PODCAST: Season 6, Episode 35
Grab your coffee and prepare for some truth bombs! Mills is calling out the coaching pyramid that’s keeping brilliant business owners trapped in performance mode instead of building actual sustainable businesses. If you’ve ever felt that little niggle whispering “surely this isn’t it,” this episode will validate everything you’ve been feeling. It’s time to stop performing credibility and start building businesses that work beyond your personal brand.
Key Revelation
You’re not broken – you’re probably up against the edge of something that was never meant to hold your massiveness. We didn’t start businesses to become content creators and performance machines. We started because we had depth.
Key Topics Covered
In this no-bullshit episode, Mills explores:
- The coaching pyramid explained – how coaches teaching coaches who coach coaches creates an endless loop of regurgitation
- Why income screenshots aren’t strategy – they’re performance marketing disguised as credibility
- The difference between survival business vs. sustainable business – and why brilliant women get trapped in the former
- Energy-first business design – building around your actual patterns, not what you think you should do
- Mills’ shift to strategic consultancy – working inside the engine, not just offering containers
- How to vet mentors and programs – essential questions before your next investment
The Coaching Pyramid Problem
Mills defines the coaching pyramid as this cycle: You get coached by someone who’s been coached by a coach to teach a method. Then you sell how you sold it. What you were taught, you then sell on, and someone pays you to teach them how to teach it. And so it loops.
The Result: Everyone’s building businesses that only make sense if you’re inside this loop. No real external proof, just performance and regurgitation.
Mills’ Real Business Experience (18 Years!)
Unlike the pyramid model, Mills has built actual businesses:
- Scaled and sold an online marketplace
- Health and wellness business with $40K monthly targets
- Painting holiday company (15 years until COVID)
- Successful coaching business
- Airbnb portfolio
- All built around her energy, strengths, and vision
The LinkedIn Revelation
Mills recently updated her LinkedIn profile (calling it “Insta’s passive aggressive cousin”) and discovered she’s been podcasting since February 2021. She started with guests as a way to network during COVID and has grown significantly in her communication skills.
Essential Audit Questions
Can your business survive without you performing?
- Could your business survive if you didn’t post for 30 days?
- Can someone else deliver your method without needing your energy to carry it?
- Are you selling clarity or just access to your proximity?
- Is your income replicable for a client who isn’t you?
- What problem do you solve outside of the coaching loop?
How to Vet Your Next Investment
Before investing in a program or mentor, ask:
- Do they have real business experience outside of coaching?
- Can they explain their methodology so someone else could implement it?
- Do they share client outcomes that aren’t just mindset wins?
- Have they built something that could live without them?
- Are they obsessed with legacy or just launch numbers?
The Breathwork Business Example
Mills shares client Sharon’s story – instead of the typical “teach breathworkers to build breathwork businesses” approach, they:
- Extended her work to retreats
- Created a breathwork school training other practitioners
- Generated 9K+ in her first cohort launch
- Built something beyond just selling sessions
Mills’ Consultancy Approach
What’s shifting: Not a rebrand, but a return to what she’s always done – helping brilliant women build businesses that work beyond their personality.
Who it’s for:
- Women with successful businesses who’ve become the bottleneck
- Leaders with teams who are still holding all the strategy
- Visionaries with brilliant ideas but no systems to scale
What it includes:
- Restructuring offers and refining messaging
- Building systems that don’t rely on referrals
- Creating operational clarity for leadership without micromanaging
- Energy-first business architecture
The Energy-First Strategy
Instead of forcing yourself into someone else’s method, design your business around:
- Your actual energy patterns
- Your natural communication style
- Your unique strengths
- Your ideal lifestyle
- Your authentic voice
The result: Everything becomes easier because you’re working with your energy instead of against it.
Who the Pyramid Really Hurts
Plot twist: The pyramid model doesn’t hurt beginners – it hurts high performers. Beginners want systems to follow, but high performers have instincts, experience, and their own ways of doing things that actually work.
The Ultimate Marketing Test
Mills leaves us with this powerful question: If you removed all income claims from someone’s marketing, do you still find it compelling?
Take Action
For immediate reflection:
- Ask yourself: Does this feel like me? Does this energize me?
- Would I want to do this even if no one was watching?
- Am I building my version of success or someone else’s?
For your next investment:
- Run potential mentors through Mills’ vetting checklist
- Look for real business experience beyond coaching
- Seek evidence of sustainable client results
Let’s Connect!
If this episode resonated and you’re ready to explore consultancy work that focuses on building businesses around your actual energy and strengths, hit up Mills in the DMs. She’s looking to work with brilliant women who are done being the bottleneck in their own success.
Remember
You don’t need to blow everything up. You just need to start making decisions from your truth instead of what you think you should do. Awareness is the first step to alignment, and alignment is where the real magic happens.
This episode is essential listening for anyone who’s ever felt trapped in the “content creation performance machine” and is ready to build something that actually lasts beyond their constant showing up.