https://www.podbean.com/site/EpisodeDownload/PB17AA00DCD3K2

In this compelling episode of the GSD Factor Podcast, host Misha Bleymaier-Farrish sits down with Téa Phillips, founder of ATS Innovations and inventor of the Metaflex glove. Téa shares her entrepreneurial journey, the challenges she's faced, and the impact her product is making on people's lives.

Powerful Quotes from Téa Phillips

"Being an entrepreneur sucks. It's difficult. This is the hardest job I've ever had. And I went to engineering school and I got my way through that. And this is way more difficult because there's not a roadmap."

"The journey has just been like getting knocked down and then getting back up and taking that next step forward and getting knocked down again. And every once in a while I take that next step forward and then the staircase becomes an elevator and I rise to this next level."

"If I didn't have something that was having such a big impact on people's lives, then I don't know if I'd still be on this journey."

"I don't want to just share the highlights. I want to be real. I want people to know what it takes to do what I'm doing."

Key Takeaways

1. Find Your Why: Having a strong purpose behind your business is essential for pushing through the difficult times.
2. Build a Support Network: Surround yourself with different groups of people who can support various aspects of your journey—industry experts, fellow entrepreneurs, and personal cheerleaders.
3. Practice Servant Leadership: As a leader, your job is to support your team, not the other way around.
4. Embrace Resilience: Entrepreneurship involves constant ups and downs; resilience is perhaps the most important trait for success.
5. Be Authentic: Share both the good and the bad of your journey to help others feel less alone and build genuine connections.

The Metaflex Story

Misha: Téa Phillips, I'm so excited to have you on the show today. Tell everybody a little bit about your story first.

Téa: I'm the founder of ATS Innovations and the inventor of the Metaflex glove. Metaflex is something that I invented when I was studying mechanical engineering at Tennessee Tech University. We were trying to help people manage arthritis at home.

We found compression and grip strengthening were two of the most recommended therapies that were non-medicinal—just a holistic way to manage pain. Compression was easy enough, but people weren't doing their grip strengthening exercises because it's burdensome and time-consuming.

So I made a wearable grip strengthener that allows you to build that strength, mobility, flexibility, and range of motion as you're going about your day. It's got resistance bands sewn into the fingertips that run the length of the fingers, mimicking the tendons, ensuring natural hand motion, and providing a little resistance as you close your hands. And then it has that really gentle compression to help with circulation, pain, swelling, and stiffness.

We got it to market last year to help people with arthritis, and it's helped so many more people in ways I didn't expect. It's now being used by athletes for grip strength, people with carpal tunnel, and many others. About half of our users are using it to sleep, just to keep their fingers extended during the night.

The Raw Reality of Entrepreneurship

Misha: What I love about our conversations is they're always raw, always authentic—it's always what's going good, what's not so good. Let's have that honest conversation because I think so many times entrepreneurs have those ups and downs. Sometimes you just need rehab, or sometimes all you need is a helping hand. Because of social media, it always shows the good. I really want to encourage those that there's not always good days. What is Téa's tidbit of information around how it's been?

Téa:  "It has been difficult. It sucks being a business owner. When I say that, other business owners start nodding their head like, "Yeah, girl, that's what it is."

I don't see people that look like me in the rooms that I go into. I'm like the odd young woman out constantly, whether it's investors, customers, or other founders.

Being an entrepreneur sucks. This is the hardest job I've ever had. And I went to engineering school! This is way more difficult because there's not a roadmap. Everybody is doing this differently, and there's a million ways to do it and a million ways to succeed. There are even more ways to fail.

I think some of my resilience comes from the fact that I love learning and I see failure as a learning opportunity instead of something that gets me down. The journey has just been like getting knocked down, then getting back up and taking that next step forward, getting knocked down again. Every once in a while, I take that next step forward and the staircase becomes an elevator, and I rise to this next level. It makes you feel so good, but that's few and far between.

I have something that I'm really passionate about and a purpose and reason for doing this. My grandma had really bad arthritis, and I watched her lose her mobility. That's why this felt so important to bring to market.

Once I got it to market, I've got customers saying, "Thank you. You changed my life. I can sleep at night. This is a miracle." It's kind of mind-blowing to read those messages, but it's also the fuel that keeps me going. If I didn't have something that was having such a big impact on people's lives, I don't know if I'd still be on this journey. I'd probably be making six figures as an engineer working for some large company, but instead, I'm scraping by and going on this passion project, this mission to reinvent healthcare."

