Can Self-Care Be Your Secret to Professional Success?

How do you transition from intrapreneur to entrepreneur, with your boss? blessing, then sell and expand your company? With a disciplined approach to self-care and smart systems at home. Kendra Bracken-Ferguson, entrepreneur and Supermom, has built an extraordinary career while nurturing her creative soul.

Ambitious Moms face a dilemma. The rules for growth at work change just when requirements at home increase. Solutions to outsmart the wage and achievement gaps elude most women. Why? Work infrastructure doesn’t really favor working Moms. To succeed, despite this, requires mental energy and creativity. Resources most Moms lack. What if self-care, dismissed by most to save time, is the answer to honoring your potential?

Follow the Momentum

“I never considered myself an entrepreneur,” Kendra explained. Although she planned a corporate path, joining a prestigious agency post-college, her passion for social media and ability to commercialize emerging trends led her to entrepreneurship. She said, “At Fleishman Hillard, during a brainstorm in 2002, I was given the opportunity. I said ‘let’s partner with MySpace.’ We created a mobile music studio and it changed my career. I ended up leading the digital consumer team and was on my way to becoming an entrepreneur and just didn’t know it yet!”

Act on the Big Ideas

Kendra’s employer supported her vision. She carved a niche as an intrapreneur, starting small ventures from inside her larger organization. As an early adopter of all-things-social, she noticed a void in the market. Many influencers had near-celebrity status, yet struggled to build businesses. She forged partnerships, that helped aspiring social stars get compensated, while brands engaged in a more relevant way with customers.

Then Go. For. It.

Kendra said, “From there I went to Ralph Lauren, and followed the same intrapreneur track. I was a team of one.” She shared her business concept with a kindred-spirit. Kendra said,  “I texted her, ‘I have an idea to manage bloggers. She said, me too!’ That Monday, I filed for an LLC. That’s how we started Digital Brand Architects.” Kendra was open with her boss about her plans, “I said, I’m going to manage bloggers. David (Lauren) said, ‘Whatever as long as they’re wearing Ralph Lauren.'” I laughed. “There was no business plan nor did we have formal management training, but we were able to connect with bloggers and help them figure out their path to monetization. It was all networking and relationships,” Kendra said.

Trust Your Dream

After a successful run with Digital Brand Architects, Kendra decided she wanted to try her hand at entrepreneurship again and ventured out to start The BrainTrust, a brand building consultancy that she says turned into a bonified social media and digital agency by accident. Eventually her business attracted a corporate suitor, CAA-GBG, Kendra said, “When we started DBA, we had a vision that CAA would acquire us, fast forward and it happened.” Amazing! She added, “At that point, it was about actualizing our dream!”

Enlist Your Partner at Home

Like most couples, Kendra and her husband didn’t plan in advance how they’d share household responsibilities post-baby. She said, “It was more natural. We never talked about if I was going to work. I’m happy with my job and he’s happy with his job. If we both had 9 to 5 jobs, we wouldn’t have as good a marriage.” Kendra admitted, however, when she felt overloaded she spoke up, “I had to make him aware of what I needed support with because I am so used to doing so much and running on all cylinders. Having a child does change your bandwidth and it’s about asking for help when you need it. My mom said, ‘if something is bothering you, say something.'” Amen! She added, “9 times out of 10, he didn’t know it was an issue.”

Be Flexible When Your Needs Change

Kendra said, “We had an amazing nanny and made a pact, that when my daughter went to pre-school, she would go to nursing school. We tried another nanny and she was just overloaded with walking the dog, running errands, etc. I still needed someone and tried to figure out what I really needed. I went from a full-time nanny to a family assistant, someone who can help coordinate the dog walker, schedule my daughter’s appointments and handle pickup and drop off.” Brilliant! Kendra’s an early riser and her husband’s a night-owl. When she felt exhausted by the evening routine, she suggested a more equitable approach, “I need your help, we need to divide the days. I get up at 5:30 am and do the morning routine and now he takes nights.” Kendra said, “We support and celebrate each other and we have a child together and celebrate her.” Beautiful!

Make Self-Care A Daily Habit

Predictably, I wanted to know HOW she does self-care. Specifically. Kendra said, “I have to work out 5 days a week. I have to meditate. I have to go to church. I don’t even put music on while I work out I make space to listen.” There are countless studies on the power of mindfulness and meditative techniques to support creativity and resilience. Kendra’s self-care habits — intentional quiet time, prayer and exercise — inspire fresh ideas that fuel her success. She said, “I’m very protective of early mornings. I converted a piece of my garage into a workout space. It was too hard, especially when my husband was traveling, if I had to leave (to workout) and that’s important to me.”

Set Smart Boundaries

Maintaining healthy boundaries is hard for Moms, but Kendra is learning when to say no and reprioritize. She said, “This week I talked to 4 people in need of advice, and I realized, I can’t do that anymore this week. I have clients, a team, a family and need to make sure I am saving time for the fundamentals in my day!”

