So cool to have Jude Miller Burke on the show talking about her new book The Millionaire Mystique: How Working Women Become Wealthy – And How You Can, Too!. She talks about her research project studying self-made millionaires and tells us the common themes they shared. Jude comes from a ordinary background in Minnesota and now lives in a very upscale neighborhood outside of Phoenix. She’s overcome a number of personal issues to be the confident, professional woman (and mom) you’ll see in the video. Have a listen (or a read).
On Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0vBYchlfUo
On Google Plus: https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/117640653308688335454/events/chkn3ceu62am85adpv7s5gg98b4
Transcript
John: There she is dancing for us, this is John Khoury, welcome back to The John & Jani show, I am your host John Khoury, author of a new book coming out soon Quanology: Evolution & You. And with me is the lovely Jani Moon from New York City.
Jani: Hello; hello: hello, hi John it’s been too long.
John: It has been too long; we had some summer breaks involved with all this didn’t we. Jani is a Media Coach, she don’t want to tell you about that but she is one and she is a
Jani: A single media coach
John: A single media Coach
Jani: In New York City
John: Right, so we are back with you on today, thanks for watching again, today we got a guest, the show is all about doing cool things with cool people on the show. Hope you learn some new stuff in your life and we got Jude Miller-Burke, Doctor Jude Miller today, she is the author of
Jani: She gets extra
John: She does, she is the author of a new book called The Millionaire Mystique, this is it right here, I just put it out today and I don’t have the book, I don’t think it’s out just yet but we will get to that in a second. It’s about how working women become wealthy and how you can too, that sound interesting if you’re a lady person.
Jani: A lady person, a normal person
John: A normal person
Jani: A lady person
John: Absolutely, so let’s bring her on , she is a psychologist as well and has 20 years experience working in Fortune 100 Companies , so she is going to share a little of the magic here today. Let’s bring her on Jude, there she is, welcome to the show Jude.
Jani: Okay Jude
John: Has this happened before
Jani: It has, hold on
John: Why is she muted?
Jani: There she is
Jude: Good morning John; good morning Jani
Jani: Hi Jude
John: Good morning Jude
Jude: Thank you for having me on your show
Jani: It’s okay
John: Thanks for being on the show, where are you now Jude?
Jude: I am in Phoenix, Arizona
John: How hot is it in Phoenix?
Jude: Oh, it’s been awful, it’s been about 100 degrees, we had monsoons, lot of storms but the summer is almost over and last winter was absolutely beautiful, could not been prettier all winter , sorry to tell you that .
Jani: I need to come visit you because I am cold
Jude: Yes
John: Unbelievable
Jude: The winters are spectacular
John: So Jude you are in Phoenix, Arizona and you have written this new book, can you tell us about this book The Millionaire Mystique?
Jude: Yes I decided about 4 years ago , that after having 3 children pretty quickly together that I wasn’t done with my career and I tried a lot of different part-time kind of positions after been Vice President of Operations at United Health Care and managing places since programme for 10 years at Honeywell Minneapolis . We moved to Paradise Valley, Arizona and the people eventually talked about over coffee or wine, the abuse and experience as children, or they grow up in poverty. Now this was just opposed to their beautiful lawns, their beautiful homes, their beautiful cars and I kept thinking, there is a story here?
John: When did these conversations come in?
Jude: Pardon
John: When did these conversations come in, you move to…?
Jude: I moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota that’s where my career was and after I had my 3 babies, my husband and I moved to Phoenix, Arizona and it was a very wealthy superb of Phoenix and the homes were beautiful ,the cars were beautiful , the lawns, the people and I felt very uncomfortable like really ,very much like a misfitting and most of the women that I knew actually were not career women when I moved here ,and so my curiosity was really peaked I thought , there is a story here, how did these people , who had told me , that they grow up in poverty ,experienced abused , had chemical independent parents, how did they go from here to here? And so none of these people were silver spoon people, and I had done research in the past for my PhD and I worked with Doctor Mark Attridge at United Health Care and Doctor Mark Attridge was our Social Science Researcher , and so I called Mark and said I really want to do a scientific research study , will you help me design it? Because I want to ensure the integrity of the research project, and so Mark and I design the study using standardised measures to make sure that we kept compare against national norms and we studied such things as , what are the work characteristics of highly successful people? What are their personality characteristics?
