DETAILS
Freezing My Ass Off on Kilimanjaro: the entrepreneur’s survival guide for building traction on a changing business terrain
By Leanne Brownoff
288 pages
$25 at Audreys Books, 10702 Jasper Ave. in Edmonton
Visit www.leannebrownoff.com to learn more.
Like Moses, Leanne Brownoff once went up a mountain and came down with wisdom that needed to be shared with the masses. Brownoff’s wisdom didn’t fit on stone tablets, however.
The business coach and freelance writer trekked up Mt. Kilimanjaro in 2014 to cross that item off her bucket list. She wasn’t thinking of the first draft of a book that she had already begun before her adventure in Africa. She didn’t even consider the idea until a client asked if her experiences in overcoming adversity and achieving success nearly 6,000 metres above sea level would become part of the book.
How could she not?
“It’s a perfect metaphor. It’s exactly what I used every step of the way that we did plan for Kilimanjaro. It was this perfect scenario of what it takes to run a business from beginning to end. He said, ‘You can’t call it the ACTION Plan. That would be really boring. You gotta call it Freezing My Ass Off on Kilimanjaro because it’s for all of us entrepreneurs who are just sitting there stuck not knowing what to do next,’” she said.
And it was so.
Freezing My Ass Off on Kilimanjaro is Brownoff’s new book and it’s filled with lofty inspirational messages, mountaintop guidance, and practical, down-to-earth advice for business people across the land. She might not have called it the ACTION Plan – and perhaps wisely so – but she does elaborate about what Awareness, Commitment, Team, Implementation, Opportunities, and Next mean to those struggling to get past big challenges or even to keep moving forward.
“What I find with business owners, especially the ones that started off on their own, they take on every hat. They are everything. They’re challenged with when to let something go and bringing people into the fold to help them move their business. Inevitably, they get stuck at some point along the way. That’s when I like to come in and help them through the process.”
The only way you can move anything from one point to another is with action, she continued, and that’s how you build momentum. She writes on how to get past obstacles, and not just seeing opportunities but seizing them, too.
“Unless you get through some of the hurdles, you aren’t going to be able to get up that mountain. You get this idea of what you want to do but there are some practical things that are going to hold you back unless you know how to do them. That’s where the book helps them.”
But Freezing My Ass Off is more than just a book. It has QR codes to audio files and web links for things like templates for business plans, tips on how to conduct interviews, reference checks, performance reviews and more. There is so much tucked in between the cover that it’s almost three books in one.
She has already found a responsive audience with many entrepreneurs and leaders of small businesses. They love her approach, she said, and a how-to book offers a complete growth plan. As an independent author and self-employed business coach, she has even found that the book offers her volumes of assistance through her own struggles.
“There’s lots of mountain ahead of me to grow with it for sure, but I’m really excited.”
