110 Generosity Grows Businesses – with Ellen Rogin

Oct 10

“A good business flourishes on a healthy mindset that you will reap what you sow.”

Today’s guest is Ellen Rogin, CPA, CFP, a renowned speaker, money expert, NY Times’ Best- selling author and Abundance Activist. Ellen combines her financial expertise and creativity in motivating people to shift their viewpoints that businesses grow when it starts to create generous opportunities to make a greater positive impact.

Her books had helped a lot of business owners develop strong “financial belief management skills” to be a rock star not only in growing their business, but also giving back to the community and inspire others.

Read Ellen's Full Bio

In this episode, we talk about:

The importance of generosity as a business core,
The science and effects of giving,
The ways she incorporated generosity in personal and business matters, and many more.

If you’re a business owner who’s ready to grow and make a positive impact, I recommend you tune in.

Generosity As a Core Value

People were hanging on so tightly to what they had, so afraid they weren’t going to be okay. At the same time that people in their lives and charities needed their money more than ever.

Now if you think your hands as being clenched, how can you possibly receive?

On the other hand, if you are always giving, giving and giving, some people have a money belief that it’s not okay to have money. It’s not spiritual or something not okay with people with money. And you’re always giving and your palms are always open doesn’t work either. Giving and receiving are both important. If you thought of a coin, there are other sides of the coin. You can’t have a giver without a receiver.

I built my financial advisory practice with that in mind. When I first started, I didn’t call it “generosity is the new currency in business.” But I was lucky to be taught very early in my career about networking and told me that what you sow, you reap. That has always been my strategy for building businesses.

If I want more business, I have to be out there giving more business to other people.

When you are out there giving, with no expectation of something in return, it always flows back to you just not necessarily from the same person whom you gave to.

And I believe it works that way with money too. The more generous you are, the more that flows in to you. When you’re loosening that grip on your finances, then things flow back.

The Science Behind Giving

Generosity is actually the physical manifestation of your gratitude. You don’t have to have a lot of money to be generous. Take a breath and focus on what is working well in your life.

People have a complicated relationship with money, whether they have a lot of money or not. The things that made people more successful were a lot more about how they thought and felt about their money.

If people could have a healthy money mindset and were more content about money, the whole idea of building their prosperity works so much more effectively.

One thing is they’ve found something called subjective wealth. When you give financially, your brain interprets that as “Oh, if I was able to give, I must be rich!” Giving 500 dollars gives you the same emotional buzz as getting a 10,000 dollar raise.

Volunteering has more positive impact on your health than people taking an aspirin every day for their heart. Kids that are generous are more successful as adults. They have lower depression rates.

It’s not just because it feels good but there’s a lot of science that shows that this actually does help us.

In terms of a business building strategy when you can focus on adding value, really being of service to other people in the work that you do, not only does it feel good and I think really boosts your motivation, I also think it grows your business. My business grew 39% in a down market in a recession. I credit a lot of that to shifting my viewpoint.

Incorporating Generosity

At this point, my goal is to build significant business so that I am walking my talk but the ultimate mission is to make the world a more generous place.

Setup a systematic savings plan and a systematic giving plan for yourself. Whatever percentage makes sense for you and to wherever you want to give it. So it could be a family member, a faith-based thing, a charity that is really important to you. Our family has been able to take volunteer vacations all over the world because we have allocated money and we have taken it out of our giving account.

People want to do good business with good people. So when you think about your business how are you out there serving? Sometimes people are so quiet about that, and it’s not necessarily needed. You could be inspiring people. It’s a way to have conversations with people.

If you give gifts to your clients, you may want to consider making them charitable gifts.

Be authentic and consistent. You don’t want you out there just giving to the community and being a jerk to the people that work for you.

There’s so many science that the world is ready for this. There are so many social enterprises starting now and people want to do business with good people so whether you are doing it in your own personal way, or you’re doing it through your business, having a positive impact on the world is really what is going to bring you business success but also personal happiness and that’s what most of it is really about. How can you make a contribution?