Welcome to Knight Talks, the Uni of Florida College of Journalism and Communications talk show, produced by students for s I'm Anna Ward, a junior studying journalism and English.

Our guest today is Jasmine Jones, founder and CEO of J. Jones Enterprises, where she provides business cons and public speaking coaching ser Hi, Jasmine.

Thank you for being here today.

Tell us about J. Jones Enterprises and how you breathe life into bu So, yes, thank you for focusing on the breathing life into busin So I'm going to do a story time.

Buckle in.

It's going to be a story.

So when I was at the University of Florida, after I graduated, there was a small period of time where I needed to find myself.

There were some big defining que that I had, and while I was in t of doing that, I noticed that- I a big for football fan.

Go Gators.

So I noticed that a lot of people during the games were illegally jaywalk or a lot of the taxi services were taking forever.

Or if it was a party of 15, they had to take 4 different car And long story short, I ended up developing a transportation business that helped large parties safely get from their hotels to the actual football games.

What was the name of that busine It was called Gator 2 Go.

I know, so fantastic.

Gator 2 Go And it was a two.

I know, it had to be the two.

And it was called Gator 2 Go.

Literally, I'm taking gators to go to the footb So long story short, the reason why I started that business was I saw a need.

And the one thing about breathin into businesses is a lot of busi out here are providing a need.

But a lot of times when you're providing a need, you can get fatigued, you can ge Most of our times I'm dealing with solo entreprene and solo entrepreneurs are entre who are the CEO.

They're the janitor, they're the they're the marketing person, they're the help desk person.

And usually they need some sort or some sort of just supporting nature of resources to help them So when I work with businesses, starting my own and understandin how I had to do everything from to picking up the people to talking to the peo to gathering the routes, I know how it is to be the one-all-be-all for bus And when I sold that business and went into consulting, I wanted to make sure that I was not only give you sustainable an for your business, but to breathe life back into your b so that you have that wind for the second leg of the fabulousness of your busi Hope that makes it.

Oh, yes, of And that takes a pretty personal with each client that you deal w It does, which can be kind of ta But I like it simply because every business that come is almost like a fingerprint, is what I call the fingerprint p Though I have a bevy and a litan of resources and services that I every business does not need the same thing for existence.

You, yourself, your journalism c English, you will understand cop You understand grammar.

You understand how to speak to p by way of literature.

If someone does that have that b that is something that we would need to speak on.

Since I have a Jill-of-all-Trade when it comes to business, I'm able to s what the business needs.

But then again, it's not always I ask the business, What exactly do you believe you We meet in the middle, come up with the plan, and usually greatness happens right after that.

Could you share an example of helping a client find their business style and becoming more successful?

Of course.

So there was a well, there is a that I'm working with right now.

She is a older woman and she really wants to get into the midwifery or the midwife or doula space.

She's been in this space for yea literally years.

But unfortunately, she did not h the business acumen to go out on She came to me to help her do some of those back end works, like a employee handbook or when it comes to business str when it comes to succession plan when she does want to get she wants to move on from the bu And we sat down and we talked about her passion.

I just wanted to hear, why do you love the babies?

Why do you love the mamas?

Do you ask every client that?

I always ask my clients what is their passion?

Because usually when you let a client dream without limits, they're able to tell you way more than if you specific questions, and youre a to glean more information out of So when I let them dream unlimit I can literally hear what type of business they want, what type of business they need, what type of business the indust and when after you dream unlimit and after I talk to the client about their passion and their dr that's when I'm able to structur their leadership style as well as their business style.

It's usually centered around their personality, and I'm so happy that I've been to be at University of Florida and other places and spaces wher been able to meet a bevy of pers so that I will be able to tailor their leadership skills as well as their business struct towards their personality so that they can be lifelong and sustaining.

It really is a person to person engagement.

It has to be.

Business is relationships.

That is the one thing that has t Business is relationships.

