We are excited to have Mindee Peterson on the podcast!
Mindee Peterson is a dynamic sales leader with over 20 years of experience turning challenges into opportunities. She’s got a gift for building unstoppable teams and ramping up sales strategies that deliver big. Data is her secret weapon, and she knows how to spin it into strategic gold. With a track record of success across industries like EdTech, Medical Devices, Manufacturing, and Banking, Mindee is a results-driven powerhouse who gets things done with style and impact!
As Sales Manager at Mytech Partners, Mindee brings her energy and expertise to a company focused on making IT easy. Mytech helps small to medium-sized businesses with a proven IT strategy that boosts productivity by 4x. Mindee thrives in this collaborative environment, aligning tech strategies with business goals to drive real, measurable results.
Outside the office, Mindee’s hustle doesn’t slow down. She’s an ambassador for the HOW Conference and Working with Women at the Metro North Chamber, a dedicated youth coordinator and a proud member of the VFW Auxiliary. When not at work, you’ll find her out on the water—fishing, hunting, water skiing, or boating with her husband and two kids.
With her sharp mind, quick wit, and unstoppable drive, Mindee Peterson is a force to be reckoned with—both in business and life! Learn more about your ad choices.
Resources:
Meet Mindee on LinkedIn
Transcript
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John Simon 0:06
Welcome to Simon Says, inspire a podcast about life, leadership and building legacies. I'm John Simon, SR and I'm Dina Simon. Our guest today is Mindee Peterson. Mindee is currently serving as sales manager at My Tech Partners. Thank you for having me. I'm honored. Well, we're glad to have you. Why don't you take a few minutes Mindee, and kind of tell our listening audience a little bit about yourself, where you live and maybe what you'd like to do in your spare time every once in a while?
Absolutely
Mindee Peterson 0:37
Absolutely So my name is Mindee Peterson, and I live in the north Metro in Blaine, Minnesota. Grew up in a small town called Bram, Minnesota, and met my husband there. We are high school sweethearts, and we live in Blaine. We have two children. I have a daughter currently attending Concordia, Saint Paul and an eighth grade boy. So he is 14, growing up in a small town out on a lake. My hobbies are all the things you do on a lake. So I love to fish and ski, and we have hunting property up in Nashwa. So we're big hunters. So real outdoorsy is what would describe me right now, though, with two children, those have kind of been put on on pause. They are in sports, so everything's just kind of sitting and waiting for us to pick up once, once the sports seasons end.
Dina Simon 1:33
And John the Concordia College is very close to Hamlin University, which is where my nephew, Jake John's grandson, Jake, went to college. So he he knows that area.
Mindee Peterson 1:47
And well, my husband is a graduate from Hamline University. He went there and played football for four years. Nice. I love that area.
I
John Simon 1:56
I understand they refer to him as Harvard in the Midwest, due they? I've heard that. Yeah, as a little bit of a joke.
Dina Simon 2:03
So your husband played football for Hamlin fun. And have you guys lived in the Twin Cities and like surrounding area, pretty much your whole life, correct?
Mindee Peterson 2:13
Yep. So once we went to college, he moved to the cities, and I actually went up to Virginia, Minnesota and played volleyball on the range, and that was a whole new experience. So we were worlds apart, is what it felt like. So I was up there for a year, decided that wasn't for me, and actually came home, took the rest of the year off from school, and saved a ton of money to come and live in the Cities and and go to school. So, then I moved to the White Bear area and worked at Applebee's in Maplewood, which was quite an experience. Yes, yep, I think you have to experience waitressing as in college, right? Yes, I agree. Lots of things to learn. Just met some of the coolest people. And you, you figure it out, right?
Dina Simon 3:05
Yes, I met some pretty cool waitressing, right?
John Simon 3:09
Yeah, Dina can tell you a really good story about that, yeah.
Mindee Peterson 3:13
Does she possibly meet her husband?
Dina Simon 3:16
Well, I in a in a roundabout way, yes. So I me and my roommates in college, we worked at the Chili's in Madison.
So, so, almost like a sister to Applebees right? Like, similar, yeah. So, waitressed at the Chili's, and it was close to Associates Leasing, which is where John was the president of the company, and got to know a lot of the executives would come in, you know, for lunch and whatever. So, that is when the HR person said, hey, you know, we've got a role you should apply for. And I did. And, so that's how I eventually met Rich, John's son. Wow, that is, it is amazing the things, yeah, that's so cool. Yeah, they know that about you. Yes. In Madison, it's really amazing how things work out.
Mindee Peterson 4:08
Sometime it does it, and it's fun to talk about when you get older, and you can share those stories, and, you know, yeah, they smile. And I'm sure there's a lot of hardship in between that right it's not all we're all smiling and all happy because we're, you know, through that. But right, yeah, you know, so nearing marrying your high school sweetheart?
Yeah, yes. Well, it's really funny. We we say we took the long road to getting married. We dated in high school. We got married, and we started our family like I said, we were worlds apart. I was way up in Virginia, Minnesota. He was playing football at Hamlin. I came home, moved to the cities, and just kind of was like, I'm not ready for this serious relationship. So we ended it, and I ended it, and it's still a funny story in our family, but we actually went our separate ways and dated other people. Seriously. And when I was in the cities, I was working at Applebee's. I had finished my two year degree at Century, and I wanted to transfer to St Thomas. And when I don't know what I was doing, but when I went to transfer, they were like, none of these will transfer to St Thomas. You're basically gonna start out from zero. And being that I paid for college on my own, I don't want to start over, and I don't, it's expensive. So like, what's your next best option for me? Counselor here at Century, and she's like, St Cloud State will take all of these credits. You're going to be a business it's a great business school. What do you think? So I packed my bags and moved to St Cloud with a waitress from Applebee's. Yes, just went there, transferred Applebee. Is a whole new experience from different Applebee's, but went up to Saint Cloud and just kind of did my thing and got to know myself. And I needed it. I needed that break. And my husband, it's funny because there's no cell phones back then, I was heading home for Christmas break, and I forgot a pair of shoes in my apartment. So I came back in and my phone was ringing, and it was my then husband. He's like, Hey, I'm going to be in Bram for the weekend. Just wondering if you're going to be home. I'd love to reconnect. It's been a couple years, and we did. We met that night at the grumpy minnow up on West rush Lake, and it wasn't the grumpy middle then, but that's what, what's there now and and we never have been separated since we got married. Two years later, nice. Moved to the cities. We bought our house in Blaine. I did not see my house when we bought it. He was a mortgage broker at the time, and he's like, Hey, one of my friends is selling. They're willing to easily get us in this house. I'm like, Sure, why not? And we've lived there ever since. So it's almost 20 years. It's really good. So, yeah, great story too. Yeah, it is. It's really, it is really special. Because I think when you when you break up with somebody, and then you realize, like, Oops, I shouldn't have done that. Like, that was a real heartbreaking time in my life, like trying to, like, work through that, because he actually he's gonna die when I say this, but he actually was engaged to be married, so he had to figure that out. And they did, and it all worked out for the best, but it was, like, it was hard for a little bit there, yeah, navigate that absolutely but everything does happen for a reason.
Dina Simon 7:22
And if you had walked back in to get those shoes exactly right away, it's the phone call you might have connected anyway, but you would have missed that for that initial call Exactly, yeah, so it was and just so many things.
Mindee Peterson 7:34
So you're right, it's crazy how all that stuff happens for a reason, so, but I think that I needed that space for myself to struggle through, and he kind of understands that, but understands it, but I needed that time to really just figure out what I'm doing and get my college degree, because I was literally waitressing to save money to pay for a semester of college, to take a semester off, to pay for a semester of college, and by the time I got to St Cloud, I was really focused, like, I need to get this done. I don't want to be I love the waitressing world, but I need to be done and I need to move on. I want to have a career. Yeah, nine to five, so I did got it done nine years later. I should be a doctor. I joke about it all the time. You know, I totally didn't take that non I took a very non traditional route to college, yeah, versus my husband, who was straight four years, went in for four, played football, lived what everybody thinks college is. I was completely the opposite, and I appreciated it for many reasons. Yeah, right. We all have our own path exactly.