I was very curious as to what kind of leadership these highly successful people recommended, so we design a research study and we have it online and we also send some out in the print media, and unbeknown to us we had a couple hundred people who had respond, so the return rate was far greater than you would ever get for a research study.
John: And who is responding to these things, rich people responding, what are you asking these people?
Jude: They were friends; friends of mine too and friends of Mark, so we had people respond throughout the country and into Canada and some people from South America, so
Jani: So were they all women or men too?
Jude: No they were men; men and women
John: And what kind of question were you asking them?
Jude: What kind of leadership style would you recommend, that’s best for your organization?
What are, what is your work style?
What are your personality characteristics?
Tell us about your family background, so we got a really good read on the demographics of this population and 75% of these millionaires are multi-millionaires, men and women were from middle class or lower class family.
They got to realize that there is quite a story there that some of these people went from very troubled family ,on average they had two adverse events as kids{ 6:00 inaudible} siblings, alcoholic parents, witnessed abuse . They still were able to go from these kinds of family backgrounds to high level of success, and I did not define success as money initially and of course; of course I don’t believe that success only has to do with money.
I believe I am a mother first, and I love being a mom, and to me that really define a lot of who I am, and how I feel about myself. And these people are the same way; they do not define their self worth by their wealth. They also have very successful family lives, but at the same time they were able to overcome quite a bit of adversity to go on to become very successful , and so I received so much data and then Doctor Mark and I worked together to do the statistical analysis.
Mark did some beautiful reports for me and we had a very clear pattern on what the personality factors were for these individuals, what their work styles are and how they overcame obstacles?
John: And how long ago did you start this?
Jude: Well I started right about the time; I was really living in Phoenix when I moved from Minneapolis, so I would say about four years ago I really adopted into it and I presented the results to the American Psychological Association and my own personal
John: How did you do that, how did you present the results?
Jude: Oh, yes send them a proposal and of course everyone is interested because, you know as I mention unbeknownst to me we had all these millionaires, multimillionaires. Self-made, these are not people who have received their money for a family or marriage these are self-made individual, so they have come up the hard way and what I really want to do at this stage of my career is to give back. My whole career has been about counselling people as a Domestic Violence Therapist a while, I was Employ System Psychologist at Honeywell. My goal, my legacy was is to give this information back and if it even helped 50 people, 100 people then I would have achieved my goal.
Jani: What can help me right now Jude, a millionaire by giving me the talk, things that I could be doing to make; to make a lot of money.
John: This is obviously a personal thing for Jani, and any woman who I think are single right now, Jani is a single woman guys just say you know, so did this happen for you as well, was there a moment when you became interested in this or was it just because of the stories you heard from your neighbors and the people in your community?
Jude: Like many of the people I studied, I grew up in a little middle-class family in Rolle, Minnesota,state fairs, sewing my own clothes, blue ribbons at the same fair.
John : So I wouldn’t think that in you, so that is, that is very
Jude: I don’t think most people know that about me and I also spent much of my life hanging around, kind of the outward bound, people who had gone to the Peace Corps, more of the wellness group and psychologist, so this kind of environment was very strange for me to be in. I have been around a lot of career people but I grew up, because my parents started having children at 18, they had five kids, boom; boom; boom
Catholic family in Minnesota and they did not have the opportunity to go to college, so I heard everyday of my life, make your own money, go to college, make your own money, go to college. The funny part is I was then 35, 36 and I hadn’t had children yet and they had their reverse going and they were very worried that I wouldn’t have a family but I grew up around the dinner table, such as many of the millionaires and multimillionaires I interviewed and researched, where my parents had a family business. So I looked at all these millionaires and multimillionaires as big kids because that’s all they are, they are just big kids, playing with their toys, and you know their cars ,their summer mobiles, their boats or whatever. But they grew up around the dinner table hearing mom and dad talked about the local grocery store, or the drugstore, or the hardware store or the farm.
