Welcome to E!'s Tales From the Top, our series on women who are leaders in their fields and masters of their craft. Spanning industries and experiences, these powerhouse women answer all the questions you've ever had about how they got to where they are today—and what they overcame to get there. Read along as they bring their resumés to life.
When it comes to rising and falling, Bethenny Frankel only believes in one of those things.
"Seeing some people become billionaires by skipping college and starting businesses in their garage makes everybody think that they need to be on the road and know exactly where they're going," the entrepreneur and author of the new book Business Is Personal: The Truth About What it Takes to Be Successful While Staying True to Yourself told E! News. "But that whole journey is where you learn everything. And you just sort of fall and land."
Actually, she continued, "You don't even fall. You wind up where you're supposed to be by all the different experiences and the different jobs that you take, and you figure out what you like and what you're good at. Everyone just wants to instantly get there and that's the opposite of the point."
Not that the rising part is guaranteed. But, as Frankel views it from her perch at the top of her game, there's a path for anyone who's willing to go for it.
"Hard work and loyalty are way more valuable than actually being brilliant," observed the SkinnyGirl founder, Real Housewives of New York City alum, The Big Shot With Bethenny host and... well, the list goes on and on.
"I'm not lazy, I just go get it," Frankel said. "I have a positive attitude. You do everything to the best of your ability and now, coming out on the other side, I realize that the cream does rise to the top. If you are passionate, hard-working, and loyal—and you really put your all into it—you really will be successful, because that's a very rare skill set."
The struggle can be real, she acknowledged, and being able to deal with setbacks is essential, whether personal or professional—or, in Frankel's case, as a reality-TV star, a combination of the two.
"It's a marathon," the 51-year-old said. "At 18 miles, people are dying, they think they can't do it. That's where they really give up hope, but that's when it matters. And then you just hit your stride. That was me in my divorce—10 years long. Do you know how hard that was? It almost killed me. But I took it as a golf game. It's one day at a time. Some days I was really miserable and it was terrible. But you just find it. Go dig deep, it's there. No one successful hasn't felt that."
The mom of 12-year-old daughter Bryn also remembered pulling a swimsuit collection from HSN at the 11th hour because she felt the quality wasn't there yet, even though not going through with the launch cost her more in the moment than if she'd put an inferior product on the market.
"That day I was playing chess," she recalled. "I was saying, 'We're going to put this on air. It's ill-fitting. We're just going to jam it through, sell it to customers that buy other products of mine that know who I am—or don't know who I am and have just stepped into the store for the first time—and sell them garbage. And then they'll feel that it's garbage and return it. It's then going to cost HSN money and it's going to end up boomeranging back on the partner that I have anyway, because they're going to have to pay for those returns, and this is a total s--t-show. So why don't I just take the hit right now?'"
"If I had gone through that whole process," she explained, "it would have cost me a lot less because the partner wouldn't have made me pay it. By [postponing], I ended up having to pay $25,000 or $50,000 for this problem. But I gladly did it."
It may have been painful in the moment, but it was worth it in the end to protect the name brand she'd worked for years to build.
And for those who are still a bit of a drive away from digesting a $50,000 loss, Frankel has a first step for that. Though it may sound simple, she said, "You just have to get started. You've got to get in the car. You don't get in the car, you're not even on the way."
Of course, the road can sometimes be scary, you never know what's around the next corner and you may plow into more than one ditch along the way. But, Frankel emphasized, there's no other way but through. And you've definitely got to be willing to lose the map.
"You're going to figure it out as you go," she insisted. "You've got to do it. You can't be stuck in the plan. Success comes in many forms and there's non-traditional success everywhere, you've got to get in the goddamn game."
But once you're in the goddamn game, what then?! Frankel talked to E! News about pushing past your fears (no, you're not the only one who's scared of cold calls), trusting your gut and why business really is personal:
(This interview was edited for length and clarity)
E! News: Why did you begin your book talking about your businesses that were the hardest to get off the ground?
Bethenny Frankel: Because everybody thinks now, in the land of social media and reality television, that it's Chia business and you can just add water. Everything, even if you are on television, takes a lot to nurture. You have to build a house starting with a strong foundation and go one layer at a time. Even in recently learning about makeup, you can't just slap it on, you have to start with priming and foundation. Things have layers, and business is obviously no different.
E!: What would you say about going through those hard moments?
BF: It makes you more resilient. It also makes you have more pride and feel that there's a value to what you built, that you deserve it, and it gives you self-worth. And when you feel you've done it properly with integrity, it's great.
E!: You make the point, too, that you didn't necessarily have the same fallback that other people may have where if I need to, I can go to my family. Do you think that helped you be such a hard worker?
BF: I just have always been a hard worker. I don't know if it's the example that I saw from having a hall of fame horse trainer as a father [Robert Frankel, inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1995], who was competitive and successful, and that's genetic. Or if, growing up at the racetrack, I learned there's no second place, you have to win. I don't know, I've always been this way.
E!: You also make the point that hard work can set you apart.
BF: Being willing to work hard, coming from a place of yes, having the figure-it-out mentality, not being negative, just being on top of it. It's the old-school mentality that I have. And when people around me have it, I can see it instantly and those are the ones that last.
E!: You also wrote about cold-calling people. I think that's one of the more terrifying things to do, but why is it so valuable?