The Importance of Mentorship

Misha: What you touch on is so important—having that "why" and remembering what is driving you. For entrepreneurs, that has to continue to be your North Star. What got me started in this? Why do I wake up every morning? Having that why, having that story, sharing that story is so important and can't be forgotten.

Téa: "I don't want to just share the highlights. I want to be real. I want people to know what it takes to do what I'm doing. Mentoring is so important—I couldn't have gotten anywhere without someone telling me their journey and story so I could figure out if this is something I want to do.

I try to share the good and the bad and the ugly because our lives right now are on social media, and that's where people go to try to find who you are. I don't want to just post about the good things, even though we all lean toward that. The truth is, life is sometimes a lot harder than it is easy, a lot more bad than good. When you share those raw moments, other people feel less alone, and we can really build community and grow together."

Misha: What you touched on around mentorship is so important. I feel very honored to be able to be a mentor. I've learned so much through that, but it's a chance for me to share my experience and the path I've taken. I talk about in my books the ability to learn something from everything and everyone.

What is one of those mentor nuggets or lessons that you have learned from one of your mentors that either you decided to be like, "I heard it, but I need to live this one out myself," or "I'm going to take that and navigate around that"?

Téa: "I've go awarded advisors, and I talk to them every month. One of the most recent talks was about how the team is growing at ATS and how do I find the right hire. I talk to everybody I can about all these problems, even when I can see that they're years away, because I want to prepare myself.

I've been learning about servant leadership from one of my mentors since 2019. I said, "I'm the CEO of a company. I want to learn about leadership. I've never led people."

We talked about how people think it's like a pyramid, with the CEO on top and everybody working for the CEO, but it's meant to be inverted. The CEO supports their staff, who supports their staff. You're meant to be a resource for them; they're not meant to be a resource for you.

Servant leadership is the biggest thing for any leader that wants to grow because you need people who feel like they're a part of the company and feel supported. So you need to make that reality for them.

A lot of the lessons I've learned are based around people. When I talk to other entrepreneurs, a lot of their struggle is people problems—managing people and trying to figure out how to get them to provide the most value to the company.

But how to get them to do that is for the company to provide value to them beyond a paycheck.

You need to offer them flexible work, consider profit sharing.

 Like Sherry Deutschman's book "Lunch with Lucy"—that's how she grew her company, by giving people a reason to increase the bottom line other than just bragging rights. Being as good to your people as you can is one of the most impactful things I've talked to my advisors about."

Building Your Support System

Téa: The people you surround yourself with set the course for your life. I was missing something that I really needed for a long time, and I found that with Brain Trust, which is an entrepreneurial organization specifically for women business owners. You meet monthly with a core group of five to seven people for four hours and go over your business problems and challenges.

It's different than talking to your friends because you're not going to solve your business problems with your friends. You need that group of like-minded business executives, someone who's in your field, at your level, doing what you're doing, that you can share lessons learned with.

So I have this group of advisors that I meet with who are industry experts in specific areas—manufacturing, medical device, email marketing, athletic sales. And then I have this group of female CEOs who talk about the struggles of balancing work life and caring for a parent or a child, employee problems, or sales problems. You need all of those different groups of people so that you as a person and as a professional can achieve your goals."

This approach aligns perfectly with entrepreneur Michael McDougald's philosophy that "the quality of your business is directly proportional to the quality of your network." McDougald emphasizes that success doesn't happen in isolation—it requires a carefully cultivated ecosystem of mentors, peers, and advisors who can provide both tactical expertise and emotional support.

For female founders especially, having access to both industry-specific knowledge and gender-specific understanding creates a powerful framework for overcoming the unique challenges of entrepreneurship. As Téa discovered, these relationships aren't just nice to have; they're essential infrastructure that provides the foundation for sustainable growth and personal wellbeing throughout the entrepreneurial journey.

Stepping Into Extraordinary in 2025

Misha: We're excited to continue to follow in your journey and excited to watch you step into your extraordinary here in 2025. Thank you so much.

Téa: Extraordinary in 2025 for me is going to be bringing on a teammate. I need to find a teammate at ATS to handle operations. So extraordinary for me would be to be able to support that person and have them take over some of my daily responsibilities so that I can focus on where we're going and not where we're at. If I can take a step back from the daily operations of the business and start planning for our future and for our exit, that would be me stepping into my extraordinary.

The inspiration for MetaFlex came from a deeply personal place. While Phillips had the technical know-how to create the product, it was her grandmother's struggle with arthritis that showed her the real-world impact her invention could have.