Business RadioX ®

Hugo Gonzalez With Equity Smart Home Loans

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Hugo Gonzalez is a loan officer of Equity Smart Home Loans out of the Pasadena area. His main goal is to help clients feel as comfortable with the home-lending process as he does. No one should be left in the dark with something this important.

That’s why he puts everything into mastering the loan process and effectively communicating how things are working every step of the way. He hopes that by understanding the process, you’ll be able to trust that he has everything taken care of.

Connect with Hugo on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Equity Smart Home Loans
  • Mortgage brokers vs Direct Lenders
  • Examples of how broker flexibility can save a deal
  • His approach to servicing clients
  • Getting pre-approved before beginning your search

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Pasadena, California. This is Pasadena Business Radio. And now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here for another episode of Pasadena Business Radio. And this is going to be a good one. Today’s episode is brought to you by Xavier Inguanzo, realtor. Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties. Today on Pasadena Business Radio, we have Hugo Gonzalez with Equity Smart home loans. Welcome.

Hugo Gonzalez: Hey, Lee, how’s it going? Thanks for having me.

Lee Kantor: Well, I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about equity. How you serving, folks?

Hugo Gonzalez: So, equity Smart Home Loans is a brokerage out brokerage out of South Pasadena, but they have licensing in several states. So I myself am a mortgage broker, so I work with over 200 different lenders that are partnered with equity smart home loans to find the right loan, the right deal, the maybe possibly the only deal that would work in some situations. So my job is to just align lenders with my clients to help them get into their homes or get any kind of home financing.

Lee Kantor: So what’s your back story? Have you always been involved in the real estate business like this?

Hugo Gonzalez: Oh, that’s a long one. No. So I actually just got into the mortgage business late last year, but it’s been going great despite the market not being so great. I actually used to be a content creator, so YouTube and such and a professional video game player. And then before that I worked at a big four accounting firm, Ernst, Ernst and Young. So I have a very varied background.

Lee Kantor: But so you have been kind of involved in finance and numbers part of business?

Hugo Gonzalez: Yeah. And it’s funny because that part of it taught me the technical side of the business. And then the stuff I did in between with the content and working with, uh, you know, other content creators, influencers, things like that. It built up the, uh, the social aspects of this business.

Lee Kantor: So what was kind of the most difficult transition to go from where you were to what you’re doing today?

Hugo Gonzalez: Uh, I’d say.

Hugo Gonzalez: Honestly, skill set wise, none really. The difficult part was just getting everything started, getting all my licenses right. I, I went through the, uh, the Dre license, the realtor license here in California, then got my Nmls license, and it just took some time. And you can’t really do the job in that time. So you’re kind of just prepping for what’s to come until that’s all done. But otherwise, once I started the job, I loved it and it all just felt very natural.

Lee Kantor: Now, are you running this equity smart home loans office, or is that a bigger company that you work for?

Hugo Gonzalez: No. So that is a bigger company that I work for. They are the brokerage and I hang my license under them. But I am completely independent. I, I generate my own business. I run it the way that I’d like. And they offer their support and guidance. But everything is me.

Lee Kantor: Was that difficult for you to go as an entrepreneur to now working for somebody, or this had all the infrastructure you needed in order to do what you need to do?

Hugo Gonzalez: Uh, no, I’d say it wasn’t difficult at all. In fact, I think it was one of the big draws for me to become a broker because I get to maintain that independence. So they don’t really tell me how to run my business. Uh, I, I can choose how to engage clients. I can choose, uh, the kind of work I put in my schedule where I work from. I get to keep all that independence. Uh, it’s mostly a place that offers me resources and, um, like the various lenders that I have access to, for example.

Lee Kantor: So what’s the difference between, uh, a broker versus, uh, you know, getting a loan directly from somebody? Like, can you explain kind of the difference between the two?

Hugo Gonzalez: Yeah, I think the, the two big, uh, facets of this business are direct lenders and brokers. So a direct lender will work directly for one specific lender or one specific bank, and they essentially only offer the loan programs that the bank has available. And they they go by the rules of that bank in terms of underwriting, whether they accept a loan or not. Uh, whereas with me, I shop it with various different lenders so I one can I have many options. So if one bank can’t do it, I do know of other banks that might be able to do it. So I could take the deal They’re on top of that being a broker kind of. It makes you sort of function as an advocate for the client, where you’re wholly incentivized to to close the deal. Otherwise, uh, you don’t get paid, but at a direct lender, you might have some part of it, uh, be salary and then a small portion of it be commission. So it’s just the way it’s structured, there’s just a lot more incentive for me to act on your behalf through the broker channel.

Lee Kantor: And it gives you more kind of space to be creative just because our rules at, um, you know, lender A are such. I can find lender B or C or D or Z.

