us to understand and demystify messaging. So I’d love to know, what do you think of when you hear the word messaging? Yeah, I always love to hear the different perspectives that come through. And also, especially with an ops angle, with a personal style angle, or just in your own experience as a business owner, what do you think of when you hear messaging?

26:31 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah, so to give you a little context, I was in market research before I moved into operations, and it was in my market research role that I then realized my strength was actually operations focused. And so in my market research role, we talked about messaging all the time, because that was one of the things our clients wanted to work with us the most is message. testing and seeing which ones landed the most for their ideal audience. so knowing that and then knowing the work that I’ve done with my own business messaging, I think of it as really the way you communicate what will help your people with what you provide, the value that you provide, and that it’s really how you can share, again, with your community and connect with the people who line with your values so that it does feel like a perfect fit.

27:40 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah, that alignment is so important that what you have to offer and who is waiting desperately, eagerly for what you have to offer, it is that space in between we are trying to fill. So I’d love to know what’s your own brand’s messaging? What’s the process been like?

28:00 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
I know we just talked about your elevator pitches or your intros, but just more generally. How do you think of your own messaging? I’m so curious to hear your particular angle on this, because when I thought of it, I was thinking that my brand messaging is simple and approachable, or I hope that it is. And that’s really where I kept it, was my brand messaging is simple and approachable. And so for style, the underlying message is really about body image. So if I were to go into more specifics, that’s what I’m currently working on is really exploring this idea of when people think of my brand as a release to style. It’s about body image and finding a fit. And then for the operations piece, it’s more actually the simplification of processes and being. being calm about it as opposed to trying to put all the tech, all the systems all at once and trying to get it up and as quickly as possible. So I’d love to hear, I’d love to hear if that’s what you’re going for, or if you had something completely different in mind.

29:18 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
I didn’t have any specific goals. Oh, this is the answer that I was seeking. I love to hear how people view their own messaging in that, oh, it feels little bit messy, or okay, I know exactly what I’m talking about and who I’m talking to. So I actually really like, and I imagine this was at least somewhat intentional, but I really like how that both approachability and simplicity are general enough that they can be umbrella terms for both facets of your business, personal style and the ops. But also, they’re quite nuanced. in the way they manifest in both sides of business. I’m really a fan of umbrella terms and almost always that is your values, which you’ve already said is the case. or you know with your three words. So I love that the simplicity can carry over into how you approach style and how you approach ops. make ops simpler, which I think is the main problem for most people is it just feels so complicated. It feels like there are too many moving parts. It feels like there’s too much tech. You mentioned the word calm, which is obviously not my personality, but like I love that you bring a sense of calm to systems, ops, decision making, that sort of thing. So it sounds like this has been a very organic build and a very introspective way of approaching your work. Whether or not you necessarily meant to zoom out. And okay, well, how can these terms specifically cover both sides in my business? You really got to the heart of, well, again, I am the practitioner, I am the visionary, I am the common link between these two sides. What is it that I’m bringing? This is the energy I’m bringing, this is the vibe I’m bringing, and this is what I’m also delivering to clients, that simplicity, that I don’t know, kind of flippant or extra, but I think also some people view it as this is so daunting. I am so afraid to look in the mirror or to look into my closet or to do anything but shop at the big stores, whatever the trends are, I’m just going to go with what’s popular, because that’s easy, right? As opposed to really digging into who they are and what they want to be and how they want to appear. So I think that making these big scary things approachable is something special. And I also think that both ops and personal style can almost be like the opposite end of the spectrum of oh well we’re going to do all the big shiny things or it’s going to be so fancy or this is like such a luxury and we’re going to you know do it all to the nines or whatever kind of the opposite of approachable. So yeah I think that both of those words are very anchoring and very unique in a lot of ways and then also quite universal so that you can go a million in one direction using those as the center of the mind map in terms of content in terms of conversation, copy, offer design, etc. So that’s my take.