Dina Simon 8:42
So then you left college, tell us a little bit then about your career from there.
Mindee Peterson 8:46
So I left college and I got a job with Franzen Corporation. I'm not sure if you're familiar with that at all, but Dennis Franzen actually grew up in rush city, which is a town right next door to Bram and when I got the job, he's an amazing human, just such a good person, such a good first job to have. But I started my first day at Franzen Corporation, and he was he was older, but he walked in and he looked at me, and he said, I know you. And I'm like, how? And he's like, You've waited on me at the grand house because I was a waitress in high school too, and that's a little cafe. So I got a job there family owned and just did you know I was a technical assistant, and my boss was the HR director, Dina sincere HR, but she introduced me to pivot tables at a very young age and how to analyze data. And it was such a gift, because I had no idea what that meant or what it did, but I learned how to manipulate data and put data into reports. And I worked there for about a year and a half, and I moved to a company called artistic finishes. They do floor moldings, and that, that was just the most amazing experience, because it was a small company. I got to do sales. I got to do more. Marketing. I got to do product development anywhere they needed me. I was willing to do it. And because I had that data analytic background and I knew how to look at processes, I just could do really anything I wanted to do there. So really thankful for them. I think that's the longest company I worked for was artistic finishes. They still exist there in Roseville. I'm also family owned. I moved on, yeah, moved on from that role, went to med device, which is a completely different pace. It was a startup. So different pace, different feel. Learned some things there. I started managing teams at a very young age. It's funny. I look back now and go, Oh my gosh, I can't believe some of the things I did, right? Like I was 28 years old, managing a team of six people that were basically my age, but tons of stuff did. Med device got to see companies merge and, you know, be acquired, and how you worked through that, but learn to manage some teams.
From there, gosh, I've been all over that. From there, I moved to Penn tear. I'm sure everybody's familiar with pen tear they needed someone to build, not build their sales department. But a lot of times, back in the day, when I was, you know, 10 - 15, years ago, sales reports were managed on the finance team, and finance looking at sales numbers. It's just a different animal. And a lot of companies were looking for someone to come in and do sales analytics, sales reporting, managing the commissions, looking at numbers at a different level from a sales perspective. So I would go in, same with the med device company. I came in and basically built the sales upside of the of the company to be able to report to the VP of sales, the CRM stats, the you know, year over year, all the good things that you do, that you need from a from a sales perspective. So when it depends, here took over managing the commission side of things. So I was responsible for the enclosure piece, where they needed someone to track emissions for their hundreds of reps and billions of dollars. And just learned a lot of good things there, because I said under the finance department. So I remember, I won't say his name, but he was, he was great. He was so particular that when I would submit a report, if my column headings weren't the same width and length, he wouldn't publish it. And that was like, at the time, I was like, my goodness, like, huh, but what a great lesson learned. Like to be detailed in that specific so that's kind of my funny story at Pentair.
From there, I moved to an ed tech company where I was a senior financial analyst. Again, I worked on the finance team, managing sales numbers, sales reports. And that one was crazy too. They were private equity. They were owned by a private equity firm, which, again, is a whole other field, then publicly traded, like Pentair and family owned, and they loved me, but they told me I talked too much, and I'm like, Well, that's because I'm sales so, like, when I left, they were like, We're gonna miss you, but we won't miss your talking, you know, in a fun way, right? Yeah, but I actually was recruited out of Edmentum to go run a small Director of Sales Operations company, startup in New Jersey, $2 million the one of my old bosses from the med device world called me up. She's like, Hey, we're trying to build this piece of the company. They did rapid testing for blood clotting, and they were trying to get a division up. And again, just like another great experience, because I was remotely working with people in New Jersey. And I don't know if you've been to the east coast, but we are different. We are so different from east coasters. They're very direct. And I'm I'm not, but again, just like a great experience like building a building a department from scratch, there was no metrics, or metrics were sitting in some software online that I had to grab and figure out how to build those departments and help the sales team. And flew around with her. I've traveled a lot, and really grateful for that. But that job, I traveled a lot going on trying to teach salespeople how to sell our products Nice. So yeah, and then, how did you end up at my tech? At my tech. I got laid off from that that job I went to source, well, and source Well, I knew I wanted to be, I was ready to be in management, like I had done all the things. And I applied for the job here at my tech, and I had no business applying for it. I was up against several people with tons of sales manager experiences. And I talk about this company all the time. I absolutely love my tech. They have best culture of all the companies I've worked for. They they really hone in on their values. I got hired at my tech because in the interviewing process, one of his questions, he had one question he was looking for out of a whole time. And the question was, how are you going to work alongside people you're managing that know more than you and have more experience because of a lot of our reps are senior. They've been here for 10 to 12 years, and I was the only person that answered. I'd have to learn from them, and I That's why I got hired nice so I beat out like I am. It's a very.
Heavily male populated. You know, sales is very male populated, which is fine, so I think I beat out some very experienced men. So I'm proud of that, if you can say that or not, but yeah, so lots of learning experience here, and it's just been a great experience. Tell us a little bit about what my tech does, yeah, yeah. So my tech is, I'm going to give you my short like 32nd pitch. My Tech is a it, consulting firm and managed service provider. And what we do is we make it easy for our clients. We come in and we develop a strategic it plan that is basically going to help small and mid sized businesses be more productive and make more money. And we take the heavy lift off of owners or people that are trying to run these businesses that have all these things to do. We come in and we lift that it piece off. We were planful. We're proactive, where we do budgets so that we can help them be more prepared for what's coming up when it comes to be technology, because we want them to focus on what they're meant to do, and that's serving their client. And you know how it is with it, like coming in, like someone needs a password reset, someone's computer is not starting, the network's down, the internet's broken, the phone's not working. So we come in and we we take care of all that.
Dina Simon 16:14
Yes, I know that painfully well, because the day I have a computer issue. So yeah, I have much appreciation for the amazing services that you provide, and I've had a chance of being in at my tech and hearing from one of the founders and all of that. So I do know that you have found just this beautiful company culture and so love that you were afforded the opportunity that you aced the interview, that you got in the fight you're in. I think that's so awesome.
Mindee Peterson 16:47
Yes, I Yes, you have been here. Yeah, I tell it to the owners all the time. I'm like, I have worked for a lot of different companies, and they're all good. I don't have anything bad to say about any of them, but this one truly lives and raised by their values. And you'll hear, you heard this here, Dina, when, when Nate, but one of the co founders was on, they're not perfect, like you're not going to come here, and we're just this perfect company that runs perfectly. It's just that they have set up some bumpers with our values that we can we can live in the managers and the people that worker can live within these bumpers. So we're not constantly going, how do we do this? We know what to do, as long as we're living within our values. Love that sounds for empowering, right? It's very, it's very empowering. And they'll say, you know, you'll never get in trouble as long as if you've done something and it's aligned to our values. We understand that. So it's pretty cool. Yeah, they also do fun stuff too, where, if you can list all 12 values, because we have 12 of them. Like it's, I don't know if they do anymore, but one of the co founders walks around with $100 bills in his pocket. So if you go up to him and find him, and you can say, our 12 values, there's money involved. Nice. And as a sales leader out in the field, I used to do that. When I'd go into offices, I would say it was similar, but I would say, Do you know, like, what the top three goals of your office are, yeah, this, this quarter or whatever, because there was always sales goals and things. So I love that. That's awesome. It is That's old school, yeah, yeah, yeah.
John Simon 18:11
People don't do that much today.
