Summary: Shannon Miles, author of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Third-Option-between-Actually-Succeed-ebook/dp/B07B8T9QGQ/&tag=authorhour-20" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Third Option</a>, is the CEO of Belay, an Inc 500 FastestGrowing Company and the winner of Entrepreneur’s Number One Company Culture awards. But that’s not what this episode is about.<br> You see, Shannon believes in living life more fully. For her, that also means being a great mom and a great wife.<br> In this episode, Shannon tells us why a woman doesn’t have to choose between a career and her family but can actually have both and succeed. If you’re a woman who wants to have the best of work and life, this episode is for you.<br> <br> <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Third-Option-between-Actually-Succeed-ebook/dp/B07B8T9QGQ/&tag=authorhour-20" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"></a>Get Shannon’s new book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Third-Option-between-Actually-Succeed-ebook/dp/B07B8T9QGQ/&tag=authorhour-20" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Third Option</a> on Amazon.<br> Find out more at <a href="http://mythirdoption.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">MyThirdOption.com</a>.<br> <br> Shannon Miles: I was in my late 20s, climbing the corporate ladder, and I finally landed my dream job in the corporation that I had been with for the last four years. I was loving it. Brian and I had been married for a while and decided, “Okay, now’s a great time to have a baby.”<br> I was selling healthcare software, which may sound super boring, but that was my world. I was selling systems to clients who already had our software, so it was theoretically an easier sell.<br> I loved the energy of it and the opportunity for travel and the satisfaction of closing a deal.<br> Charlie Hoehn: Awesome. You two were ready to have a baby?<br> Shannon Miles: Yeah. You got everything in line, you’re like, “Okay, let’s just mix this all up.” Fortunately, we were able to have Rainey right away, and she totally wrecked me.<br> <br> Sticking to the Plan<br> Shannon Miles: The plan was to go back to that perfect job and for Brian to continue on his path and his sales job as well. So we found a nanny while I was on my three month maternity leave, hired her, brought her on, and that was the plan.<br> After I went back to work, it started to become obvious that this actually wasn’t a sustainable plan.<br> <br> I didn’t factor in the love of this little baby girl. <br> <br> On paper it all made sense. You know, we’re just going to keep doing what we do. We hadn’t planned financially for either of us to quit our jobs.<br> We were going to make it work. I held her and I’m like, my gosh, this little tiny thing needs me so much and I love her, and I can’t imagine both of us maintaining these sales jobs, traveling around and essentially having a nanny care for her.<br> That was the crisis for us.<br> Charlie Hoehn: What month did that really hit you? <br> Shannon Miles: She was about six months old when we realized, okay, this can’t continue on. It was a tough time in our house because we were stretched financially.<br> We both had to keep working.<br> We had, fortunately, worked to get out of massive amounts of debt that we accumulated when we were in college together and young and married and stupid.<br> Still, you know, you spend the money you make, right? We were saving for retirement and stuff like that, but there was not a lot of margin. Not the luxury of just saying, “Okay, somebody just quit their job and we’ll just figure it out,” that just wasn’t an option at that point.<br> An Either/Or Situation<br> Shannon Miles:There was this tension between the reality of the situation, knowing we couldn’t continue on with the way things were going, but then also knowing we had to make a change.<br> They’re only little for so long, and the sacrifice of the time away wasn’t going to be...