So over 50% of the individuals that I studied that became successful, grew up listening to their parents take risk knowing that entrepreneurship was acceptable and they had some kind of business sense from that experience.
John: Okay and so, what are the lessons that we have learned through this book that you would have the characteristic and traits, or you said that kind of spring out at you?
Jude: Well I think one of them is something that I learned myself to this process, now I have had been VP of Operations at United Healthcare, so there was a day when I thought, you know I kind of had to roll by the tail long before I was married and that I made my own success and really thought, you know that I pretty much knew what’s was going on. But this book process was so humbling for me I went to Harvard to a publishing conference and I stood up in front of 200 Medical Doctors, HR Directors and VPs and presented my little, tiny proposal for the book and I was nervous, I was very scared but I persevered and that is something that I learned from my parents that these millionaires have also. Then I had several people that wanted to represent me as my agent, well once I got an agent which is hard to do.
John: You got this from going to the Harvard publishing?
Jude: Yes, Harvard Publishing Conference and basically it is trial by fire, you stood up and you presented your proposal and then this whole panel of people evaluate you, yes, no, yes, no. And they hand you the sheets at the end of your
John: Not everybody proposed, only a few people presented their proposal?
Jude: No we all had stand up, boom; boom; boom. Everybody had a very quick rating and I was fortunate enough and I think a lot of it is because the book is based on a research project and it is statistically significant, which as a psychologist is important to me
John: Were you a Psychologist at that point?
Jude: Oh yes, I have been for many years. I received my license with my first Masters Degree way back in the 80s and so I persevered and continued and then I proceeded to have people say, well no one is going to pick you up; no one is going to publish you. So the very characteristics that my, the people that I studied told me about I had to employ, but obviously to have done what I did with my credit I had already have those skills conscientiously, perseverance and sometimes just acting as if, because it’s easy to feel more confident when you have, you know your own office and your business card ,and you have a couple hundred people at least ,that you are responsible for in a corporation.
But when you are out on your own and you say, I am going to write to this book or I am going to do this presentation or as you and Jani are doing, I am going to do this TV show, you have to believe in yourself and you have to dig deep. And there have been many moments where I wake up in the morning at 5:30 and start writing and I think, I don’t have anything to say to people, I have been raising my children the last few years. I don’t have anything to say about working leadership and so I had to really dig deep and look at my lack of self-confidence in the face and slowly over the three years I have one success after another, I just presented again in Washington DC at the American Psychological Association, and the difference between three years ago and last week was dramatic. I had a blast, I met people, presented my research, do it coaching I have received, hardly used any notes and I told my personal story. No one moved, no one spoke and no one left the room, and so
John: This was pretty good progress, we going to give you some applause over there because that is impressive, now you talked about lack of self-confidence, but yes when I look at you I don’t see lack of self-confidence but you are saying it’s there.
Jude: It is there
John: But you also saying, it is something that you have to fight against and you are also saying that other people have this as well.
Jude: Yes everyone of the millionaires and multimillionaires, I also did extensive interviews with Francine Ceredial, who have her own marketing firm and so she is an expert juggler at raising three kids without any help, and then also managing her business. I mean I interviewed lots of women about how they managed their careers and how they overcame their obstacles to success.
Jani: How do they; how do they, what is, what are your findings for that?
Jude: Well I think part of what I just said, in that you take the baby steps and I have had a lot of people tell me that I couldn’t do it, like why do you want to do this? You don’t need to do it, well for me it’s very important to leave a legacy and to give back, that’s what this is all about. The second thing is to just to get support from people, every woman I called and my men friends when I asked to interview them they all agreed; they didn’t have to do this.