Yeah,
Mindee Peterson 18:13
Yeah, it's good if we we do have a annual banquet, and during that banquet, anybody can stand up, including a spouse, and say those values, and there's money involved, and a spouse that like killed it this year, just rattled them off, made us all look bad, nice. That's so awesome, but that's a way to keep them alive, right? I think it's one thing.
Dina Simon 18:36
As you said, you've worked for some really great companies, and so it's one thing to have values on your website and on your wall, but if you can't see them, feel them as a living organism throughout your company, you know that that's where the magic is. I agree. Yeah, agree.
John Simon 18:51
And it's great to get the spouses involved in it. Also, because we had a we had a program where I worked in Dina, worked at the associates called cop achievers. And whenever we started the program every year, the package of information went to the house for the spouse to see. And it really it brought them into it also. And because the trip might be a trip to Ireland or a trip to Italy, we did one time. And, you know, yeah, and it's funny how when the spouse gets involved in it, they don't mind when you work a little bit of extra hours, or you're working overtime, and it it paid off. I agree. I agree. And work can be hard sometimes, especially in the IT space, there's always something going on. So it's always fast paced, always stressful. So I agree. I'm gonna, I'm gonna bring up that to my owners, Italy. What did we say, Ireland? I think we need to Italy. Well, yeah, I think, I think we initially started the first time we did it, it was a trip to Napa, and, you know, we would do it like Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
Sunday type thing. I started off with four, like four days, and then every year it got a little bit better. But the goal was, is to not only retain the employees, but to increase the number of people to get to go, because you would have a sales objective, and you had to, you had to get a certain percentage of new customers, plus growth from existing customers, because a lot of time that gets forgotten about. And the goal that we had, we had a pretty mature business that we had. We wanted to grow 15% a year. And how do you do that? Then 10% of it would come from existing clients and maybe 5% come from new clients. If you do that about every four and a half years, you double the size of your company.
Mindee Peterson 20:48
I like it, John, you're hired. I have openings right now.
Dina Simon 20:53
So we talked a little bit about your life, and then on leadership. So you've had some really great leaders throughout Would you talk just a moment for you know yourself, what you feel you bring as a leader or leaders that are brought to you? What does you know good or great leadership look like to you?
Mindee Peterson 21:12
I think good or great leadership couple things I am, I would say energy, positivity, coming to work and being with someone who wants to be there, and being passionate. Being passionate and coming to work and ready to work is very important. I think that's what I bring to the table. I think also being a good listener is a huge that's one thing. I think when I look back first time I was a manager, I didn't do well. I think you learn that as you go just really listening, being curious, number two, and then just being trustworthy. You have to be able to trust the people you work with, especially the people you report to. So that are the three things that I want to bring and be really good at in this role, and just developing talent. I think when I first started out as a leader, I thought it was to know everything. I think that's what everybody thinks like. I have to be good at everything so I can tell everybody what to do. And that's not true, right? My job here is to bring in talent and grow talent and develop talent. And sounds so easy. It's not the easiest thing to do, but that's, that's what my job is here, and it's awesome. All right, yeah,
Dina Simon 22:18
really good, huh? But that's what you even in your interview, you know, right? You don't have to be the smartest person in the room. You want really smart people around you as a leader, you know, making sure that you're getting people focused on the right things. You're removing obstacles and all of that. Yeah, yeah,
Mindee Peterson 22:36
correct. It's really especially in sales, as a woman. In sales, it's an ego check. I have to check my ego at the door every day, because I'm not when it comes to the sales aspect, I'm not I have people that have been here for 10-15, years. I don't have to be the smartest person in the room. I just need to get them in the right spot and remove barriers when, when we need them.
Dina Simon 22:56
And so life leadership and building legacies. So we say building legacies is not what you you know leave behind that it certainly is part of legacy, but really, legacies is what you're doing on a day to day basis. And so talk to us a little bit about thoughts on how you're building and living out your legacy.
Mindee Peterson 23:14
Legacy right now, for me, is knowing my values, knowing my worth, setting great examples for my daughter, especially in my son, healthiness and marriage, and doing things that fill my cup. So I'm super involved in the community. Do a lot of things with my my kids' sports, the board. I'm on a baseball board. Support a nonprofit giving back to that. I'm a youth coordinator. Those are things that are, I guess, are important to me, just getting up every day and being happy, and things are going to happen and they're not great. Life sucks sometimes, and you just got to choose to be happy. So that, I think, is kind of my legacy right now, and it's taken me a long time. I'm 47 years old. I don't care. I'm going to say it on your podcast, but I haven't done that ever. I've just been like, busy, like, you get married, you have kids, you go to college, you're, you know, grinding through a job, and my daughter went to college last year, and I feel like I shed a layer, and a new person has, as a has came about, like a butterfly. It's, it's the weirdest thing, but it just it. That's what did it for me. And I don't know if it's because I had time or just because life changed and I didn't want to be the empty nester or the person that was so sad that she went to college, because it's not, it's a happy thing. So I think, like, I don't know. So that's where my legacy is, that right now, I'm just trying to navigate this next piece and be happy and love life and do the best I can.
John Simon 24:44
Does your daughter have your personality? To a
Mindee Peterson 24:48
T so it's like, when I've watched her going through some of the things that she struggles with, it's like, I'm trying to help her, but sometimes that mother daughter advice is more of annoyance to her. Than helpful, but I'm hoping it sinks. And she's playing at a d2 college right now, and the amount of pressure, like, you forget, like she's trying to do softball, she's having all these hard courses, and she's just trying to navigate that right now. And I'm hoping I can just be her voice of reason and bring that like, just take a deep breath. But I remember what it was like back when you were 19, just grinding hard.
Dina Simon 25:23
It is hard. You have to allow them some of that leeway just to go. Do they don't really have to listen to us anymore, yeah. And so there is that, that push and pull more so than ever, right? Yeah, yeah, agree. And
Mindee Peterson 25:38
it's like the funnest thing to watch them go and grow. And if you can have that, like, that's, that's the attitude I have, like, go and learn, go and do. And she's like, you know, thinking about, like, if I get out of college, what if I just went down to Florida for a year and, like, waitress and live on the beach? And I'm like, do it, because you'll never do it again. You'll never do it when you're my age, because that's maybe not responsible, but I'm like, go do it. But she's pretty focused. And I've got this little eighth grader who I've never had brothers. I don't get boys, and he's just the funnest thing to watch. To where, at first, I was like, I don't know what I'm doing with him. I don't know if people feel that way too, but I hope it's good. But he's, he's, he's another one where it's gonna be fun watching that one go through life,
Dina Simon 26:22
and what a fun age, too, right? So your daughter's at college. She's not super far away, so you are able to go to games and still be engaged and involved, but she's far enough away that you're not seeing her on a daily basis. But now also with your son, you know, going into high school next year, and you'll get those four years of him, you know, experiencing all that time with him, which is awesome.
Mindee Peterson 26:43
Yep, I do we like to say, my husband and I like to say, it's like we have two only children because of that gap, there's such a big gap. There's a five year gap between them. And he has unfortunately been drug to so many softball tournaments. But, I mean, our tournaments were across the country, so he just, he doesn't even know that he was drug because it was always somewhere fun with a pool or something we were doing. So it's going to be fun watching this one go through, because he's different. He has a totally different idea of where he wants to go and what he wants to be so nice.
