A La CARTe Connection
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Financial
Independence for those we love most
Presentation by: Sharon Lechter | Captioning by: A La CARTe Connection www.alacarteconnection.com A La CARTe Connection | www.alacarteconnection.com
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A La CARTe Connection
www.alacarteconnection.com
>> SHARON LECHTER: Hi, I’m Sharon Lechter. Welcome to the Sharon Lechter website ( http://www.sharonlechter.com ). You may know me as an author or co‑author of a book that you may have read, but I’d like to tell you a little bit more about me. I grew up in a very lower middle‑class home. My father was career Navy, he didn’t get past the third grade. My mother had a high school degree. And their dream was that their daughter would have a college education. My sister and I both graduated with college degrees. And I started my career in accounting, one of the big 8 accounting firms, back when there were the big 8, many, many years ago. So I fulfilled that dream for my parents and started my accounting degree and my accounting career in the mid‑’70s. And it wasn’t very long after that that I realized the entrepreneurial bug bit me. You know, when you’re 26 and you know everything, well, I started building my own companies when I was in my mid‑20s. And met my husband, fell in love, got married and we had children. And as we progressed through our marriage and raising our children, family was very important to me. And as my children got to be a little older, they didn’t like to read. So I met the inventor of the first talking book. You know, the children’s books that have the sound strips down the side that make noise and music. And I helped that inventor grow that business. It was called Sight and Sound. And it started way back in the 1980s, ‘87. It was a time when bookstores were very quiet places. They didn’t like us coming in because they didn’t want noise in their bookstores. And so if you fast forward to today and think of the robust places bookstores are now, we’ve come a long way. But then my children got older and we relocated to Arizona back in 1991. And it was in ‘92, my oldest son, Philip, went off to ASU and got into credit card debt. I was so devastated. Was I mad at him? Yes. But I was more mad at myself, because I thought I had taught him about money. I had taught him the things that my parents had taught me. But I didn’t have credit cards when I went off to college. And so he was with me when I used my credit cards, but he wasn’t with me when I paid them off every month. And so his first semester in college, he got himself in a lot of credit card debt. Came home and said mom and dad, will you bail me out? And our answer was no. And it took him 7 years to get out of credit card debt and to repair his credit, but I’m
A La CARTe Connection | www.alacarteconnection.com
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A La CARTe Connection
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happy to say that Philip today stands side by side with me and is president of my company, Pay Your Family First. And he’s as passionate as I am about providing the educational tools to help anyone wanting to take control of their financial life. But that was back in 1992. And at that point in my life, I dedicated my career to financial education and financial literacy tools. Fast forward a few years, and I met Robert Kiyosaki, we wrote “Rich Dad Poor Dad,” started a company together for 10 years, and did 14 Rich Dad books. And then in 2007, I was still just as committed to family and young people and entrepreneurship education, and so I started my own company, Pay Your Family First. And that was the year when I had the call from President Bush asking me to be on the very first president’s advisory council. What an honor, what a incredible humbling experience. And I served both President Bush and President Obama. And then coming full circle, we talk about the importance of association and who you hang out with, well, coming full circle, in 2009, I was asked by my profession, the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, to serve on their national commission on financial literacy. And I still serve in that role. And it’s a huge honor to represent my profession. Because CPAs across the country are providing very essential and important financial education and financial support to their clients. So also in 2008 was when I had the call from the Napoleon Hill Foundation. And I’m very humbled and honored that I am working with the Napoleon Hill Foundation to bring Napoleon Hill’s words of wisdom, his words of self‑determination, entrepreneurship and the fact that each and every one of us can take control of our own lives, be CEO of our own life, and take control of how we are building our wealth and making sure that we not only earn it, but employ it and preserve it, so that our families can have a strong financial future. So welcome to the Sharon Lechter website. I hope you’ll find resources to support you and your family. Because at the end of the day, it’s up to each of us to pay our families first and ensure financial independence for those we love most. Thank you.
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