BF: It's so valuable because you probably have something to offer. It's how are you going to package it and have it locked down in a brief period to engage someone, entice them or just plant the seed that they now know who you are. Then you might run into them, or see them, or send another email or a follow-up or a gift. This book is really about a road to non-traditional success and utilizing it as a tool kit for any person. The book is digestible at every level of business, from a person who just has an idea to a person who's already very successful.
E!: Looking back at your own career, what was the first moment where you thought, "Oh, I'm doing this, this is the first big win"?
BF: I remember talking to some people after I'd been on the Housewives and I had my book coming out, Naturally Thin, and I said to them, "Everything's going to change in March." And I just pushed it through. When you're on a blackjack table or a craps table and the tables are hot, you press your bets. You don't think about later and what's going to happen, you've got to just feel that set and just ride it.
E!: You talk about the time after The Apprentice: Martha Stewart, when you thought it was going to be the start of everything and it wasn't. How did you force yourself to keep pushing forward?
BF: I thought that all the [Bethenny Bakes] cookies were going to sell and that was going to be the whole thing. That was a great lesson, that reality television is fool's gold. Just being on TV doesn't mean you're going to be successful by any stretch of the imagination. It was a dry sponge that had a tiny bit of moisture still left in it, because I was more than a total nobody. I had been on television, I had worked for Kathy, Paris and Nicky Hilton. So I had the tiniest bit of something that a magazine might think is interesting and I just took it for all that it was. I remember getting the Today show and I remember OK! Magazine and In Touch writing something about me. It's a stepping-stone. You just take one thing to get to the next thing.
E!: Do you have advice for how people can push past roadblocks when they're at their lowest?
BF: Listen, pros play hurt. Whatever you're experiencing now, it can be way worse when you're really successful. So if you don't got it now, you don't got it later. I've literally been sweating in my cracked-windshield, $500 Ford Bronco making thousands of cookies, and then shrink-wrapping them by hand in a single machine, and blow-drying the shrink-wrap seal on. Then, getting in a car at 6 in the morning after baking all night and delivering them to all these delis to deliver two dozen—then pick up 18 from the week before because the cheap wrapper was open or crumbling or moldy. I mean, I have seen it all. You've just got to grab something and figure it out. Otherwise, you're not built for this anyway.
E!: You talk about not just building the brand, but protecting the brand. What steps are important for maintaining your success?
BF: Establish what the line is, where the line is, what it means, what the message is, what the brand is, what the culture is, what all of it is—and do not stray. The way that you have morals and ethics in your family, what your kids can and can't do, what you accept or don't accept from your partner or spouse—whatever that is, that's the same thing in business. The line can't just keep moving. You can't just say, "Oh, I guess I'll do that even though it's cutting corners." Then your product's going to end up s--tty. Or, "I guess I'll partner with that person even though my gut instinct says that they might be a little shady." Then your business is going to be shady. You've got to stick to the program and you have to be strong, because it's easy to see the shiny objects.
E!: Just how important it is to trust your gut and the idea that you know when something is not right?
BF: There's no way to state how important that is. You can feel it. Get it out of the way now, just don't go down that road. People who are doubting getting married, you feel it. If you have major doubts, don't think, Oh, later you'll make it better, you'll figure it out, you'll stuff it down. Just don't stuff it down, whatever it is. You've got to deal with it.
E!: You wrote, if you want to get something done, ask a busy woman to do it. What did you mean by that?
BF: I just watch women, and they've got to go to the drugstore and they've got to try to look good and conceal their under eyes and do their grays and get a manicure and go work out and maintain intimacy and plan a vacation and get the costume for the kids and get the lunch done. All of this. Not to say that men don't do a lot, but in society right now, these are jobs that women are doing with careers. And even if they don't have a career, it's just a lot to do. And they do it with grace and without complaining and they just get it all done. But if you're sitting around doing nothing, you'll get nothing done. The less you have to do, the less you'll get done.
E!: What has been your proudest career moment thus far?
BF: I think getting the cover of Forbes is pretty substantial.
E!: You talk about not making grand plans, but rather trusting the process. What does that look like for you?
BF: I keep saying no to deals that don't feel right to me. If I don't like doing it, I'm not doing it. If it's making me feel stressed out and unhappy and it's a toxic addition to what's going on in my infrastructure, then we're not doing it. If it's really messing up the work-life balance that myself and my staff have, then we're not doing it. I'm taking a lot of things off the board and staying really disciplined. Then, if there's something great that comes, I have so much room for it. But it all happens organically. I just was approached about a very interesting entertainment opportunity and I'm taking it—and it just came to me. There's nothing about me that's searching for anything. I'm doing what's right in front of me. I'm looking at the B.S. in beauty, so I'm recording videos to talk about that. I wrote Business Is Personal because it couldn't be more true.
We independently selected these products because we love them, and we think you might like them at these prices. E! has affiliate relationships, so we may get a commission if you purchase something through our links. Items are sold by the retailer, not E!. Prices are accurate as of publish time.
Business is Personal: The Truth About What it Takes to Be Successful While Staying True to Yourself by Bethenny Frankel
For more tips and insights on building a business while maintaining balance, pick up a copy of Business is Personal.
(E!, NBC and Bravo are all members of the NBCUniversal family.)