Hugo Gonzalez: Right? Correct. Exactly. So, um, I think that’s probably been my favorite part of the job is how creative I can be in making the deal work, just because of all the different options that I have now.

Lee Kantor: Um, when you’re working to find your clients, is this something that you need to have kind of relationships with other people in order to kind of serve that client? Because it sounds like, I mean, when I started my business, I would go to these networking meetings and there’d be a real estate person, a mortgage broker, uh, you know, an attorney they had I called them the Mafia. They had their own little group of people that they were all kind of working together to help each other, because one lead would affect all of them. They all would touch that. That client.

Hugo Gonzalez: Yeah. Yeah.

Hugo Gonzalez: Um, yeah. Everything is interconnected, and I, I would be somebody that would be at some of those networking events. Um, but I also find that, uh, clients are everywhere. So sometimes I will go to my favorite bar where they’re having a chess night, and I will just hang out with people and play chess there and meet, meet, uh, future business partners or potential clients there, too. And, um, to your point, everything is connected. So if if I do an amazing job and I was referred by a real estate client or sorry, partner or or a financial advisor partner, then that reflects well on them as well. So then and the reverse is true also, right? Like if something went wrong then it would reflect poorly on everybody involved. So there’s a lot of stakes in every single interaction. So you always got to make sure that you’re treating everyone to the best of your ability, with the best service you can possibly offer.

Lee Kantor: And you want to kind of build that trusted advisor network where everybody is in a place where everybody knows that, hey, I know I’m watching your back, you’re watching my back. And that way the customer is going to have a good experience and know there’s like, no weak links in there.

Hugo Gonzalez: Absolutely. I don’t think there’s any room for B or C players. Uh, if, if I, I basically won’t partner up unless I know that you would treat my clients with the utmost care and respect. And, you know, dedication to making something work.

Lee Kantor: Now, um, when you got into this business, was that it was that one of the hard parts is okay, I got to get the lay of the land. Like, who are the A players here? Who are the people that I should avoid? Like, you have to know that in order to do your job well and to help your clients get the outcome they desire.

Hugo Gonzalez: Oh, yeah. Yeah, that was probably one of the, um, more difficult things. It’s kind of you’re only going to learn through trial and error in that sense. And sometimes I would work with people where, you know, thankfully, it never led to anything disastrous, but possibly at worst, just time wasted. But you got to know how they operated. And after some time you realize, wait, this isn’t someone I’d like to work with. So now I know what to look out for for the next time. And you get better at it as as you go on and you start to realize who, um, who fits exactly the type of person you want to work with.

Lee Kantor: So now let’s talk about, um, you know, kind of the nuts and bolts of what a day in your life looks like. So a person comes to you, they’re ready to buy a house, or they’re coming to you, you know, to pre-qualify. Like, what is the, um, you know, kind of that first interaction you’re typically having with a client?

Hugo Gonzalez: Uh, it could be all of the above. So sometimes let’s say they were a referral from a real estate agent partner. Then, uh, they’re ready to go, right? They’re looking for a pre-approval. They’re ready to start shopping for homes. Sometimes they are just inquisitive. And they saw me post something online and they just maybe not even to find out more. They just messaged me saying, oh, these rates are kind of rough right now, right? And then we just get to talking and they start revealing their their goals of homeownership. And a month or two later now they’re there, ready to get pre-approved. They’re they’re asking me if I know any realtors that can help them out. Um, sometimes that’ll just. Everything will change very quickly. I’ve had people message me saying, yeah, we’re about a year to two years out, and then we talk and then they find out, wait, we are a lot closer than we thought we were. And then within a week, they’re already shopping for their home. So it it varies. They talk to me about anything at any stage and then we see where we go from there.

Lee Kantor: So do you have any advice for the person that’s looking for a loan. What could they be doing. You know, before having that conversation with you to get ready to maximize their chances of getting the right loan at the right rates?

Hugo Gonzalez: I think the best thing you can do is if you have an interest in buying a home or refinancing or or taking out a line of credit on your home, or doing a fix and flip anything you want to do with a home. If you have questions regarding that, just reach out to a loan officer because I think the worst thing a person can do is go to some heavily advertised or sponsored article on Google that doesn’t actually speak to your situation. If you speak to someone directly that understands your specific circumstance, you would know best what to do from there. Right? Like you. I’ve had people reach out to me thinking that they need to wait a year because they don’t have 20% down, and I say, wait, you have the minimum of 3% down already. Your credit is great. You’re about to get into another year long lease at your apartment. Is that really what you want to do? Or are you ready right now? And then they will see that they’re ready right now. But they might have just avoided the conversation altogether if they just felt like they weren’t ready to talk to me yet.

Hugo Gonzalez: Right.

Lee Kantor: Because they read some blog post that gave them some general rule of thumb that isn’t relevant to their specific situation.