And business, unfortunately, especially in a lot of different structures, people think that bu is very transactional.

If you do this, I do this.

If you do that, I'll do that.

But when it comes down to it- and I should be making you pay for this information.

No, Im just playing.

But one thing I always tell when I'm talking to people about business is when businesses, relationship people will buy anything from yo because you're the relationship You're the relationship foster p So if you're a good person and you're ethical and you're do the things that are right by your customers, you could sell water to a zebra and the zebra was still by the w because they're buying the produ because of you and also because the product wor But mostly because of you.

And communication is a huge cornerstone of that.

A lot of times in my business consultancy, I'm talking to the holistic being of the act We're talking about business pro we're talking about accounting, we're talking about pricing.

You know, we're talking about the structures of business But a lot of the times when I'm in the consulting, I'm asking them, How's your life?

How are you doing?

I saw that you had a client and you got a little stumbled up on and you gave them a discount.

What about that experience was uncomfortable for Let's talk about how the prices how you're feeling.

If you're not feeling in a good you usually give a discount.

If you're feeling in a great moo you overshot the price.

Let's see if we can find a or medium area where your emotio and your prices can kind of stay So it does take a lot of communi from the actual business owner, but it takes a considerable amou of communication from me because I have to hear what they're not saying.

I know that sounds very therapy.

You know, for the folks who are very Frazier.

I'm listening.

But I have to be able to hear what they're not saying so I can ask the questions to draw out what is needed so that they can hear it and I c and we can make a plan off of th You also coach and public speaki I do.

Have you always been a confident public speaker?

Or did you receive coaching at a As arrogantly as it sounds, yes, I've been good at public speakin Or should I say I've been good at speaking in pu because there is a difference.

So I was good speaking in public meaning I have a very large fami It's literally we could repopulate the earth, but there is a lot of us.

So a great example that I give i we like to eat, oh my gosh, we love to eat.

And it will be a big family dinn and there's food everywhere.

And if I want to get that last p of any type of food, that large slice of pizza, I have got to sp up, be loud, be clear, be succin And not only clear, succinct, but fast to get that last piece and let it be known that I want the last pizza.

And I understood how communicating effectively to a large mass of people can he steer me in directions that will be great for me as just a person.

After moving into college, I saw a lot of my friends., they were very scared of public like very scared.

To the point where it would para and affect their grades.

So I would just pull them to the and say, hey, here is one, two, three pointers.

These are some of the things you may want to work on.

Like, for instance, if you're ever in a really big r you don't necessarily have to imagine people in their You can just look at the exits signs and scan the room by the e and that's going to make it look like you're looking at ever But you're really not and you're concentrating on what you have t So I knew these pointers from being in Toastmasters, from the oratorical contest, from all these things that I had through, technically, and I was to share this information with m And of course, me being the busi that I am, I decided to put it on to one of my services packages.

And I do help people around the with their public speaking and j them tips and tricks and working physically in order to make sure that what they need to be said can be said without any imp without any stutters, without any distractions.

We want to focus on you and what you have to say.

That's so interesting that you were already coaching before you were really coaching.

I didn't know that.

Should have been charging.

I should have been charging.

Rig But you know what?

That's fine.

I love my friends.

But you're right.

And also, that's something that a lot of people don't know your business is in the thing th already.

And I didn't understand that unt through that path and understood hey, I'm good at this.

Like they're actually getting A's in their class becau they had to take an actual prese Maybe I should look into this a little bit.

Was that first time you had confidence in your coach That was.

It really was because coaching i because you have to be outside of yourse You can't tell someone this is what you should do for your busi A lot of people believe coaches and some coaches do do that.

You need to do this for your bus or you need to exactly say this and this is going to cure all th speaking in the world.

That's not how it works.

But the good coaches.

The good coaches, they are influ They lay out a buffet of options you each option has a consequenc Both positive and negative.

Which one fits you?

Okay.

You think number four fits you?