They have obviously no skin in this game, in fact all the profits from this book, if they are any because that’s a whole another issue when you write a book based on research project. They are really aren’t that many profits but the profits that I will receive will go to Freshstart Woman Foundation, which is a local Woman Research Center here in Phoenix , Arizona that we helped built 8 years ago
John: And so, when you talk to these people it sounds like, I’m just going to put, connect the dots here, so you have got a degree in psychology and you are interviewing all these people. I am assuming you have to get a little bit personal with them, are they open, it sounds like they are opening up to you a lot. Is that partially because of your degree or just your manners with them?
Jude: I think I was born that way; I think I was born that way, which is one of the things that comes out in this study. The basic personality characteristic in your family background, my mom worked in the family business but she always took time to, there was a family in Minnesota were on the streets and who didn’t have mittens and coats, she would take all of her own kids into the clothing store, and we didn’t have much money and she would get them coats and hats and mittens, that’s what I grew up with.
My father is also a very giving person and so where ever I have been, whether it is Alaska fishing or Argentina fishing ,the fishing guides are telling me their stories and you know I feel like it’s a blessing that people telling their stories.
Jani: What about the people that you find all these characteristics with these millionaires, what about the people that aren’t born with it? Like what’s your advice to them, and the people that don’t have the skills in their genes or in them?
Jude: That’s a really good question and you know I was very lucky, and that my parents were very hard workers. They had their own business and they worked seven days a week, and so to me that was the norm but I think your family background, if you did not grow up with hard-working parents where you learn industriousness, and you need to learn conscientiousness in a real hominess and creativity. I mean my parents were entrepreneurs, they worked so hard I can’t tell you there whole lives, until I grew up with that and many of these people did. They saw their parents lose jobs, changed jobs, lose businesses, build businesses until they are very resilient. But if you did not grow up with that, you can read my book or another book that tells you, are the ways to success and you can start to emulate. I mean conscientiousness at work is very specific, you show up on time, you know you stay late; you get your work projects done, openness which is creativity.
You think of new ideas, you stay ahead of your industry, to be able to contribute to those staff meetings, you are agreeable, if your boss comes in and says, can you help me prepare for this court date, the right answer is yes, and you set your work aside , and you help your boss, you believe in teamwork
Jani: You notice any difference between the men and women millionaires?
Jude: Yes, if someone should say overall, the personality profiles were more similar than different, and that’s against all the past social science research, you know what that’s really, you know points out that men and women are very different but the personality characteristics of these men and women are similar. Now they have very different styles, you know the women obviously are much more feminine than the men. Both of these groups of people know how to communicate in, kind of a tend your friend way, they know how to build teams, they build good relationships.
They have high social influence skills, they are politically astute and they are authentic, they are comfortable in their own skin and that is one thing that is hard to teach people, is becoming comfortable with yourself, that takes some work. Back to your question, Jani, in terms of the differences, the differences were most pronounced around the detours and failures, men have many more failures but again they bounce back up and built new businesses. Women had many more detours and most of the detours were due to childbearing and child raising and so I love Doctor Corley and Doctor Higgledy book Through the Labyrinth, it’s a beautiful book, it’s a compilation of all the researches on women’s issues.
But they talked about women past to success as a Labyrinth, it’s not linear and really it wasn’t very linear for the men that we researched also, but the women had a lot of detours due to child bearing, child rearing and taking care of other sick family members.
Jani: Wow, what do you hope, you know, what do you hope when people read your book? What do you hope that they get out of it, what’s the biggest thing that you help people get out it? To get more buyers
John: Trying to get 1 million buyers
Jude: Its barely, My hope for them is success and happiness in whatever form that takes, I do not think you need to be a millionaire to be happy, not at all.
John: So what the key them for you?
Jude: Happiness, I think is a balance, feeling good about yourself, doing what you are passionate about. I have had the great fortune to be helping people, and every position I have had from my first job at a Nonprofit Crisis Centre of the West bank of the University of Minnesota campus through Honeywell United Healthcare.