Dina Simon 27:14
So you talked about how, you know, it's been, you know, however, months that you shed the skin and you're stepping into your own understanding who you are, you know, at this stage of your life. So I met you around that time, so that's super fun. But what are some of the things that, what are some of the things that you've done to try and understand like to step into that power and who you are? And yes,
Mindee Peterson 27:41
so the the journey started when my daughter was in July, right before she was supposed to go to college last year, and we had a leadership call. And my my general manager had a leadership moment. We have leadership moments once a week where he shares some leadership thing and it's cool. And his was, what are your values? And I was sitting there looking around like, I don't I don't know who my values are, and no one spoke up. And finally, I'm like, I don't know my values. I'll be honest. And I was terrified. I was like, Why did I say that? Like, why would I admit to that? And I was like, No, I'm gonna figure this out. So I started just Googling, researching what are, how do I figure out what my values are? And I knew of Wired, I knew of the Collaborative. And I'm like, You know what? I'm just gonna do this. I'm gonna see what this is all about. I'm gonna try it. And I joined this collaborative of 12 wonderful women. It's the women you want to be around. I got lucky. I don't know if other collaboratives exist like this. I always think ours is the best, but I'm sure they're all wonderful. But to meet a group of 12 women, and I know you know this, Dina is a woman going through career, you don't know who you can trust, and especially being in the sales world, you don't know man or woman. It's just cutthroat trying to get your way through a career. And I've just had not had the greatest experiences, and I've met a group of women who cheer me on, who aren't jealous, who are trying to cut me down. They're just women that want you to succeed, and that really has catapulted me into this. I don't even know who I am. That's what I like to say. But I'm doing the collaborative and I wanted to do this podcast that you so graciously let me do. I started a networking event of women only, and Dina is my next special guest, which I'm very excited about. I hired a coach, a personal coach, to help me get through some of the doubts I've been having. I'm gonna say her name, Kelly Jenner Byrne. I don't know if you've heard of her, but she's also I've invested really heavily in myself this year to figure this out, and book reading, journaling, attending networking events, where I have to go meet people and learn about them. So those are the things I'm doing. I want to start a podcast. That's another thing I'm doing. I'm gonna start that with my girlfriend, so we're gonna get that going. And I think I'm gonna start one with my son as well. He's a little eighth grader that loves to talk sports. So I'm like, let's talk sports. Fun. He's just a metrics, little driven thing. So these are all the things I want to do, and I know I can't do them all at once, so I think I looked it up. I'm like I used to. I never used to talk about my accomplishments because I thought it was arrogance. And that is not true. No, that is not you can be proud of your accomplishments, and I've just come a long way, baby, I like what I like to say, Come along, baby, in a short amount of time. So
I really liked one quote that I I read in your bio about you getting things done with style and impact. And not everybody can do that. Yeah,
yep, we do. I am a different kind of energy. I would like to say I I'm pretty transparent. I show up in ways where people are like, I can't believe she said that. And I'm usually in heels, so I'm probably gonna need surgery, is what I like to say. I'm always in heels. It's gonna be bad. But, yep. But
Dina Simon 30:49
style and impact and the impact too, like, you the cool part? Well, there's many cool parts, but like the numbers driven, like the data driven, that doesn't come natural to everybody, and so for you to have that analytical but then also the other side, you know, the creative failure is really yellow. It's a really cool mix.
Mindee Peterson 31:08
It is, and it was probably the most beneficial when I actually, I knew my goal is to be a VP of Sales someday. What I think so far, I'm still on that track. So if you look at my resume, when I was 25 I looked it up, like, how do I get to be a VP of sales? And it, like said, all these job descriptions, and I've basically done them all. The one thing I hadn't done was actually be in the field selling. I was always supporting a rep. I was always doing all those kind of things. So when I was at Sourcewell, I told the person that was hiring me, I'm like, That's my goal here. I need to be in the field. And she knew it, and gave me that shot, and handed me over a territory, and I managed, managed, and that analytical piece was huge, because you can grab data really quickly, and a lot of reps don't have that piece where I could look, see, where I could go, find opportunity. Nice.
John Simon 31:58
It's funny. It's funny. You say that because at Associates at one point, I became senior vice president of sales, and I never sold anything to anyone, but it happened, and it was just because of the circumstance that it happened. But the one thing I used to tell the salespeople, I said, hope is not a strategy. You better have a plan. Yes,
Mindee Peterson 32:18
yes, I would have to agree with that, yes, me
Dina Simon 32:22
as well, only because I I've known John since my early 20s, so hope is not a strategy, and I know that well exactly. So Mindy as you were prepping to be on our podcast. Is there any other topics or things that you wanted to talk through for our listeners? No, I just
Mindee Peterson 32:39
I like I said, I'm appreciative, and I'm your perfect example of if you don't think you can do it, you can. I've taken every non traditional route to do something, and I've survived it so you can do it. It's just mindset, and I've learned it a lot. It's
Dina Simon 32:56
just mindset and and tenacity. I mean, look at how hard you worked putting yourself through college and and all of that, and all those smart decisions. And it sounds too like you've had some really cool people, even the counselor for to talk about, where are you going to go to college, that your stuff is going to transfer? Yeah? Yeah,
Mindee Peterson 33:17
yeah. It is it, you know. And I'm a huge believer in everything happens for a reason, and it's always good. So you just, I tell my kids that all the time, like always, is good. It always, there's always a reason for it. You got to figure it out. Gotta figure it out fast
John Simon 33:31
and and hard - hard work will always lead to success.
Mindee Peterson 33:35
Agree, Agree, Agree. And that server background is it was kind of my foundation. I learned really quick. If you can give customer service and work really hard, you can make money at it and go, go pretty quick,
Dina Simon 33:51
Right? And of the lost art of customer service these days,
Mindee Peterson 33:55
yes, yes. I know. I know you go into places now and you're like, Oh, I just want to help you. I just want to do something. Oh,
John Simon 34:03
there. Yeah. And you keep in mind one thing I used to say, you know, the customer is not always right, but the customer is always the customer, and you have to let them know the right way to do things. Sometimes it's how you go about doing it that makes all the difference in the world. 100%
Mindee Peterson 34:22
yes, yeah. And how you manage that? And boy, you get lots of that bets when you're serving Yes,
Dina Simon 34:29
right? Well, I'm excited about hearing about potentially two new podcasts, and so we're here to help you in any way that we can. So just know that.
Mindee Peterson 34:39
I appreciate it, and I'm very much looking forward for you to being my next guest at my Balancing Love Life and Relationship events that I'm starting, and I think that's going to be really
Dina Simon 34:49
good too. Yes, yeah, so the last one was amazing, and so super excited to be a part of it and to support you as you carry on. And John's going to have a chance to meet some other collective members, because they also have said yes to being on the podcast. And it really is this lovely opportunity. We do have the best collective, I'm not going to lie, and for us, just truly too, just it's a remarkable room of women, and as you said, to lean in and how important that is. So
Mindee Peterson 35:21
it really is. It really is, know your circle and love your circle. That's how I like to
John Simon 35:28
say it, yep. And when you and your son put your podcast together about sports, I would love to get in it, because there's nothing I enjoy more than talking about sport. You know,
Mindee Peterson 35:39
that is so cool. And I'm probably going to take you up on that, because when I pitched it to him, I'm like, hey, what do you like to do? Like Ashland over here, doing all this sports stuff and all these things in college. He's like, Mom, I just I like to talk about sports and hang out with my friends. I'm like, what if, like you and dad, you know, started like talking or bringing grandpa, or bring in somebody that wants to talk, because he's always like, Mom, did you hear so and so got traded and I have zero idea. I don't follow any of that. Or he'll be like, Hey, did you hear what? Like, man, you're in eighth grade. So he he's a numbers he's a numbers guy. So see what he what he's got. But John, I'm writing you down.
John Simon 36:16
Well, I'll tell him the story about when, when Rich and his brother John, were playing little league. I was the I was a commissioner, and plus, I was the manager of the team. And I'll tell the story about how I got thrown out of the game before the game even started. So it's a, it's a, it's a cute story, but he'll enjoy here. He'll enjoy hearing it anyhow. Well, thanks for all your time today. I thought that what a great conversation we had.
Mindee Peterson 36:47
Thank you like it was so fun. I love it.
Dina Simon 36:50
Thank you for your friendship, for being part of the collective and for being on our podcast, but just the people that get to work with you and around you are so lucky to have you, and it will be exciting to see what you do in these next few years as we stay stay very much connected. So thank you so much.