32:45 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Thank you so much for all the feedback and I want to bring in what you had mentioned in the beginning of our time which is this idea of being scientific especially on the style side. And you’re absolutely right. That’s, it’s funny you say that because that’s what some clients and even some people in passing have described the way I talk about styles. So I’m so glad to hear that, you know, even though our introduction has been brief, it seems like you’re really bringing in the things that I want to be able to communicate without even knowing beforehand. And so that approachability to style is something I do want to show people. And I would say, you know, to enter a question about the process, like what has it’s been like. I feel like it’s been so much easier to communicate that in person and with someone back and forth. And I am currently in the process of figuring out how to communicate that through online content, through more of this one way medium and show people that. Yeah. Yes, there’s creativity and style. At the same time, yes, it can be a process, just like you would have in operations, where you go through certain milestones to really figure out the foundations of your style, so then you can get creative. So it doesn’t feel so overwhelming of, well, let’s just start wherever, you know, however we feel and what are feels right. But let’s set the foundations first to then go into that realm of creativity.

34:33 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Oh, I love that idea of creativity within constraints. I gave myself a personal challenge when I was very pregnant with baby number two and like, yeah, had very little time to prep for baby out in the world. And so I gave myself a project push and the constraints I put in place mostly time wise. really enabled me to have a lot more creativity in terms of repurposing, in terms of refreshing, in terms of, well, what do I want to say if I only have this much time and this much space to do it in. So I think so often, especially creatives, multifaceted people, the deep thinkers that I work with, sometimes we’re like, we don’t want any bounds on our creativity or on our expansiveness or anything like that. We just want to be free and yet so often it is so supportive to have frameworks, processes, some sort of constraint to then allow us to thrive within. And then, you know, if we need to push the guardrails because we have outgrown, great, we can do that, but it is so much less overwhelming when we do have some of those constraints. I also in like deep, deep down the ADHD rabbit hole and time constraints are like one of the biggest motivators for the ADHD brain that urgency, whether it is real or fake, almost always it has to be real because we can outsmart ourselves. So yeah, any sort of constraint we can put around our creativity can sometimes be incredibly supportive, especially when we have the external accountability, like a coach, like a stylist, like a consultant, someone to keep us in check, keep us going down the path that we said was important to us, that can be really, really powerful. So it sounds like you are really setting yourself, your clients up for the success that they want.

36:42 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Thank you, thank you.

36:45 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
So I’d love to know, you talked a lot about advanced alignment, you talked about reading the room, how do you figure out what words work for you, and when they’re actually connecting with your perfect fit people. How do you know that you’re with your perfect fit people? are those clues? How do you connect those dots for yourself?

37:08 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
I’m going to reference my notes for this one because I remember this was a tough question at the moment. So let me go find that really quick.

37:18 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah, no worries, see. Also, I’m very curious to see, you know, what’s changed from pastia, you know, however long ago you wrote these.

37:25 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah, yeah. yeah. Let’s see, okay. yes, I remember why this was difficult. It was because the first thing I wrote is that I’m a projector and so I, and I guess this is part of my specific reading, but I make decisions mostly based on emotion and I feel like that is so true. And when I think of what would be the perfect fit, words or the question? lose it’s this idea that it feels effortless to speak with them or to be around them or to work with them. And so as it relates to business partners, it’s this idea that the time we spend together is super productive. I am that person who’s like, I’ll have so much fun if we go to a for clients or the community. It’s about creating these deeper relationships that it’s not just the quick hand shake or it’s not just the brief intro, you know, these networking events where you just say hi. It’s really getting to know them. And also coming back to, like you mentioned, the values is knowing that they are also hard working and that they trust in themselves too. They trust in themselves and their skills.

40:00 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
business best practices and whatever else. And we forget that we are very real humans dealing with other very real humans. And I think the more often we can remind ourselves of that, the less pressure we’re going to feel to be any sort of way or say any sort of thing that just doesn’t feel right in the moment. So yeah, I love that, especially given some of your other responses.