For the last 10 years I have been doing executive coaching, so for me it was who I am, so I have chosen a profession that resonates with my own personality. When you do that you are much more likely to find success, you know because you are doing something that is natural to you and you are passionate about.
My hope for the book is to let people know, here is a template for you to look at your pronounced characteristics, I have self-assessment for most of the chapters, for you to self-assess and to help plan your own journey toward success, to find out where your obstacles might be and then there are tons of advice from all these very successful men and women about how to become resilient, how to overcome obstacles, how to strengthen yourself ,and the best person you can be.
John: But the basic line here, the basic path for these people is always setting up a business or whether a man or woman you can basically set up a business, you got these, right?
Jude: People had, they also had done, you know gigs in different corporation for long periods of time, quite of few of them had become CFO and CSO of major companies, but not all of them had been their own business owners but at some point they usually do own a business along the way.
John: Okay is that more common for a woman to maybe in a company and do well or is it more a thing for them to just start their own company?
With my population I actually some more woman, owning their own business, because that allowed them to create a culture where they could bring their own kids to work if needed, you know they would have a separate area for the kids and allowed the other people working in the organization to bring their kids in whenever there is a crunch. But many of the women have created a very specific culture that is family friendly but I would highly recommend. I loved working at Honeywell and I loved working at United Healthcare, it’s very hard working, you do have to kind of limit expression of yourself in some ways and really go for the long term rewards, but I
John: Limited expression is just a kind of, fall in line a little bit, more not so outgoing?
Jude: Well for instance, I would see clients in the factory area in the basement in one of Honeywell factories, 3 years no windows, you know there is no decoration I mean it, you know, you really have to focus on what is it you want to do and you can’t go out for long, you can’t take a nap during the day, you are running through airports, six months pregnant, you know trying to get to the next sale presentation in California. I mean it requires a lot of stick intuitiveness and conscientiousness and follow-through.
John: I always feel like the corporate culture at least in America and basically everywhere is not so friendly with woman because we are not taking all these things so much into account, taking care of kids, six months pregnant they should not be flying you around when you are six months pregnant, right but maybe businesses are much more answer these days before women?
Jani: They are changing, right businesses have changed a lot, and when you are looking at, if you have company A that’s want to hire you and company B ,really take a look at how family-friendly the policies are, and many men today want to be a very involved dads and so it’s very important for the men too, to look at those family-friendly policies and really talk to other people who have worked there to see, you know how supportive they are of, you know growing a family.
John: Right
Jude: Which I as I mentioned earlier I think, having a family is just absolutely wonderful.
Jani: So Jude your biggest number one piece of advice for all of those who want to go out and buy your book and learn about Millionaire Mystique, what is it?
Jude: I would read the tips at the end of each chapter and take the self-assessments, because the self-assessment will give you a good idea about where you are at in terms of your political influence, your ability to do teamwork, your leadership skills and help you get a basic understanding of your personality , so you know where strengths and weaknesses are, and that’s a lot of what I do as a coach but I do it one on one.
Is I help people to realize, if they are an introvert you can be a great leader as an introvert, you don’t have to be extremely extroverted. But to really build on your basic characteristic and to be comfortable with yourself and it’s just like the playground, you want to play nice in the playground, you want to be kind, in fact I just send my son off to college yesterday and I left a little note card and I make the zest, be kind to others when you don’t feel like it, because those are words coming back to you, giving back to people is really all we have in my opinion, and helping other people.
Jani: How can people get your book?
Jude: You can order the book at Amazon.com or through my publisher Nicholas Brilley.com and or any independent book seller.
John: Is it out now is it?
Jude: It is coming out October 14, very soon
John: October 14, okay
Jani: And how can people get in touch with you Jude?
Jude: JudeMillerBurke@gmail.com
John: And you have a website as well, I believe?
