Episode 032
Susan Perry
Is your business stuck on a “hamster wheel” of rework and relaunching? In this episode of Women’s Million Dollar Conversations, Alice Tang speaks with Susan Perry, a transformational change agent who knows exactly how to knock down resistance and accelerate growth. Susan shares her personal story of growing up without abundance and how she spent 20 years strategically building a million-dollar net worth through resilience and constant education. Learn why Susan believes money represents the ultimate freedom of choices and why caring for yourself—”paying yourself first”—is a lesson worth mastering.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
-The “Organizational Fixer” Blueprint: How Susan turns teams into efficient machines by removing the drain of rework and retraining.
-Money as Choice: Why Susan defines wealth as the freedom of independence to spend time with family, community, and clients.
-The Long-Term Play: Insights into the 20-year journey Susan took to reach a million-dollar net worth using employer tuition reimbursement to earn her MBA.
-Analytical Decision Making: Susan’s process for navigating high-stakes decisions by evaluating outcomes against clear definitions of success.
"Having an outward focus will never ever serve you wrong, having that opportunity to serve others, having that opportunity to help others doesn't come from inward thinking."
[00:00:00] Welcome to Women’s Million Dollar Conversations with Alice Tang, where we share stories from successful business women who have saved, earn or sold over a million dollars and discuss how they build their success and insights to help you achieve your goals. Now let’s join the conversation.
Alice Tang: Good morning, my friend from the East Coast, Susan Perry. How are you?
Susan Perry: Good morning, Alice. I’m well, thank you. How are you?
Alice Tang: Good. Thank you for being a guest and making time for this important recording. To me, it’s really about empowering women so that they can reach to the moon.
And you’re one of the role models. Susan, our audience would like to know about you. Would you introduce yourself and tell us a little bit before we get into the questions?
Susan Perry: Absolutely. So my name is Susan Perry and I opened my consulting doors four years ago and Accelerate Your Changes is the name of my company.
My [00:01:00] business is focused on making change happen. So we all know one thing is constant and that’s change and most naturally resist it. But not us, of course, everybody else. But what if we could not only fully accept changes, but also accelerate them? That’s what I’m focused on as a transformational change agent and a strategic advisor.
I like to call myself an organizational fixer because I know how to turn businesses and their teams into fast moving machines. And we all know in today’s day, we need to be moving as quickly as we can to get the results we need. So I help them improve performance and engagement and really help them grow their revenue and get.
Successful outcomes from their changes and really having leaders learn how to capitalize on change intentionally. So what does that mean? That means that I’m helping them to design strategies and roadmaps specific to their [00:02:00] needs and challenges so that they can drive results as quickly as they can. I like to use a people centric and inclusive approach to change leadership really to help knock down any resistance that people might experience.
It means change happens much faster. And then I also like to diagnose what’s getting in the way of outcomes. I like to say, get my clients off the hamster wheel of relaunching, re communicating, retraining, do overs. It’s all costly rework and it’s really a drain on everyone’s energy.
So that in nutshell is what I do in my business.
[ 2:41] Alice Tang: Great. So the first question, Susan, we start easy. What’s the value of money?
Susan Perry: So the value of money. I’ll say we didn’t have a lot of it growing up and decisions were extremely guided. My dad worked several jobs. My mom went back
into the workforce. Third, fourth [00:03:00] grade of when I was in school. So I really learned firsthand how really hard you have to work for what you need and what you want. And I also learned that. You can never take it for granted. You need to have a plan. You need to think about what is your goal and then adjust your actions.
Spend wisely is really, the philosophy that I’ve held throughout my life. Give it some time. Be thoughtful.
Alice Tang: I also have the privilege of talking with Susan a few times before this recording. So she has mentioned money really mean freedom of choices for her. So would you expand a little bit, Susan?
Susan Perry: I would, it creates freedom to do what I love being able to spend time with who I love my family, my community, my clients, [00:04:00] and do the work that I love. Without that freedom and I will also add independence, it gives you a level of independence in the life you want to live.
Alice Tang: I cannot agree more with that because in my daytime job, I tell people what to do.
And many times I think everything is falling down to financial freedom and financial independence. So knowing that you’re resilient, even let’s say the COVID hit the jobs are drying up. So for somebody who’s owning a business, right? So you don’t worry so much about it. You can still make your payroll make sure you take care of the people around you.
Now Susan. I know from our conversation just right before the recording you mentioned you want to focus on saving to a million. Can we ask how long does it take for you to get to your million dollar net worth? And what is one of the biggest bias in between as you were getting there?
Susan Perry: [00:05:00] So It’s taken a long time. I would say a good 20 years with clear goals, focus, determination, a lot of grit and patience. And, what I would say from a bias standpoint is, being a female has been a challenge. Not so much today as it was as I was navigating my career early on.
With so many men, successful men in the workforce. And I would say part of that for me was a bias around my education. So not having enough of it, my parents didn’t have the money to send me to college, and school loans weren’t a big thing way back. And so as a result, I.
Was a student for a large part of my professional career attending college by taking advantage of my employers tuition reimbursement benefits up and through the [00:06:00] time I earned my MBA. So that, has been a challenge one I think I’ve successfully overcome, but it didn’t happen easily. It didn’t happen without a clear goal, and without that determination and that ability to be resilient in spite of all of the challenges. You just have to do it.
Alice Tang: You’re not stoppable. What I’ve gotten is once you have a very clear vision of what you want, including getting to the million dollars of saving and finishing at least two degrees that I heard about now. So have a clear goal and then just keep going at the goal.