Mindee Peterson 37:09
Thank you. Thank you for you to do. This is amazing. Thanks for having me.
Dina Simon 37:13
I'd like to thank Mindee Peterson for being on our podcast. She is a phenomenal business woman, mother, wife, community member, and super proud that she's part of the collective group that I am a part of. And we'll make sure you know how to get in touch with her, and she is launching some really cool networking opportunities for women here in the Twin Cities. So we'll make sure you see in the show notes how to get engaged with her for upcoming events. But just really want to thank her for her time, her passion and her story. And as always, I'd like to thank my father in law, John Simon, for CO hosting with me. And the podcast is a proud member of C suite radio, and until we talk again, you
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Welcome to Simon Says, inspire a podcast about life, leadership and building legacies. I'm John Simon, SR and I'm Dina Simon. Our guest today is Mindee Peterson. Mindee is currently serving as sales manager at My Tech Partners. Thank you for having me. I'm honored. Well, we're glad to have you. Why don't you take a few minutes Mindee, and kind of tell our listening audience a little bit about yourself, where you live and maybe what you'd like to do in your spare time every once in a while?
Absolutely
Mindee Peterson 0:37
Absolutely So my name is Mindee Peterson, and I live in the north Metro in Blaine, Minnesota. Grew up in a small town called Bram, Minnesota, and met my husband there. We are high school sweethearts, and we live in Blaine. We have two children. I have a daughter currently attending Concordia, Saint Paul and an eighth grade boy. So he is 14, growing up in a small town out on a lake. My hobbies are all the things you do on a lake. So I love to fish and ski, and we have hunting property up in Nashwa. So we're big hunters. So real outdoorsy is what would describe me right now, though, with two children, those have kind of been put on on pause. They are in sports, so everything's just kind of sitting and waiting for us to pick up once, once the sports seasons end.
Dina Simon 1:33
And John the Concordia College is very close to Hamlin University, which is where my nephew, Jake John's grandson, Jake, went to college. So he he knows that area.
Mindee Peterson 1:47
And well, my husband is a graduate from Hamline University. He went there and played football for four years. Nice. I love that area.
I
John Simon 1:56
I understand they refer to him as Harvard in the Midwest, due they? I've heard that. Yeah, as a little bit of a joke.
Dina Simon 2:03
So your husband played football for Hamlin fun. And have you guys lived in the Twin Cities and like surrounding area, pretty much your whole life, correct?
Mindee Peterson 2:13
Yep. So once we went to college, he moved to the cities, and I actually went up to Virginia, Minnesota and played volleyball on the range, and that was a whole new experience. So we were worlds apart, is what it felt like. So I was up there for a year, decided that wasn't for me, and actually came home, took the rest of the year off from school, and saved a ton of money to come and live in the Cities and and go to school. So, then I moved to the White Bear area and worked at Applebee's in Maplewood, which was quite an experience. Yes, yep, I think you have to experience waitressing as in college, right? Yes, I agree. Lots of things to learn. Just met some of the coolest people. And you, you figure it out, right?
Dina Simon 3:05
Yes, I met some pretty cool waitressing, right?
John Simon 3:09
Yeah, Dina can tell you a really good story about that, yeah.
Mindee Peterson 3:13
Does she possibly meet her husband?
Dina Simon 3:16
Well, I in a in a roundabout way, yes. So I me and my roommates in college, we worked at the Chili's in Madison.
So, so, almost like a sister to Applebees right? Like, similar, yeah. So, waitressed at the Chili's, and it was close to Associates Leasing, which is where John was the president of the company, and got to know a lot of the executives would come in, you know, for lunch and whatever. So, that is when the HR person said, hey, you know, we've got a role you should apply for. And I did. And, so that's how I eventually met Rich, John's son. Wow, that is, it is amazing the things, yeah, that's so cool. Yeah, they know that about you. Yes. In Madison, it's really amazing how things work out.
Mindee Peterson 4:08
Sometime it does it, and it's fun to talk about when you get older, and you can share those stories, and, you know, yeah, they smile. And I'm sure there's a lot of hardship in between that right it's not all we're all smiling and all happy because we're, you know, through that. But right, yeah, you know, so nearing marrying your high school sweetheart?
Yeah, yes. Well, it's really funny. We we say we took the long road to getting married. We dated in high school. We got married, and we started our family like I said, we were worlds apart. I was way up in Virginia, Minnesota. He was playing football at Hamlin. I came home, moved to the cities, and just kind of was like, I'm not ready for this serious relationship. So we ended it, and I ended it, and it's still a funny story in our family, but we actually went our separate ways and dated other people. Seriously. And when I was in the cities, I was working at Applebee's. I had finished my two year degree at Century, and I wanted to transfer to St Thomas. And when I don't know what I was doing, but when I went to transfer, they were like, none of these will transfer to St Thomas. You're basically gonna start out from zero. And being that I paid for college on my own, I don't want to start over, and I don't, it's expensive. So like, what's your next best option for me? Counselor here at Century, and she's like, St Cloud State will take all of these credits. You're going to be a business it's a great business school. What do you think? So I packed my bags and moved to St Cloud with a waitress from Applebee's. Yes, just went there, transferred Applebee. Is a whole new experience from different Applebee's, but went up to Saint Cloud and just kind of did my thing and got to know myself. And I needed it. I needed that break. And my husband, it's funny because there's no cell phones back then, I was heading home for Christmas break, and I forgot a pair of shoes in my apartment. So I came back in and my phone was ringing, and it was my then husband. He's like, Hey, I'm going to be in Bram for the weekend. Just wondering if you're going to be home. I'd love to reconnect. It's been a couple years, and we did. We met that night at the grumpy minnow up on West rush Lake, and it wasn't the grumpy middle then, but that's what, what's there now and and we never have been separated since we got married. Two years later, nice. Moved to the cities. We bought our house in Blaine. I did not see my house when we bought it. He was a mortgage broker at the time, and he's like, Hey, one of my friends is selling. They're willing to easily get us in this house. I'm like, Sure, why not? And we've lived there ever since. So it's almost 20 years. It's really good. So, yeah, great story too. Yeah, it is. It's really, it is really special. Because I think when you when you break up with somebody, and then you realize, like, Oops, I shouldn't have done that. Like, that was a real heartbreaking time in my life, like trying to, like, work through that, because he actually he's gonna die when I say this, but he actually was engaged to be married, so he had to figure that out. And they did, and it all worked out for the best, but it was, like, it was hard for a little bit there, yeah, navigate that absolutely but everything does happen for a reason.
Dina Simon 7:22
And if you had walked back in to get those shoes exactly right away, it's the phone call you might have connected anyway, but you would have missed that for that initial call Exactly, yeah, so it was and just so many things.
Mindee Peterson 7:34
So you're right, it's crazy how all that stuff happens for a reason, so, but I think that I needed that space for myself to struggle through, and he kind of understands that, but understands it, but I needed that time to really just figure out what I'm doing and get my college degree, because I was literally waitressing to save money to pay for a semester of college, to take a semester off, to pay for a semester of college, and by the time I got to St Cloud, I was really focused, like, I need to get this done. I don't want to be I love the waitressing world, but I need to be done and I need to move on. I want to have a career. Yeah, nine to five, so I did got it done nine years later. I should be a doctor. I joke about it all the time. You know, I totally didn't take that non I took a very non traditional route to college, yeah, versus my husband, who was straight four years, went in for four, played football, lived what everybody thinks college is. I was completely the opposite, and I appreciated it for many reasons. Yeah, right. We all have our own path exactly.
Dina Simon 8:42
So then you left college, tell us a little bit then about your career from there.