She also takes a strategic approach to keeping her network fresh. She said, “When I left DBA (the company she co-founded) I knew I needed smart people around me, that I trust.” She organizes her list each month: allies, partners, trustworthy, not trustworthy but important, then develops an outreach plan. She’s also learned to set healthy boundaries at home. “Sometimes my daughter says, ‘Mommy stay with me don’t go work out today’ I say, I have to sweetie, Mommy will be back in 45 minutes,” Kendra said. Even when they don’t understand it, our kids benefit when we model healthy behavior.

Choose Your Own Adventure and Make Time for Play

I met Kendra, her Mother and daughter, after she moderated a panel at the BlogHer Summit. “I take my child everywhere.” She said. I nodded, having traveled extensively for work with my oldest. She also recharges by taking short breaks. “I texted (my husband) that me, my Mom and daughter wanted to spend a few days in the Dominican Republic, do you mind? I knew that he was busy and wouldn’t say no,” Kendra said. She also prioritizes dedicated couple-time. She said, “Our daughter spends nights with her grandparents sometimes. We just got back from a trip for a few days by ourselves.” Amazing!

In a culture that reduces self-care to the occasional spa treatment, it’s hard to prioritize meaningful, restorative routines. However, strong self-care habits, can help you tap that inner spring of creativity needed to reach your dreams!

Many thanks to the talented Kendra Bracken-Ferguson!

Follow Kendra’s great adventure on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram.

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About Kendra

Kendra Bracken-Ferguson is the CEO of Carmell Corporation (NASDAQ:CTCX). She is the Founder and CEO Emeritus of BrainTrust which encompasses BrainTrust Agency, a digital marketing and brand development consultancy, BrainTrust Founders Studio, the largest membership based platform for inclusive founders in beauty and wellness and BrainTrust Fund I, a traditional venture fund. Kendra has the distinction of being one of the first 100 Black women to have raised over $1M in investment for her first company.  She is a transformative brand builder, visionary leader and a proven secret ingredient in guiding and monetizing more than 200 influencer-driven brands which have collectively generated more than $100M in revenue.

While her career has spanned brand development, strategic partnerships, and C-suite leadership, Kendra is a pioneer in the digital media space. She has spent her career focused on building data-first lifestyle, beauty, and wellness businesses which have given her a unique understanding of what it takes to engage and convert communities into consumers. She has continued building revenue-generating brand partnerships ever since 2003 when she launched the first mobile music studio licensing and revenue share deal between Myspace, Cingular Wireless, and unsigned music brands.

Before embarking on her entrepreneurial journey, Kendra was a member of fashion designer Ralph Lauren’s team, responsible for helping to establish the brand’s social media footprint as the company’s first Director of Digital Media.   Previously, she honed her digital media expertise at Fleishman Hillard, where as Vice President of Digital, she led the digital consumer team and advised brands such as AT&T, P&G, Reebok, and Mary Kay on their social media strategies.

In 2010, Kendra took a leap of faith, guided by her mantra, “Carpe Diem,” and created Digital Brand Architects (DBA) alongside Karen Robinovitz.  DBA was the first American blogger management company that eventually grew into a global powerhouse.  By 2019, when DBA was bought by management firm UTA, it had achieved a collective reach of 200 million viewers.

After exiting DBA, Kendra founded BrainTrust, from which BrainTrust Founders Studio and BrainTrust Fund 1 were born. BrainTrust is a brand development and social media agency that drives brand strategy and online media presence for talent and global brands.  Clients have included Kelly Ripa Home, Dear Drew by Drew Barrymore, Revelations Entertainment by Morgan Freeman, Sally Beauty Company, Cantu Beauty, Under Armour, and many others.

Kendra has served as a mentor to numerous entrepreneurs throughout her career. She believes that two brains are always better than one, and more can be accomplished together than alone.  She has endowed a Communications scholarship at her alma mater, Purdue University, for a Black female freshman student to help increase the number of Black students at the university.  She is a co-founder of BeautyUnited, a non-profit focused on diversifying the beauty and wellness industry, and sits on the board of Blushington, G&B, and Cayton Children’s Museum.  She is a member of DealMakeHers and Female Founders Collective.  She is also the host of Business and the Beat, a beauty and wellness podcast focused on diversifying the beauty and wellness industry highlighting multicultural Founders and senior executives, available on Apple, Pandora, and Spotify

Her list of awards and accolades is ever-growing.  She was named as one of Essence Magazine’s “17 Inspiring Black Executives Redefining the Face of Beauty” in 2020.  In 2021, she was named to the Glossy 50:  The Collective that Shaped the Beauty and Fashion Industry; named to Ulta Beauty’s MUSE 100: A Celebration of 100 Inspirational Black Voices Making Beauty in Our World Possible; and was included in LA Style’s Most Influential List.

Kendra happily resides in Las Vegas with her husband, daughter, an English bulldog, and turtle.