Susan Perry: I would also add, care for others. We have to care for ourselves. We have to not only pay attention to ourselves and our needs , and making sure that, we’re doing the right things, but we also need to pay ourselves [00:07:00] first. We don’t often think of, building our personal equity in that way, we make a lot of sacrifices.
But we can’t always sacrifice ourselves. And that I think is such an important lesson. It’s a difficult lesson, but one that is worth paying attention to because without that clarity and without that desire, it becomes a far more difficult road. a far more difficult goal to achieve.
Alice Tang: . Absolutely. I would imagine many of us have heard about the oxygen mask analogy when something happened, on the plane, you were told over and over again, every time before it. Takes off, put the mask on yourself first, right before you attend to the people around you, the baby, the child, or the elderly, because you
need to help yourself first. And then one of my favorite author Barbara Stanny, who wrote the book The six figure woman, probably [00:08:00] two decades ago and overcoming under earning her theory was, make sure you save enough for yourself before you consider donating a huge part of your wealth
or giving it to the friends and family
Susan Perry: yes, absolutely.
[8:14] Alice Tang: , beautiful. So on to the next question on your journey to your million dollars, obviously there are times when it’s topper is more difficult to put away a few dollars to a few hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars and there must be a point where you feel, oh gosh, I want to quit.
What kept you going?
Susan Perry: So Alice, I will tell you quitting is not in my vocabulary. I’m a fighter. I have a lot of energy and I find a way. It may not be the way that I had originally planned, but it’s a path forward is what I’m always looking to achieve. I think that I’ve had enough setbacks and not so great experiences and disappointments in my [00:09:00] path.
That have really helped me to build that resilience as well as build that confidence to know that I can keep going and I can get to where I need to be. It may not happen always in the way I envisioned it may not happen in the time frame but I’m not going to be too far off, and there isn’t only one path there are multiple paths.
I think. Realizing that don’t be stuck on exactly one way because generally things don’t always turn out that way and I think that’s what’s makes me so good at what I do in my change consulting work that I’m able to turn things on their head and see them a little bit differently and find a way.
Alice Tang: Very good. So turning the challenges to your strength or your success. And there’s always a path, it may not be your originally perceived path.
When you’re making a huge life changing decision talking about
00:10:00] changes. What process do you put in place to make such a decision?
Susan Perry: I think for me, I’m clear on my goal and I’m clear on the outcomes and I’m clear on what success looks like. I’m able to look at the alternatives then and really evaluate what are the pluses of something? What are the minuses of something? What are the different options or paths? I’m pretty analytical, but I also trust what’s in my heart.
That helps me to arriving at a decision, whether it’s a really big one with high stakes or something that , means a lot to me. That’s what I do. I go back to what’s my goal. What are the outcomes? It’s like sometimes things get in your way. It’s called a deer in the headlights moment.
If you can bring yourself back to what it is you’re after and being clear on the outcomes, write down what a success look like what is going to be different. I ask my [00:11:00] clients that. That is the way I navigate through those difficult decisions.
Alice Tang: Very powerful. Now we’re winding down to the last three questions.
[11:17] What is one piece of very good Or very bad advice that has made a huge impact to
you
Susan Perry: very good or very bad advice. It’s not about you, it’s about them. You need to be thinking about who’s in your circle, who can you help and support, what do they need. And how do you bring people along having an outward focus will never ever serve you wrong, having that opportunity to serve others, having that opportunity to help others doesn’t come from.
inward thinking. It doesn’t come from a focus on you. I’ve learned that it’s not all about you. And even though you have your own goals, there are other ways in which you can make a difference in this [00:12:00] world. And I’ve also learned that in the darkest times that I’ve experienced if I’m giving Back , helping somebody else that really is helping me to see that light.
Alice Tang: That’s so true because sometimes we can untangle ourselves. So let’s take the focus off me and project it to somebody else. And actually is a brain break to me, you take a break for your brain for your mind, not keep solving right Einstein said keep doing what you’re doing is insanity, so you can stop doing that.
[12:36] What are you grateful for?
Susan Perry: Oh, I’m grateful for so many things.
I’m grateful for my family. I’m grateful to be in a location that has terrific health care because of my daughter and what she’s experiencing. I’m grateful for the faith that I have, the experiences that I’ve [00:13:00] been on. I really have a lot to be grateful for. , my life has been wonderful.
Alice Tang: Thank you, Susan, for today’s time together. If people would like to get a hold of you, how do they get to you?
Susan Perry: They can find me on accelerateyourchanges. com or LinkedIn.
Alice Tang: .
Thank you so much. I’m grateful for you.
Susan Perry: Thank you, Alice.
Susan Perry is a highly experienced consultant, thought leader, and speaker specializing in Human Resources leadership, business transformation, and change management, with over 25 years of experience delivering transformative results.
Prior to establishing her successful consulting practice, Susan served as the Vice President of Change Acceleration for Comcast Spotlight for five years. In this role, she conceived and built Comcast Spotlight’s change management Center of Excellence (COE) practice. Her pioneering efforts significantly improved change and project success rates, resulting in the realization of change ROI, enhanced business results, and a better customer and employee experience.
Susan holds an MBA from Simmons Graduate School of Management in Boston and is a graduate of WICT’s prestigious Betsy Magness Program. Her passion lies in helping organizations achieve transformative results through strategic organizational change.