We were lucky to catch up with Ashley Boxer recently and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, so we’re so thrilled to have Ashley with us today – welcome and maybe we can jump right into it with a question about one of your qualities that we most admire. How did you develop your work ethic? Where do you think you get it from?
My work ethic comes as a product of visibility to women in the workforce at a young age.
I grew up in a tough and loving Chinese Jamaican home in Miami, Florida. When my parents separated when I was eighteen months old, we moved in with my mom’s parents and we never left. My mom’s family migrated to Miami in the 1970s from Kingston, Jamaica. To say I had an upbringing similar to those around me, would be far from the truth, however, it was one that showed me unconditional love in a variety of love languages (including some delicious home cooking despite whether I was hungry or not), self-sufficiency, dedication, loyalty, and authenticity.
My mom and Popo (grandmother in Chinese) worked when I was a little girl. Furthermore, my mom’s sister, my godmother, who I am very close to and grew up with, worked as well. Seeing these women have this sort of independence made a huge impact on my life and the choices I made. So much so that when I turned 16 years old, I knew I wanted to work right away. My mom allowed and encouraged me to get my first job at TCBY, The Country’s Best Yogurt, as a shift worker. She helped me open up my own bank account which had a seed fund from my Sweet 16, in order to start building my wealth. She taught me how to balance my checkbook and so forth.
When I got older and started working in college, my mom instilled some serious lessons: work hard, don’t give people a reason to talk about you, treat people kindly, cross train yourself to learn about everyone’s functions and how they work together, and have the emotional intelligence you need to get down to everyone’s level of communication. These lessons have stuck with me and have guided me through the best and worst of times.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about career before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
My boutique consulting firm of one focuses its efforts on advising companies on how to realistically scale and strengthen their public presence footprint in order to align with their business objectives and goals. The Boxer Strategy offers a variety of services to public, private, and non-profit corporate partners, including: community outreach, government affairs, corporate social responsibility, diverse vendor identification and partnerships, corporate board engagement, strategic planning, public speaking, and personal styling services.
My years of experience in a variety of external affairs roles for some of the country’s largest healthcare systems positioned me to learn from some of the best in the game. Working for large employers also allowed me to give my time, talent, and treasure to important causes, and I’m grateful for the opportunities to do so.
I try my hardest to diversify my client load and the scope of services I am doing for each. This allows me the space for flexibility, and them, the piece of mind that I don’t have conflicting work.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
1. Learning about how the sausage is made. You often hear that term when it relates to politics/government affairs. I am so grateful to one of my former mentors that he believed in me to take on a government affairs role, having not had any prior experience in that field. Learning about the political process at the state level has been extremely valuable in my career. It opened the doors for opportunities I never would have had outside of this experience.
2. Getting work experience directly following obtaining my undergraduate degree.
I’m often asked by college students about whether they should go straight through to get their graduate degree or work and my answer will always be work! I started in the workforce at the young age of 22. By the time I was 27, I was overseeing the community engagement expansion into a new market for Baptist Health South Florida, one of the largest not-for-profit healthcare systems in the country. I would not have gotten the work experience needed to have such a position and also wouldn’t have been exposed to the decision makers that put me in that position. And ironically, through my work connections, I was introduced to a higher up at Nova Southeastern University who helped me through the Graduate degree/ MBA application process. She was instrumental in helping me apply to the Board of Governors scholarship hence cutting my tuition in half and my employer paid for the other half. I ended up graduating in 2016, ten years following my undergrad graduation. So, it all worked out in my favor and for the best.
3. Hard skill learned in college which transferred – learn about your community; its elected officials and key stakeholders.
My first year in the Telecommunication News program at the University of Florida was grueling. But hey, what to expect with a program of only thirty (30) admissions a year? One of the instructors, a veteran local news anchor taught us the importance of learning about your community’s stakeholders. Know the difference between the county you live in versus the municipality you live in. Know the Sheriff, police chief, fire rescue chief. Know the difference in titles – officer versus deputy sheriff versus Trooper. Know the state and federal officials and the difference in those offices. Know whether or not you have a Strong Mayor or a mayor/manager model. All of these things matter deeply when connecting with people and learning about your community.
Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?
Growth. What a blessing to have this challenge. I remember when I was thinking about starting my company, while four months pregnant, a friend who had started her own PR company years earlier told me I need to start with one client then it will take off from there. Of course, I didn’t believe her. I had such doubt about client acquisition. But, she was right. I had one client for the first seven months. That grew to two clients at the year mark and tripled to six in less than a year of starting The Boxer Strategy.
I am working nonstop and likely need some assistance but realize that people hire me for my skillset and connections. So I’m at this crossroads of: how do I maintain my current workload and maintain sanity or do I hire someone to help with some of lingering and laborious tasks and let a little control go?
Image Credits
Picture with President Biden: Photo credit to Joe Reilly Picture with Governor DeSantis and Lieutenant Governor Jeanette Nunez: Photo credit to Executive Office of the Governor’s Press Team