40:25 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
You know what’s funny? I didn’t realize that until you mentioned it that, yeah, having this contrast of the operations and the systems versus the way I answered this question, it’s so funny. Because if you did ask me this question, probably when I first started or even a year ago, it would have been probably more numbers based or more logistics based. But I feel like the more I am learning about business, the more I am understanding that human side of things. That is why I’m answering the way I am today. So very interesting you brought that up.

41:05 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
I love that very clear sign of progress and evolution and just change. Yeah, thank you for that really beautiful example. You’ve also mentioned your values a couple of times. So I’d love to know just another example or reiteration of how you integrate your values into either your marketing and messaging and or the values line decisions that you make beyond your coffee, your content, your conversations, maybe in your personal ops or in your personal tech stack or something like that. Yeah, how do you integrate your values into values line decisions?

41:47 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah, I would say the first example I want to touch on is in how I approach my own systems and I keep my tech stack pretty simple right now. It’s because I know that I don’t need some fancy CRM at this point. point and I don’t need, I don’t even need any fancy integrations. And I don’t need to think about that as this huge chunk of investment for now, because I want to keep it simple. I want to keep it manageable. And then I would say, so right now I’m actually focusing on content creation. And one of the things we talk about is showing your values in other parts of either your personal life or your business. And so I do like to show that work ethic. I like to show that discipline in things like my fitness journey or things like making, making small decisions throughout the day. So the fitness part that is really where I’m talking about and also keeping it simple. right now, I am practicing yoga every day for my personal mental health and also to make sure that I’m just doing something every day. And then for my personal, you know, decisions, I love focusing on experiences over things. And so I feel like that’s what would relate I don’t know what to say, personal satisfaction of knowing that I have embodied style. But it’s how do I express my style through the way I communicate? How do I express my style through my hair, my makeup, if I’m wearing makeup that day, or the way I have transformed a shirt or worn a jacket with a different top and bottom combination. that’s how I I’ve talked about values in different parts of my life.

44:05 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah, I love, I love the idea of personal style being more than the clothes you’re wearing, and especially more than the clothes you’re shopping for. I have also got, oh, have you noticed the trench here? I’ve gone deep down the rabbit hole of like personal style videos, and I love good, you know, one top style, 20 ways type of video, or like a style challenge where they like get this weird game from the thrift store, or this thing that they’ve had in their closet for 10 years and they like make five different outfits, and they’re a totally different vibe based on, again, simply how they do their hair, if they’re wearing a makeup, is it a bold lip, or not, like whatever it is. And you even mentioned, you didn’t say specifically like how you carry yourself, but there are so many other factors than like the things you’re putting on your body, it is also the energy you are bringing, it is the the way you speak, the way you walk, the way you hold yourself. Um, yeah, you could be wearing the same outfit as someone else and just have a totally different vibe. Uh, and I think that’s really important to remember. And I think that carries through not just in our personal style during me, but also in our personal brand more globally and in our brand experience, just how people experience us. Um, do we introduce ourselves with confidence? Or are we kind of hemming and hogging and stumbling over words because we’re trying to remember the script that we wrote and we’re missing the marker? Or is it, uh, you know, are we making direct eye contact or not? Uh, and you know, it’s, it’s, it’s not that it’s right or wrong, but the, the way we deliver what it is that we’re bringing really does matter. Um, or even, even like in the, so my mind also goes to the online world, because that’s mostly where I live. And, um, even the idea. of do you put exclamation marks in your sales copy in your emails or not and you know we were told oh well that’s a one thing or that’s an unprofessional thing I am a proud exclamation mark user because I speak in exclamation marks so why would I not write with exclamation marks or I had a sales page once and I had feedback from someone she didn’t you know end up joining the group but she said oh I saw that you wrote triple exclamation marks here I knew you were my kind of person and like that is all part of our personal brand not necessarily our personal style but it’s all part of that experience of how people perceive us, receive us and experience an interaction with us.

46:45 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
I’m so glad you bring that up because that is what we talk about the way you communicate whether it’s with exclamation points or not is also that how we can bring that personality into your style. If you’re the kind of person who is concluding with three exclamation points, then one of the three words you said is vibrant, of course, that makes sense because you’re going to show up as a vibrant person as well. Really glad that you mentioned that.