Let's go at number four.

If it doesn't work, let's go with number five.

So they're literally an influenc and someone who's going to walk through the process to find whatever it is at the end that y They're not telling you what to They're showing you how to do it So that when you remove the coac out of your life, you still have the tactics to ma Sustainability is really key when it comes to coaching.

When you were going through all these different like contest and then getting to college and so speaking, did you have any secret weapons that improved your public speaki Breathing.

Breathing?

I know that sounds so weird.

And maybe because I love yoga, but breathing a lot of times when it comes to your great sing they have undeniable control of their breath and a lot of times when you're s a lot of people speak from their some speak from the diaphragm, some speak from their chest.

And once you know where their voice comes from, th you know how they can breathe.

That I need to be careful of when I breathe, when I pause.

When I speak up and when I stop.

All the that has to be around yo and your breath control.

Also, another tidbit, there is s called the speaker's box.

So it's been scientifically prov that people trust you when you have your hands up in t I do subconsciously, but right.

I do it subconsciously but it's because I've been train it.

People will think you are tr when your hands are in a box from right here.

So it goes from your torso to your hip and here.

Long as you stay in this box, people are really engaged and really intrigued with what you're saying.

Soon as you go out this box, it gets a little weird.

So when you stay in this box and you control your breathing, a lot of times a lot of those fa and those stumbling blocks of public speaking, they usually ease down.

And this also helps with nervous I was just going to say that I feel like this gives you something to do with y but you're not getting to like f and just like very harsh or dire You're not a ballerina, you're a public speaker.

So your hands stay right here.

And long as your hands stay here shake off the nervousness, you'r giving personality, you're givin experience, you're giving trustw Youre giving all the giving.

I feel like the emphasis on breathing helps a lot, too, because I think if people get up in front of a c and they're just nervous to look at everybody and they kind of start breathing Breathing is one of the essential things of life.

So we're speaking, you got to sp And even those who can't speak with a voice as we speak with ou we speak our eyes, we speak with our bodies.

So speaking is something that we do as human And when you combine speaking and breathing, there's a lot of good things that can happen.

People hear what you have to say People can change their minds, their beliefs.

Change happens when those two things come toget So if you focus on the breathing keep your hands in your speak box, shake off all the nervous Nellie A lot of good things to happen.

So I know you've always been goo speaking ever since you were a kid and tr to get that last slice of pizza.

But did you have any obstacles i setting out on this career?

Obstacles are going to always be in the way of greatness, no matter what the way my obstacles were set up in my l is, they were more teachable mom So, for example, the business that I talked about the Gator 2 Go, that business en having to be sold because Uber was introduced into the industry Yes, I was here before Uber.

That taught to me that the industry is always chan And if I'm not being innovative I'm doing, the industry will pus So after I finished that busines now what next?

What industry can I go in to.

Another obstacle that I also faced was financial.

So black entrepreneurs are less likely to get business loans, are less likely to get fi For whatever reasons there are in the universe, we are less likely to get fundin So that means that my business had to go through, like a lot of other businesses, bootstrapping.

Bootstrapping is basically when you use your personal funds in order to fund your actual bus So that means that the business that I have can only be a large is how much that I can have access to.

And since this is all personal, you have to be very serious about what goes into your busine So that's another obstacle as well as financial, but also another obstacle was li What if someone passes away?

You know, when I had death in th or when I was finishing my master's degree, I couldn't spend so much time on my busines I had to focus on my studies or just traveling.

You know, I'm traveling around.

I was able to visit Nigeria and I'm traveling and I'm seeing the But that means that at that time my business is not the focus at So how do you readjust your life in order to either move around the obstacle, move the obstacle, or just completely acknowledge the obstacle and just make it a way of life.

Those are the three ways that I usually have to figure ou how to deal with obstacles.

At that time, when you're talkin you know, what if a family member passes a when you're working on your mast degree, was the business complet on your shoulders?