Hugo Gonzalez: Exactly. And that’s not to say that the information out there is wrong. It’s just as you said, it’s a lot of things that are written out. There are rules of thumb and it doesn’t like loans are complicated. It doesn’t necessarily apply specifically to your scenario. So it’s always best just to talk to an expert.

Lee Kantor: And that’s the key thing there. You want to talk to somebody who’s done this before, not somebody who’s you know, just read an article like you like somebody who’s kind of been in the weeds of this that can kind of figure out kind of creative ways to solve these problems that a blog post just they can’t. That’s not what blog posts are, you know, general information.

Hugo Gonzalez: They’d have to write an entire story, like multiple pages to cover every possible scenario. Right? It’s just not practical.

Lee Kantor: Now, is there a story you can share maybe that explains this or illustrates this type of complexity, where somebody did come to you with a challenge that they thought maybe was insurmountable, and you were able to be to be creative to help them get the outcome they desired.

Hugo Gonzalez: Yeah. Sorry about that.

Lee Kantor: You don’t have to name the name or anything like that, but just maybe the general problem and the solution you provided.

Hugo Gonzalez: Yeah.

Hugo Gonzalez: Um, so I worked with a, um, a content creator at one point. So this is somebody who who makes videos on YouTube or live streams, games, things like that. And, um, with people like that, they could have a year where they maybe did something viral that took off and they made a lot of money one year, and then the next year their income just goes back to normal. And that normal income in this particular situation I’m thinking about was totally enough to qualify for a loan on its own. However, some lenders would find issue with the dramatic decrease from one year to the next on the income, and they might consider that income in unstable. And so my this is what I love about the job. I get to become creative and I start finding out. There’s a rule where if you are self-employed in the same line of work for five years, you get to a lender will only require one year of tax returns. So the solution was to, you know, get the CPA to write a letter to prove the five years. And then all they needed to see was the one year. And while there was a decrease, they never had another year to compare to. So just to the lender, all they knew was that my borrower made enough money in this given year to qualify. And it was and it was smooth from there. And he had brought this situation to other loan officers, and they just kept giving pushback about the stability of the income. And I just found a solution. And it was smooth and it worked out.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. And that and that having the background you had in that industry probably didn’t hurt either.

Hugo Gonzalez: Yeah, it makes them very comfortable to tell me their situation and I know how the business works. So when someone tells me they. Dropped an income, that doesn’t mean they’re not going to shoot back up the next year.

Lee Kantor: Right. That’s not a red flag to you. That’s just part of the business.

Hugo Gonzalez: Exactly, exactly. So my job is to understand what would be red flags to a lender and like and navigate that. I’m basically just aligning lender expectations and requirements with borrower circumstances. And my understanding of what they do helps me navigate all that.

Lee Kantor: And you can cherry pick the right lender for the right situation. You don’t have one way to do something. There’s lots of ways to do this. If you have the right lender and you have access to more than one.

Hugo Gonzalez: Exactly. So if there’s ever a moment where it’s a gray area, right, like the example I gave, it was per the guidelines, and I knew it would work wherever I took it. But sometimes there’s a gray area in the guidelines and I can get on the phone, call a representative from the lender, tell them the them the situation. They could tell me. Yes, they could tell me. No. And now I know who all my yeses are. And then I can choose. And I could go from there. And I’m not stuck. Whereas, you know, if you go to a direct lender and their specific lender doesn’t do it, then that’s just the end of it.

Lee Kantor: Now, do you have a niche? Is there an area that you would feel like, okay, this is my sweet spot. I want to get more clients like this.

Hugo Gonzalez: To be honest, I would say no because I have so much fun figuring out every situation that I wouldn’t say I have a niche, but where I seem to be falling into is the the um, the niche where I need to get creative. Right? The the income is there, the credit is there, or sometimes not. Right. But there needs to be a creative way to pick up the credit. Um, that’s where I shine. So if somebody feels like they might not get what they need out of, um, the easy like, you find it on Google or you go walk into a bank. If that might not be for you, then talk to me and I can get creative, and I can find the right loan and the right circumstance to make it work.

Lee Kantor: So if they’ve been kind of having having some friction with one of these mega banks, maybe it’s worth giving you a call to see if there’s, uh, other options that maybe this mega bank isn’t. It’s may not be the right fit for them, but you can possibly find them. The right the right lender.

Hugo Gonzalez: Yeah, 100%. And I’d also say that, um, sometimes you don’t want to find out the hard way either, because everything that a mega bank can do, I could do it too, right? That’s not to say that I can’t do the, the, the straightforward stuff either. Right? But sometimes people will go to these larger banks and then find out the hard way in the middle of Escrow that it won’t work and it might be too late to fix things at that point. Whereas maybe you could call me on the weekend. You could call me at 1 a.m., you could text me at any time, and I’m responsive and I you’re going to know right away what where the loan is at and what we need to do to make it work.