Mindee Peterson 8:46
So I left college and I got a job with Franzen Corporation. I'm not sure if you're familiar with that at all, but Dennis Franzen actually grew up in rush city, which is a town right next door to Bram and when I got the job, he's an amazing human, just such a good person, such a good first job to have. But I started my first day at Franzen Corporation, and he was he was older, but he walked in and he looked at me, and he said, I know you. And I'm like, how? And he's like, You've waited on me at the grand house because I was a waitress in high school too, and that's a little cafe. So I got a job there family owned and just did you know I was a technical assistant, and my boss was the HR director, Dina sincere HR, but she introduced me to pivot tables at a very young age and how to analyze data. And it was such a gift, because I had no idea what that meant or what it did, but I learned how to manipulate data and put data into reports. And I worked there for about a year and a half, and I moved to a company called artistic finishes. They do floor moldings, and that, that was just the most amazing experience, because it was a small company. I got to do sales. I got to do more. Marketing. I got to do product development anywhere they needed me. I was willing to do it. And because I had that data analytic background and I knew how to look at processes, I just could do really anything I wanted to do there. So really thankful for them. I think that's the longest company I worked for was artistic finishes. They still exist there in Roseville. I'm also family owned. I moved on, yeah, moved on from that role, went to med device, which is a completely different pace. It was a startup. So different pace, different feel. Learned some things there. I started managing teams at a very young age. It's funny. I look back now and go, Oh my gosh, I can't believe some of the things I did, right? Like I was 28 years old, managing a team of six people that were basically my age, but tons of stuff did. Med device got to see companies merge and, you know, be acquired, and how you worked through that, but learn to manage some teams.
From there, gosh, I've been all over that. From there, I moved to Penn tear. I'm sure everybody's familiar with pen tear they needed someone to build, not build their sales department. But a lot of times, back in the day, when I was, you know, 10 - 15, years ago, sales reports were managed on the finance team, and finance looking at sales numbers. It's just a different animal. And a lot of companies were looking for someone to come in and do sales analytics, sales reporting, managing the commissions, looking at numbers at a different level from a sales perspective. So I would go in, same with the med device company. I came in and basically built the sales upside of the of the company to be able to report to the VP of sales, the CRM stats, the you know, year over year, all the good things that you do, that you need from a from a sales perspective. So when it depends, here took over managing the commission side of things. So I was responsible for the enclosure piece, where they needed someone to track emissions for their hundreds of reps and billions of dollars. And just learned a lot of good things there, because I said under the finance department. So I remember, I won't say his name, but he was, he was great. He was so particular that when I would submit a report, if my column headings weren't the same width and length, he wouldn't publish it. And that was like, at the time, I was like, my goodness, like, huh, but what a great lesson learned. Like to be detailed in that specific so that's kind of my funny story at Pentair.
From there, I moved to an ed tech company where I was a senior financial analyst. Again, I worked on the finance team, managing sales numbers, sales reports. And that one was crazy too. They were private equity. They were owned by a private equity firm, which, again, is a whole other field, then publicly traded, like Pentair and family owned, and they loved me, but they told me I talked too much, and I'm like, Well, that's because I'm sales so, like, when I left, they were like, We're gonna miss you, but we won't miss your talking, you know, in a fun way, right? Yeah, but I actually was recruited out of Edmentum to go run a small Director of Sales Operations company, startup in New Jersey, $2 million the one of my old bosses from the med device world called me up. She's like, Hey, we're trying to build this piece of the company. They did rapid testing for blood clotting, and they were trying to get a division up. And again, just like another great experience, because I was remotely working with people in New Jersey. And I don't know if you've been to the east coast, but we are different. We are so different from east coasters. They're very direct. And I'm I'm not, but again, just like a great experience like building a building a department from scratch, there was no metrics, or metrics were sitting in some software online that I had to grab and figure out how to build those departments and help the sales team. And flew around with her. I've traveled a lot, and really grateful for that. But that job, I traveled a lot going on trying to teach salespeople how to sell our products Nice. So yeah, and then, how did you end up at my tech? At my tech. I got laid off from that that job I went to source, well, and source Well, I knew I wanted to be, I was ready to be in management, like I had done all the things. And I applied for the job here at my tech, and I had no business applying for it. I was up against several people with tons of sales manager experiences. And I talk about this company all the time. I absolutely love my tech. They have best culture of all the companies I've worked for. They they really hone in on their values. I got hired at my tech because in the interviewing process, one of his questions, he had one question he was looking for out of a whole time. And the question was, how are you going to work alongside people you're managing that know more than you and have more experience because of a lot of our reps are senior. They've been here for 10 to 12 years, and I was the only person that answered. I'd have to learn from them, and I That's why I got hired nice so I beat out like I am. It's a very.
Heavily male populated. You know, sales is very male populated, which is fine, so I think I beat out some very experienced men. So I'm proud of that, if you can say that or not, but yeah, so lots of learning experience here, and it's just been a great experience. Tell us a little bit about what my tech does, yeah, yeah. So my tech is, I'm going to give you my short like 32nd pitch. My Tech is a it, consulting firm and managed service provider. And what we do is we make it easy for our clients. We come in and we develop a strategic it plan that is basically going to help small and mid sized businesses be more productive and make more money. And we take the heavy lift off of owners or people that are trying to run these businesses that have all these things to do. We come in and we lift that it piece off. We were planful. We're proactive, where we do budgets so that we can help them be more prepared for what's coming up when it comes to be technology, because we want them to focus on what they're meant to do, and that's serving their client. And you know how it is with it, like coming in, like someone needs a password reset, someone's computer is not starting, the network's down, the internet's broken, the phone's not working. So we come in and we we take care of all that.
Dina Simon 16:14
Yes, I know that painfully well, because the day I have a computer issue. So yeah, I have much appreciation for the amazing services that you provide, and I've had a chance of being in at my tech and hearing from one of the founders and all of that. So I do know that you have found just this beautiful company culture and so love that you were afforded the opportunity that you aced the interview, that you got in the fight you're in. I think that's so awesome.
Mindee Peterson 16:47
Yes, I Yes, you have been here. Yeah, I tell it to the owners all the time. I'm like, I have worked for a lot of different companies, and they're all good. I don't have anything bad to say about any of them, but this one truly lives and raised by their values. And you'll hear, you heard this here, Dina, when, when Nate, but one of the co founders was on, they're not perfect, like you're not going to come here, and we're just this perfect company that runs perfectly. It's just that they have set up some bumpers with our values that we can we can live in the managers and the people that worker can live within these bumpers. So we're not constantly going, how do we do this? We know what to do, as long as we're living within our values. Love that sounds for empowering, right? It's very, it's very empowering. And they'll say, you know, you'll never get in trouble as long as if you've done something and it's aligned to our values. We understand that. So it's pretty cool. Yeah, they also do fun stuff too, where, if you can list all 12 values, because we have 12 of them. Like it's, I don't know if they do anymore, but one of the co founders walks around with $100 bills in his pocket. So if you go up to him and find him, and you can say, our 12 values, there's money involved. Nice. And as a sales leader out in the field, I used to do that. When I'd go into offices, I would say it was similar, but I would say, Do you know, like, what the top three goals of your office are, yeah, this, this quarter or whatever, because there was always sales goals and things. So I love that. That's awesome. It is That's old school, yeah, yeah, yeah.
John Simon 18:11
People don't do that much today.
Yeah,
Mindee Peterson 18:13
Yeah, it's good if we we do have a annual banquet, and during that banquet, anybody can stand up, including a spouse, and say those values, and there's money involved, and a spouse that like killed it this year, just rattled them off, made us all look bad, nice. That's so awesome, but that's a way to keep them alive, right? I think it's one thing.
Dina Simon 18:36
As you said, you've worked for some really great companies, and so it's one thing to have values on your website and on your wall, but if you can't see them, feel them as a living organism throughout your company, you know that that's where the magic is. I agree. Yeah, agree.