47:18 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah. You said the word personality. feel like that’s the thing. That’s the thing that we’re capturing with our personal style, even in our operations, with our messaging, with our marketing. We are capturing our personality, and whether you’re a founder-forward brand or not, sometimes for us solopreneurs or coaches, consultants, direct practitioners, our personality really is to a large extent our brand personality. But even if you’re working as part of a larger brand that’s less directly you buying and facing, your brand still has a personality. And so I feel like that would actually be a really cool exercise is if your business very often. That is the beauty of a brand messaging guide. I always advocate for like, can this guide over to anyone you ever bring into your business ever? The ops person needs to know how the systems need to feel. The VA or the email marketer or the social media manager or the copywriter needs to know your voice, needs to know your personality, to know your audience. so yeah, like how jarring would that be to hear me, for example, on the podcast or, you know, see me on a story or something where I’m like face to camera. And then if I had an assistant, I do have people on my back end, but none of them are like writing my emails. But if, for example, they were to be writing a newsletter from me or a response. And it was like the most formal mundane, like it would be so, so jarring. would say, oh, did she get hacked? Am I in the right place? And we would lose a lot of trust and you’re paying people to be part of your team, and you want that brand experience to be carried over. They don’t have to be clones of you, they can bring their own personality potentially, you know, depending on the role, depending on the circumstance, but they need to be part of that bigger brand experience vision. And so I think that’s so, so important. Yeah, I think you have all the ops examples, but I will leave it at that.

50:23 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
No, I feel like we can talk about this for so long.

50:27 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah, okay, well, we’ll do a three-hour podcast some other time, but so, okay, you’ve talked a lot about the journey here and even the fact that you are very much still in progress, which I think is all of us, but I would love to know what you like when you feel tongue tied talking about your vision or about your brand, is there anything you do to feel more confident in it? Yeah, or what do you feel most confident about your messaging or anything related to your confidence?

52:00 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
who you already are, let’s say in your personal style or what your business already is, and then let you express that to the maximum. So I’m sure there are, you know, ideal projections you have of what you want to achieve yourself, but it’s not like we are changing you, we are just exposing more of you. So that’s something that I would love to feel more confident in.

52:31 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Oh, I think that is so, I think that’s what everyone is looking. Well, not everyone, but I think people who are grounded in themselves, who are centered in themselves, even if they don’t know how to express it, that is what they’re looking for is someone who can pull out their essence. I know that’s my clients, like they know in their head and heart, it is so clear what they’re building, but they get tongue tied about it, or they get that writer’s block, or like, why is something that I live and breathe all day every day, so hard to communicate. A, it’s the because we’re so close to it. B, it’s because we overthink it. C, it’s because these things are hard. So I love that idea of I’m not changing anything. I’m bringing out more of you. And the parts of you that you want to shine through, right? It’s not about, you know, exposing all your deepest secrets or insecurities. It’s not about brushing them under the rug necessarily. It’s about working with what you do love. It’s about working with, like on the upside, what is working, what could be optimized, what could be better because it’s already good, not better because it’s bad. And I think that’s so permission giving for so many of us who have impostor syndrome or struggle with confidence or, you know, for any given reason. Yeah, I love that idea of expression, yeah.

53:54 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
I know this is audio only, but I have to tell the audience that I was nodding the whole time you’re saying all of that.

54:00 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Yeah, it’s just it’s like it’s just such a magical position to be in. know we do very different work, but I just feel like it manifests in really similar ways. And yeah, it’s just like such a privilege. It’s so fun. Yeah.

54:16 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
And one thing I want to say is I’m so glad you mentioned Essence because that is something we talk about in personal style is we find what your essence is, what you want other people to see about you in your essence. And so again, it’s not that let’s say you are you want to be boho and you’re you just don’t know how to communicate it. And it’s really not you. It’s that you actually naturally are more boho chic. And we want to figure out how then can we incorporate those details in without it looking like a costume, you know, Oh, yes, the idea of it not looking like a costume.