Jude: Yes I have a website themillionairemystique.com and then I have my own business website JudeMillerBurke.com, funny I am not very extroverted, so we are talking about challenging and as Jani knows the marketing of this, has been a challenge but I feel myself growing as we speak, and I encourage all of you to do the same thing. Take those things that you are afraid of and jump into them and do them.
Jani: You are amazing; amazing super-mom, beautiful, mama bear, professional woman that is a role model for me and for everybody, thank you so much.
Jude: I do want to say that I have a really struggled with my self-esteem and if I can do it, I kind of bugs along, you can’t do it.
John: I see no remnants of that Jude, thanks very much for being on the show, you have been a great guest and you look very comfortable in your skin, so I guess it is working.
Jude: Thanks John; thanks Jani
Jani: Thank you so much, we will have to have you back and you have to tell us, maybe more about how you overcame your self esteem issues because I know that; that’s a big issue for a lot of women and men, so.
Jude: I would love to do it, yes thank you.
Jani: Thank you so much
John: Thanks very much, everybody Jude Miller at judemillerburke.com and the book is The Millionaire Mystique on Amazon, go check it out,here we go The Millionaire Mystique, here we go ,thanks Jude we will see you next time.
Jani: Bye
Jude: Bye; bye
John: Bye; bye so Jani that was fun, what a interesting set of steps there, so she tells she was
Jani: We were very serious like, it was so intriguing like, I was just like , I didn’t know how to talk, I was so involved in what she was saying because it was so fascinating and she so eloquent and she as such, she has such a kind, graceful manner about her
John: Her story is so very clear as well, so she just took it and ran, yes so I am interested in the book I tell you that, it’s interesting to see all those little steps she took in then and she tells me that she is not, and she I couldn’t believe her background though , so it’s interesting to note that you never know a person until you get to talk to them but
Jani: Exactly but it is interesting to hear the statistics around how the qualities with the men and women were similar, I don’t, I didn’t, I wasn’t expecting that
John: No I guess not either; I guess you have to have certain characteristics like she said, so for me the big ones to take out of those is perseverance. I guess that I am still on that train too, it just keep going and keep going.
Jani: You tell me, I felt lazy
John: Do you feel lazy?
Jani: I don’t know
John: You’re working hard
Jani: Sometimes not really, I mean sometimes I work hard, sometimes I feel like I don’t and, you know sometimes I feel like I am coasting but the perseverance and baby steps, I like baby steps because I think that; that you got yourself a little successes, and I think that is really important.
John: I think it is great to see the progress, she said that she was very nervous at the first time at the Harvard convention, and then last week she said she gave her presentation in Washington and she felt very confident and had a great time ,which was things to look forward to.
Jani: Yes, so now you and I have no excuse to be millionaires
John: I am taking it step by step, I just got off the phone with the editor today for the book, and so I have to do some more revisions
Jani: Your book
John: For my book, yes believe it or not and so baby steps getting there
Jani: Baby steps, wow I talk with you on a show about you talking about your book Quanology
John: 30:02 I didn’t even know I just get off the phone with this one guy, this marketing company wants like twenty grand to do stuff, oh my god
Jani: Oh but we have to
John: But I think spilt that up in twenty steps
Jani: That is more of a waiting process because I know that’s a whole thing in itself
John: Sure, but it sounds like she have it all very clear, she went through hell and a lot of research and partnered up with a psychologist to do, to get it all laid out and make it very quantitative and empirical.
Jani: I mean it’s important, like so it’s not coming out in thin air, it’s based on what’s expected, going through like she said, looking at the tips and doing questionnaires, so that you can be self aware and know what type of quality you are , so that you can see where your strengths are, and where your areas are that you need to work on
John: On October 15 I am going to buy you the book Jani
Jani: Yes, buy me the book
John: I will ;I will buy you the book, the digital version right, hope it’s all on kindle, alright see you Jani
Jani: Thank you John
John: Thanks so much I am going to
Jani: Until;until next time
John: Until next time we hope to see, we will see you all soon, I am looking into the camera now, so here we go, alright here we are bye, Jani is dancing