[6:12] Growing up in Slovakia and Developing her Passion for Language Learning

• Becoming passionate about foreign languages in high school
• Wanting to be a professional conference interpreter
• Learning her first two foreign languages, English and German, in the classroom

[9:29] Developing Her Own Unconventional Methods of Learning Languages Fluently

• Learning Spanish on her own by reading Harry Potter
• Practicing listening and speaking with native Spanish speakers
• Refining a replicable process for learning any language

[13:57] How Lydia Retains Fluency in 8 Languages Simultaneously 

• The #1 key to retaining fluency even when you don’t speak it for a long time
• The importance of getting to the B2 Fluency Level 
• Learning only one new language at a time

[17:08] Lydia’s Principles for Becoming Fluent in Any Language 

• Having a compelling reason for learning the language
• Making language learning fun for you
• Having effective methods 
• Work with the language one hour a day for 500 hours
• Creating habits and systematizing your language learning

[20:34] Lydia’s Journey into Entrepreneurship 

• Lydia’s freelance career as a professional interpreter trading time for money
• Getting advanced degrees to become a high-level conference interpreter 
• Overcoming self-doubt and deciding to start an “expert business”
• Overcoming “imposter syndrome” by creating a supportive network of entrepreneurs 
• Developing and validating her minimum viable product 
• Refining her product using focus groups to get better results
• Offering her initial services for free in exchange for testimonials

[30:02] Learning How to Build a Business 

• Learning to create an online course
• Bartering her language skills for other skills she needed to build her business
• Using automated webinars to sell her online course 
• Building a team and starting to scale her business
• Lydia’s reflections on the difference between being a freelancer vs. a business owner
• Refining her product over multiple focus groups
• Describing her current product offerings
• How Lydia teaches people to learn languages she doesn’t even speak
• The customer journey at Lydia’s company
• Why Lydia started by niching down and marketing her product only in Slovakia 
• Lydia’s expansion into the international market
• The power of affinity-marketing

[47:51] Scaling Her Business by Hiring Her Best Customers and Raving Fans

• The huge value of hiring your raving fans and brand loyalists
• How Lydia creates a fun and cohesive company culture
• Organizing in-person team retreats for her remote team
• How Lydia manages her distributed team of 12 women
• Why Lydia only hires her satisfied customers
• Lydia explains her hiring process

[56:17] Similarities between Learning to Build a Business and Learning a Language

[58:16] How Lydia Manages Stress as an Entrepreneur

• Looking at setbacks as ‘lessons’ instead of ‘failures’

[1:00:43] Lydia’s Productivity Techniques and Work-Life Balance

[1:05:51] Reflections on Traveling to Over 40 Countries 

• What travel means to Lydia
• The difference when you speak the local language fluently
• Lydia’s most memorable travel adventures

[1:12:50] The Lightning Round

• The Top 2 Books Lydia Recommends
• The #1 App Lydia Recommends
• The Person with whom Lydia would most like to have dinner
• The Advice Lydia would give to her 18-year old self
• The Advice Lydia would give to anyone who doubts their ability to learn a language
• Lydia’s Top 3 Travel Destinations
• Lydia’s Top 3 Bucket List Destinations

[1:22:53] Contact Lydia

• Lydia’s website 
• Follow Language Mentoring on Social Media