Completely.

So is that why you're so focused on sustainability in business?

Yes, that is.

Over 97% of the businesses in America are small businesses.

Small businesses defined by the SBA is any one th 100 employees making less than h a million dollars a year.

Okay.

So when you have these small bus a lot of the times they have one two, three, four employees or they're just they're by thems I was one of those businesses that was there by themselves.

Again, I was the janitor, I was the marketing, I was the customer service.

I was everything.

When you have a business like th that is serving the needs of the community, it is so hard to sustain that because your business is taking a 150% of your energy, 150% of your attention.

It's taking everything and there's no time for PTO.

There's no paid time off.

There is no breaks.

It's 100 miles an hour at all ti So whenever I speak to my client I am always, always, always trying to stress to them sustain like taking breaks.

Like doing products that have residual income and residua is when you have a product that sells itself without so much energy from you.

A great example of that will be You will be able to sell that on but because Amazon is a 24 hour, seven days a week platform, you' not necessarily out pushing your It's just there for someone to g So you can get it at 2:00 in the You can get it at 4:00 in the mo you get it, you know, 4:00 in the afternoon.

That is residual income.

So I work with them on putting in sustainable practi in order for them to not have a hit on their botto but still be able to holisticall still be a person because of the person is not good, the business is not And I want the business to thriv So I must focus on the holistic Now, you can't give from an empt You cannot.

And you can't pour from an empty Absolutely.

I'm going to switch gears real q I know you're a graduate of the of Florida College of Journalism Communicat I sure am.

How did that experience prepare you for your career?

How did it not prepare me?

I think thats a shorter list.

Well, first, let's start, what was your major?

So my major was telecommunicatio with a concentration in business administration.

That was a whole mouthful.

And after my telecom degree, bas I should have been able to go in or TV and become a GM or anything GM a I did not do that clearly.

Originally, I came to the journalism college because I was at reading and writing.

I had a strong background in rea writing and I wanted to become a Can you believe it?

I wanted to become a lawyer and I had lawyer friends.

Glad I dodged that bullet.

I wanted to become a lawyer.

And as we know for the LSAT, you have to have very strong reading and writing skills.

So I decided to go ahead and come to journalism college.

I went through all of my classes journalism as far as communicati speaking with people, communicating by way of paper was much more important than I t And it was by a professor, actua Professor Sorel, he was one of my professors here If you're watching this, profess Professor Sorel.

I got you on Twitter, Ill just say hello there, too.

He gave us a prompt in class that really got me to thinking a how does communications interact with life?

And that set me on a trajectory which actually sparked the entrepreneurship in me.

I've always been an entrepreneur but it sparked that fire of how can communications, how can the basics, the fundamental of journalism, can be shared with the world in a way to make the w a better place.

I was able to gain resources through the journalism college that I had no clue that I even c tap into.

I got the message pretty clearly that journalism college is a special place to be.

I learned just how to be a better person h how to communicate as a better p how to communicate with others, how to work with different count and meet in the middle so that we could be able to finish a project.

Because everything is team work, everything is teamwork, everything is team work.

So I learned how to do all that but most importantly, from a journalism college, I lea if you cannot communicate who you are and what you stand f the world is going to be tough to navigate.

Because without understanding th and without knowing that you can be led two paths that don't serve you.

And I learned and honed in that who is Jasmine and what does she want to do?

What does that look like?

How do I communicate that?

How does that look on a resume?

How does that look in the interv How does that look when I'm standing up in front of, you kno Professor Sorels class giving a Who does that look like?

What does that look like?

I learned all of that and more f being in the atmosphere of the journalism college.

Communication is really key.

It's like, what's going to unloc everything you have going forwar It does.

I believe that.

And that's going to be the next title of our book.

Thank you.

I won't charge.

You've held positions with Wells Fargo, the Boys and Girls of Alachua County and Nationwide Did a communications background help you in those organizations to unlock any doors?