John Simon 18:51
And it's great to get the spouses involved in it. Also, because we had a we had a program where I worked in Dina, worked at the associates called cop achievers. And whenever we started the program every year, the package of information went to the house for the spouse to see. And it really it brought them into it also. And because the trip might be a trip to Ireland or a trip to Italy, we did one time. And, you know, yeah, and it's funny how when the spouse gets involved in it, they don't mind when you work a little bit of extra hours, or you're working overtime, and it it paid off. I agree. I agree. And work can be hard sometimes, especially in the IT space, there's always something going on. So it's always fast paced, always stressful. So I agree. I'm gonna, I'm gonna bring up that to my owners, Italy. What did we say, Ireland? I think we need to Italy. Well, yeah, I think, I think we initially started the first time we did it, it was a trip to Napa, and, you know, we would do it like Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
Sunday type thing. I started off with four, like four days, and then every year it got a little bit better. But the goal was, is to not only retain the employees, but to increase the number of people to get to go, because you would have a sales objective, and you had to, you had to get a certain percentage of new customers, plus growth from existing customers, because a lot of time that gets forgotten about. And the goal that we had, we had a pretty mature business that we had. We wanted to grow 15% a year. And how do you do that? Then 10% of it would come from existing clients and maybe 5% come from new clients. If you do that about every four and a half years, you double the size of your company.
Mindee Peterson 20:48
I like it, John, you're hired. I have openings right now.
Dina Simon 20:53
So we talked a little bit about your life, and then on leadership. So you've had some really great leaders throughout Would you talk just a moment for you know yourself, what you feel you bring as a leader or leaders that are brought to you? What does you know good or great leadership look like to you?
Mindee Peterson 21:12
I think good or great leadership couple things I am, I would say energy, positivity, coming to work and being with someone who wants to be there, and being passionate. Being passionate and coming to work and ready to work is very important. I think that's what I bring to the table. I think also being a good listener is a huge that's one thing. I think when I look back first time I was a manager, I didn't do well. I think you learn that as you go just really listening, being curious, number two, and then just being trustworthy. You have to be able to trust the people you work with, especially the people you report to. So that are the three things that I want to bring and be really good at in this role, and just developing talent. I think when I first started out as a leader, I thought it was to know everything. I think that's what everybody thinks like. I have to be good at everything so I can tell everybody what to do. And that's not true, right? My job here is to bring in talent and grow talent and develop talent. And sounds so easy. It's not the easiest thing to do, but that's, that's what my job is here, and it's awesome. All right, yeah,
Dina Simon 22:18
really good, huh? But that's what you even in your interview, you know, right? You don't have to be the smartest person in the room. You want really smart people around you as a leader, you know, making sure that you're getting people focused on the right things. You're removing obstacles and all of that. Yeah, yeah,
Mindee Peterson 22:36
correct. It's really especially in sales, as a woman. In sales, it's an ego check. I have to check my ego at the door every day, because I'm not when it comes to the sales aspect, I'm not I have people that have been here for 10-15, years. I don't have to be the smartest person in the room. I just need to get them in the right spot and remove barriers when, when we need them.
Dina Simon 22:56
And so life leadership and building legacies. So we say building legacies is not what you you know leave behind that it certainly is part of legacy, but really, legacies is what you're doing on a day to day basis. And so talk to us a little bit about thoughts on how you're building and living out your legacy.
Mindee Peterson 23:14
Legacy right now, for me, is knowing my values, knowing my worth, setting great examples for my daughter, especially in my son, healthiness and marriage, and doing things that fill my cup. So I'm super involved in the community. Do a lot of things with my my kids' sports, the board. I'm on a baseball board. Support a nonprofit giving back to that. I'm a youth coordinator. Those are things that are, I guess, are important to me, just getting up every day and being happy, and things are going to happen and they're not great. Life sucks sometimes, and you just got to choose to be happy. So that, I think, is kind of my legacy right now, and it's taken me a long time. I'm 47 years old. I don't care. I'm going to say it on your podcast, but I haven't done that ever. I've just been like, busy, like, you get married, you have kids, you go to college, you're, you know, grinding through a job, and my daughter went to college last year, and I feel like I shed a layer, and a new person has, as a has came about, like a butterfly. It's, it's the weirdest thing, but it just it. That's what did it for me. And I don't know if it's because I had time or just because life changed and I didn't want to be the empty nester or the person that was so sad that she went to college, because it's not, it's a happy thing. So I think, like, I don't know. So that's where my legacy is, that right now, I'm just trying to navigate this next piece and be happy and love life and do the best I can.
John Simon 24:44
Does your daughter have your personality? To a
Mindee Peterson 24:48
T so it's like, when I've watched her going through some of the things that she struggles with, it's like, I'm trying to help her, but sometimes that mother daughter advice is more of annoyance to her. Than helpful, but I'm hoping it sinks. And she's playing at a d2 college right now, and the amount of pressure, like, you forget, like she's trying to do softball, she's having all these hard courses, and she's just trying to navigate that right now. And I'm hoping I can just be her voice of reason and bring that like, just take a deep breath. But I remember what it was like back when you were 19, just grinding hard.
Dina Simon 25:23
It is hard. You have to allow them some of that leeway just to go. Do they don't really have to listen to us anymore, yeah. And so there is that, that push and pull more so than ever, right? Yeah, yeah, agree. And
Mindee Peterson 25:38
it's like the funnest thing to watch them go and grow. And if you can have that, like, that's, that's the attitude I have, like, go and learn, go and do. And she's like, you know, thinking about, like, if I get out of college, what if I just went down to Florida for a year and, like, waitress and live on the beach? And I'm like, do it, because you'll never do it again. You'll never do it when you're my age, because that's maybe not responsible, but I'm like, go do it. But she's pretty focused. And I've got this little eighth grader who I've never had brothers. I don't get boys, and he's just the funnest thing to watch. To where, at first, I was like, I don't know what I'm doing with him. I don't know if people feel that way too, but I hope it's good. But he's, he's, he's another one where it's gonna be fun watching that one go through life,
Dina Simon 26:22
and what a fun age, too, right? So your daughter's at college. She's not super far away, so you are able to go to games and still be engaged and involved, but she's far enough away that you're not seeing her on a daily basis. But now also with your son, you know, going into high school next year, and you'll get those four years of him, you know, experiencing all that time with him, which is awesome.
Mindee Peterson 26:43
Yep, I do we like to say, my husband and I like to say, it's like we have two only children because of that gap, there's such a big gap. There's a five year gap between them. And he has unfortunately been drug to so many softball tournaments. But, I mean, our tournaments were across the country, so he just, he doesn't even know that he was drug because it was always somewhere fun with a pool or something we were doing. So it's going to be fun watching this one go through, because he's different. He has a totally different idea of where he wants to go and what he wants to be so nice.