54:58 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
feel like for you, that’s a very direct But I think for, you know, more broadly branding in general, like we don’t want it to feel like we’re doing something fake or like we’re trying to fill someone else’s shoes. I think that idea of wearing a costume is really universal like we’re trying to be the guru that we learned from we’re not them or we’re trying to follow those those practices that just don’t fit for our business. You said, I don’t need a fancy CRM. Okay, you’re an off person who doesn’t have a fancy CRM. That’s great because that works for you. That doesn’t mean that your clients won’t need a fancy robust Belden whistle CRM. And you could guide them through that or you could talk them off of that lead because they don’t need that. And I think that’s like such a powerful perspective shift is you’re on your journey, and you need what you need and your people, your perfect fit people need what they need from you.

56:00 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
or the rest yes yes to that so i’d love to know more tactical brass tacks kind of things what’s something you wish you had known either about personal style or about ops or one of each before you got started something that you wish you had known about your expertise is i’ll start with a style side here because i feel like it comes through so strongly for me is that shopping isn’t a problem or i’m sorry sorry shopping isn’t the solution is what i mean to say i feel like that is where people start their journey or they feel like if they’re stuck then they gravitate toward shopping in order to see a new phase of their style but it really comes down to knowing what fits knowing your best country colors and knowing your essence, like what we talked about briefly. And when you know that, then you will have such a better and easier time shopping for new things. So don’t chase the trends. Don’t chase the shopping. That’s what I have to say about the style side. I would say something I wish I had known about operations before I started is more something that I want to share with those who are working on their operations is that all businesses are going through the same kind of challenges, whether you are a one person business or you are a 50 person business or you are a multi 1000, what do you call it? People company. So the challenges I hear from friends who are in larger companies, the challenges I hear from smaller companies, know, it. It comes down to all of these consistent conversations about team, about communication, about leadership and so something I want to share with those who might be figuring out their operations is that you’re not alone and it’s, you know, you, you have more than you need and you know more than you think you do.

58:26 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Oh, I think that’s a universal truth across life to not just in our operations. Yeah, so thank you for that reminder. What is one tactical tip you can share about styling and or ops that will save, especially multi passionate deep thinkers time or money or energy, something that’ll make life easier. I feel like this applies to both personal style and operations.

58:57 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Love it when yeah. When it comes to saving energy, I want to say really trust yourself that you know more about your style than you think you do. You know more about your business than you think you do. So any energy that you’re spending on, am I good enough? Do I know my style enough? I know what to do here with my business enough? You actually do. It’s just about talking it through with a trusted source who is an expert in the thing that you need help with to then make progress. I would say on the money piece, this is more style related. It’s that trendy pieces are a waste of money unless you know how to fit into your existing style.

59:48 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Love that. My little sustainable heart is pumping over here with that chip. But yeah, I think that that trust yourself, but also lean on outside perspective. Ooh, okay. feel like that’s a mic drop. I watched her documentary years ago and loved it. so I’ll have to link that in the show notes or something if it’s still on Netflix. That’s how I watched originally. But yeah, thank you for that quote. All right, if people are loving what you’re laying down on the personal style front, on the ops front, on the approachable simplicity front, how can they stay connected with you?

1:01:27 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Yeah, I’m always reachable via email. I love email, which I feel like is a weird thing to say. But I love engaging in email conversations. so that’s Gia at simply Gia.com. If you want to learn more about style, then you can follow me at simply Gia style dot com on Instagram. And my business Instagram, which is a little bit quieter, is at it’s Gia and And then if you are interested in learning more about style long term, I do have a newsletter called the Friday Fit. And so that is where every Friday I share something that is really to fit as it relates to your personal style as well. And so you’re welcome to join me every Friday on that.

1:02:24 – Ashlee Sang (Ashlee Sang)
Lovely. will have all of that linked in the show notes as well as anything we talked about. In the episode, yeah, thank you so, so much for sharing your insights and for chatting with me.

1:02:36 – Jia Zheng (simplyjia.com)
Thanks so much for having me.