One of my favorite sayings is “There is no work-life balance, there is just life!” I say this because I live it everyday. I enjoy my work, but it is more than that. I am blessed to get to work in an industry that shows me daily how my business, the pump industry, is vital to life. From drinking water to manufacturing, none of it would be viable without pumps. Wait a second, let’s not walk past this thought! This is a huge!!! You should stop what you are doing right now and tell all your friends and family about this discovery… Pumps Are Everywhere, they Power our Lives, and are the heart of many process systems. It’s that important! I tell my family constantly how important pump systems are to our lives. I am encouraging my sons and daughter to be engineers so that they can help develop the next and more efficient system… why? Because it’s important to our business, AND it is important to our lives!

A lot of people might think we are just an advertising company; maybe even saying things like, “you want to educate pump users or inform the pump industry; talk to Charli”. But Empowering Pumps is more than that… it’s bigger than advertising a product. It is about being a significant part of our customers and readers stories. The unexpected email from the reliability guy that says you made his day with a solutions or the hometown friend reading a blog that inspires her to act; this energizes me and it energizes my team, making us to want to have a bigger impact. It is all about the connections. It is about networking with your connections in business to better their lives.  It’s about loving them enough to do what you can to help them succeed. And, whenever possible… put a smile on their face during the process!

When I started Empowering Pumps, we focused heavily on educating the industry about social media.  We hosted webinars, wrote blogs, and sat beside them to show them exactly which submit button to click.  We started to teach others how to create a LinkedIn profile; as basic as this may sound today people needed to be shown how to do this.  Now, we need to show them the “why”.  Why are we doing this? What is the purpose of networking through social media? The answer is… it has power!

I have been privileged over the last 5 years to be able to define my company’s culture and set its business goals. My personal goal and that of my business is to keep improving in every area. As a constant reminder to myself I wear bracelets that read, “Anything is Possible” and “Live Happy”.  They are mantra I have lived by every day since I started EP and I work to instill the same passion in my team. I believe you can work hard and accomplish what you put your mind to. I believe we all have different abilities and gifts so we should be realistic in our goals, but if you have a dream – GO FOR IT!

In order for me to live happy, I need to travel. Some people say I travel too much and that it isn’t all work.  The latter is true; I always try to add some time for fun to my work trips… An hour, A day, or once in a while A week.  This may seem selfish to some, but it helps keep my passion alive.  I need to experience new things and have quality time and conversations with my customers. I have many business travelers tell stories about never leaving the conference room or eating dinner in their hotel rooms; never taking the time to see the area they just traveled all day to get to! I urge you… Get out and SEE SOMETHING NEW…. Meet Someone…  Network with a stranger! They may just have the answer to your life’s question! Something you will never know if you stay in your hotel room.

Get out and connect your life with your business and live happy!