Dina Simon 27:14
So you talked about how, you know, it's been, you know, however, months that you shed the skin and you're stepping into your own understanding who you are, you know, at this stage of your life. So I met you around that time, so that's super fun. But what are some of the things that, what are some of the things that you've done to try and understand like to step into that power and who you are? And yes,
Mindee Peterson 27:41
so the the journey started when my daughter was in July, right before she was supposed to go to college last year, and we had a leadership call. And my my general manager had a leadership moment. We have leadership moments once a week where he shares some leadership thing and it's cool. And his was, what are your values? And I was sitting there looking around like, I don't I don't know who my values are, and no one spoke up. And finally, I'm like, I don't know my values. I'll be honest. And I was terrified. I was like, Why did I say that? Like, why would I admit to that? And I was like, No, I'm gonna figure this out. So I started just Googling, researching what are, how do I figure out what my values are? And I knew of Wired, I knew of the Collaborative. And I'm like, You know what? I'm just gonna do this. I'm gonna see what this is all about. I'm gonna try it. And I joined this collaborative of 12 wonderful women. It's the women you want to be around. I got lucky. I don't know if other collaboratives exist like this. I always think ours is the best, but I'm sure they're all wonderful. But to meet a group of 12 women, and I know you know this, Dina is a woman going through career, you don't know who you can trust, and especially being in the sales world, you don't know man or woman. It's just cutthroat trying to get your way through a career. And I've just had not had the greatest experiences, and I've met a group of women who cheer me on, who aren't jealous, who are trying to cut me down. They're just women that want you to succeed, and that really has catapulted me into this. I don't even know who I am. That's what I like to say. But I'm doing the collaborative and I wanted to do this podcast that you so graciously let me do. I started a networking event of women only, and Dina is my next special guest, which I'm very excited about. I hired a coach, a personal coach, to help me get through some of the doubts I've been having. I'm gonna say her name, Kelly Jenner Byrne. I don't know if you've heard of her, but she's also I've invested really heavily in myself this year to figure this out, and book reading, journaling, attending networking events, where I have to go meet people and learn about them. So those are the things I'm doing. I want to start a podcast. That's another thing I'm doing. I'm gonna start that with my girlfriend, so we're gonna get that going. And I think I'm gonna start one with my son as well. He's a little eighth grader that loves to talk sports. So I'm like, let's talk sports. Fun. He's just a metrics, little driven thing. So these are all the things I want to do, and I know I can't do them all at once, so I think I looked it up. I'm like I used to. I never used to talk about my accomplishments because I thought it was arrogance. And that is not true. No, that is not you can be proud of your accomplishments, and I've just come a long way, baby, I like what I like to say, Come along, baby, in a short amount of time. So
I really liked one quote that I I read in your bio about you getting things done with style and impact. And not everybody can do that. Yeah,
yep, we do. I am a different kind of energy. I would like to say I I'm pretty transparent. I show up in ways where people are like, I can't believe she said that. And I'm usually in heels, so I'm probably gonna need surgery, is what I like to say. I'm always in heels. It's gonna be bad. But, yep. But
Dina Simon 30:49
style and impact and the impact too, like, you the cool part? Well, there's many cool parts, but like the numbers driven, like the data driven, that doesn't come natural to everybody, and so for you to have that analytical but then also the other side, you know, the creative failure is really yellow. It's a really cool mix.
Mindee Peterson 31:08
It is, and it was probably the most beneficial when I actually, I knew my goal is to be a VP of Sales someday. What I think so far, I'm still on that track. So if you look at my resume, when I was 25 I looked it up, like, how do I get to be a VP of sales? And it, like said, all these job descriptions, and I've basically done them all. The one thing I hadn't done was actually be in the field selling. I was always supporting a rep. I was always doing all those kind of things. So when I was at Sourcewell, I told the person that was hiring me, I'm like, That's my goal here. I need to be in the field. And she knew it, and gave me that shot, and handed me over a territory, and I managed, managed, and that analytical piece was huge, because you can grab data really quickly, and a lot of reps don't have that piece where I could look, see, where I could go, find opportunity. Nice.
John Simon 31:58
It's funny. It's funny. You say that because at Associates at one point, I became senior vice president of sales, and I never sold anything to anyone, but it happened, and it was just because of the circumstance that it happened. But the one thing I used to tell the salespeople, I said, hope is not a strategy. You better have a plan. Yes,
Mindee Peterson 32:18
yes, I would have to agree with that, yes, me
Dina Simon 32:22
as well, only because I I've known John since my early 20s, so hope is not a strategy, and I know that well exactly. So Mindy as you were prepping to be on our podcast. Is there any other topics or things that you wanted to talk through for our listeners? No, I just
Mindee Peterson 32:39
I like I said, I'm appreciative, and I'm your perfect example of if you don't think you can do it, you can. I've taken every non traditional route to do something, and I've survived it so you can do it. It's just mindset, and I've learned it a lot. It's
Dina Simon 32:56
just mindset and and tenacity. I mean, look at how hard you worked putting yourself through college and and all of that, and all those smart decisions. And it sounds too like you've had some really cool people, even the counselor for to talk about, where are you going to go to college, that your stuff is going to transfer? Yeah? Yeah,
Mindee Peterson 33:17
yeah. It is it, you know. And I'm a huge believer in everything happens for a reason, and it's always good. So you just, I tell my kids that all the time, like always, is good. It always, there's always a reason for it. You got to figure it out. Gotta figure it out fast
John Simon 33:31
and and hard - hard work will always lead to success.
Mindee Peterson 33:35
Agree, Agree, Agree. And that server background is it was kind of my foundation. I learned really quick. If you can give customer service and work really hard, you can make money at it and go, go pretty quick,
Dina Simon 33:51
Right? And of the lost art of customer service these days,
Mindee Peterson 33:55
yes, yes. I know. I know you go into places now and you're like, Oh, I just want to help you. I just want to do something. Oh,
John Simon 34:03
there. Yeah. And you keep in mind one thing I used to say, you know, the customer is not always right, but the customer is always the customer, and you have to let them know the right way to do things. Sometimes it's how you go about doing it that makes all the difference in the world. 100%
Mindee Peterson 34:22
yes, yeah. And how you manage that? And boy, you get lots of that bets when you're serving Yes,
Dina Simon 34:29
right? Well, I'm excited about hearing about potentially two new podcasts, and so we're here to help you in any way that we can. So just know that.
Mindee Peterson 34:39
I appreciate it, and I'm very much looking forward for you to being my next guest at my Balancing Love Life and Relationship events that I'm starting, and I think that's going to be really
Dina Simon 34:49
good too. Yes, yeah, so the last one was amazing, and so super excited to be a part of it and to support you as you carry on. And John's going to have a chance to meet some other collective members, because they also have said yes to being on the podcast. And it really is this lovely opportunity. We do have the best collective, I'm not going to lie, and for us, just truly too, just it's a remarkable room of women, and as you said, to lean in and how important that is. So
Mindee Peterson 35:21
it really is. It really is, know your circle and love your circle. That's how I like to
John Simon 35:28
say it, yep. And when you and your son put your podcast together about sports, I would love to get in it, because there's nothing I enjoy more than talking about sport. You know,
Mindee Peterson 35:39
that is so cool. And I'm probably going to take you up on that, because when I pitched it to him, I'm like, hey, what do you like to do? Like Ashland over here, doing all this sports stuff and all these things in college. He's like, Mom, I just I like to talk about sports and hang out with my friends. I'm like, what if, like you and dad, you know, started like talking or bringing grandpa, or bring in somebody that wants to talk, because he's always like, Mom, did you hear so and so got traded and I have zero idea. I don't follow any of that. Or he'll be like, Hey, did you hear what? Like, man, you're in eighth grade. So he he's a numbers he's a numbers guy. So see what he what he's got. But John, I'm writing you down.
John Simon 36:16
Well, I'll tell him the story about when, when Rich and his brother John, were playing little league. I was the I was a commissioner, and plus, I was the manager of the team. And I'll tell the story about how I got thrown out of the game before the game even started. So it's a, it's a, it's a cute story, but he'll enjoy here. He'll enjoy hearing it anyhow. Well, thanks for all your time today. I thought that what a great conversation we had.
Mindee Peterson 36:47
Thank you like it was so fun. I love it.
Dina Simon 36:50
Thank you for your friendship, for being part of the collective and for being on our podcast, but just the people that get to work with you and around you are so lucky to have you, and it will be exciting to see what you do in these next few years as we stay stay very much connected. So thank you so much.
Mindee Peterson 37:09
Thank you. Thank you for you to do. This is amazing. Thanks for having me.
Dina Simon 37:13
I'd like to thank Mindee Peterson for being on our podcast. She is a phenomenal business woman, mother, wife, community member, and super proud that she's part of the collective group that I am a part of. And we'll make sure you know how to get in touch with her, and she is launching some really cool networking opportunities for women here in the Twin Cities. So we'll make sure you see in the show notes how to get engaged with her for upcoming events. But just really want to thank her for her time, her passion and her story. And as always, I'd like to thank my father in law, John Simon, for CO hosting with me. And the podcast is a proud member of C suite radio, and until we talk again, you
Transcribed by https://otter.ai