In every single way.

For example, and not in the most traditional So, for example, I was able to w a Fortune 500 company called Nat And even though my position didn't have any communication ba I was still able to have my comm to be the forefront of what I wa I saw that the morale of my team was kind o We had a lot of work to do.

We had a short amount of time to get it done.

But I also understand as a leade if your morale is high for your team, a lot more produc can come out of them.

They produce better products.

So of course, I went to my super and I let her know, let's do a c She's like, Well, you know what kind of contest that you wa So I was able to put together a full presentation.

I know no one asked me to do thi but I'm Jasmine.

So I put together a full present of a month full of contests.

One was who could drink the most Another one was a walking contes because we were so sedimentary a I wanted to get up and move.

Now that is the most unorthodox that you can approach communicat but that's what I did and what I We had a phenomenal time, comple change and revolutionize the pro level of the team to the point where our team produced so well.

We were put on a pilot program that is still and they still fee the effects of the pilot program in nationwide to this day.

And I was to help pilot that pro because our team did so much pro because of the communication of what we did around the contes That's so incredible.

And it really shows your person a person method of communicating with people, you know, like asking if they even wanted to be a part if they wanted to help.

Since Nationwide, you went on to for Saint Leo University and the University of Florida.

What did you do at these college At the University of Florida, I love this program, we had the edit program and the edit program was ran through the computer information and engineering.

And the edit program, long story we took in about 10 to 12 entrep and these entrepreneurs were at the baseline of their thought pr So that means that they only had had a thought of a business, no They didn't have it fully fleshe nothing like that.

They just had an idea.

And I was able to be on a team o that was able to move nine entre from idea to fully functioning p We walk them through the six steps of ideation.

We talked to them about technolo We helped them set up their webs We helped them talk about SEO, we helped them talk about time m All the things that it takes to become a great entrepreneur, we talk to them about that.

And the edit program was so wond because I got to see regular peo achieve extraordinary dreams, and that literally is what I'm h for, is if you can literally have the re have the time, have the money, have the space, have the people, have the support in order to make your idea into a fully functioning busines Oh sign me up.

And that is what the edit progra Unfortunately it wasn't renewed, but I was so glad to be on that and if they ever ask me to come I'm there.

As we start to wrap up here, what is any other advice you have for college students li Oh, man, I have a lot of advice.

Do we have enough time for all o I'll stick to the top two.

The first thing is to remember you're here for a reason.

Okay?

There are a lot of people in thi that do not have access to the G Nation, and the Gator nation is very special.

I've been fortunate enough to be an alumni here.

I've been walking through airpor and people will see me with my my Gator jacket on and we just stop and talk.

Be very present here in the Gato because we literally are everywh And the more you can get out of University of especially with journalism colle the more connections you can make, the better your network is for when we are stepping outside of UF, you don't feel so lost or so lon you'll always have someone who will call to he And the second thing that I will offer to any student especially for my journalism col students, is remember that rest should be built into your daily Okay, your daily schedule.

I can't tell you what rest looks because rest is very personal.

Rest may be lights off, no talki Rest may be reaching out to your to talk to her or your mom or yo or your aunt.

Rest may be reading a book on yo or old fashioned opening up the Rest is very personal and it should be taken very seri And rest is the one thing that w to make sure our body lasts a little longer, our mind lasts a little longer.

To make sure we are staying connected to this earth and the people that are on them.

You set that timer, you take tha because if you don't take that b it is going to wear you out and you're not going to be able to retain that information.

And in a world that is always telling us to pus rest is one of the most radical things that you can do in order to keep your body, your and your mind aligned with what exactly that it is that you need And that's to live.

Those would be my two pointers.

Thank you for your insights, Jas It was incredible to learn about not just like communication and entrepreneurship, but also j a person and understanding others as people navigating life efficiently.

Yes And thank you for our viewers for joining us.

Until next time, goodnight.