Lee Kantor: Now, if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on your team, what is the website? What is the coordinates to connect?

Hugo Gonzalez: Uh, so the best way to connect with me is, uh, to go to equity smart loans.com. And, uh, my, my contact info is on that website. Otherwise, I don’t know if, uh, Lee, I don’t know if I’m allowed to give my number, but I, I am somebody who is totally okay with giving that out.

Hugo Gonzalez: Well, it’s it’s.

Hugo Gonzalez: 100% the best.

Hugo Gonzalez: Way to contact me.

Lee Kantor: Um, or can they find you on LinkedIn? Is there ways to, uh, find you or just go to Equity Smart loans.com and look for Hugo Gonzalez and then.

Hugo Gonzalez: Uh, honestly.

Hugo Gonzalez: Another fun way. So this is this is me going back to my content creator roots. I don’t mind people messaging me on Instagram. I post, uh, loan officer content there. Uh, I’ve had several future clients reach out to me through Instagram. I think it’s a great space for loan officers and realtors to share information. Um, so my Instagram is at huggs 86 and I kept it to my content creator days because I don’t feel there should be a difference between my personal page and my professional page, because I keep it professional throughout no matter what.

Lee Kantor: So good stuff. Well you go. Congratulations on all the success. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you.

Hugo Gonzalez: Thank you so much Leah I appreciate it.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Pasadena Business Radio.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne With T.I. Verbatim Consulting

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Jean Kay Ibanez Payne is a Military Sexual Trauma Survivor, Certified Coach (Leadership, Emotional Intelligence, DEI) Entrepreneur, Author, Speaker Born in the United States and raised in Colombia, South America, she represents a remarkable blend of cultural experiences that shape her impactful narrative.

Following her military service, Jean embarked on a 20-year career spanning workforce training, communications, marketing, diversity, program management, and risk management. As a corporate leader, she excelled in communications, marketing, and diversity efforts, culminating in her role managing the Diversity and Inclusion program for a Fortune 200 utility company with over 14,000 employees, where she launched groundbreaking employee resource groups for veterans and women.

In 2014, she left a successful corporate career, selling their dream home and cashed out savings to start TI Verbatim Consulting (TIVC) with a mission to help people work better together. TIVC rapidly gained trust among corporate clients and government agencies such as, NASA, FDIC, and the Departments of Treasury, Homeland Security, and Defense.

Her impressive credentials include a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice, and a Master of Business Administration. She serves on several nonprofit boards and holds multiple professional certifications from accredited institutions in the areas of change management, leadership coaching, resilience, emotional intelligence, and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI).

Today, Jean stands as a powerful advocate for survivors of abuse, using her voice and her story to ignite hope in others. She embodies the belief that every woman, no matter her past, has the power to reclaim her worth and forge a life filled with purpose and joy. Through coaching, workshops, speaking engagements, and personal storytelling, she engages with her audience, imparting valuable lessons learned through her journey..

Connect with Jean on LinkedIn and follow her on Facebook.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Brief overview of her book “Reclaiming Your Worth”
  • Her experiences of losing her worth in different stages of life – during military service, in the corporate world, and as a small business owner
  • How she managed to overcome the adversities in life

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here. Another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Jean Kay Ibanez Payne and she is with T.I. Verbatim Consulting. Welcome.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to be here today.

Lee Kantor: Well, I am excited to learn what you’re up to. You’re an author, you’re a women’s advocate, and you’re the CEO of T.I. Verbatim Consulting. So tell us a little bit about your work.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: So I ten years ago, I took a leap of faith working in the corporate world, decided to to leave that behind and start a company, sold everything, cashed for one K and started this amazing company called Verbatim Consulting, which is focused, is to help people work better together. We focus on culture in the workplace, improving the culture of the workplace. So then yeah, so.

Lee Kantor: What about your your work in the corporate world kind of led you to this moment. Did something big happen or what was kind of the genesis that got you moving in this different direction?

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Well, I always believe that there’s nothing in isolation. Every decision comes about as a combination of many different things. So I just had I just had adopted a baby and I had a listing ideal boss. And then I was also navigating some aspects of my mental health from the sexual trauma in the military. So it was a combination of many different things that led me to leave everything behind and start the company.

Lee Kantor: So when you decided to start the company, did you have clients already or was this kind of like, okay, now that I’ve done this, I better find some people that want to buy some services, like how did you get your first clients?

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: My passion has always been human capital optimization and how to help people work better together, how to attract, develop and retain talent. So I was doing some of that work in the corporate world, and I literally, you know, it was a situation, kind of precarious situation where I thought about it for a moment, but I decided just to leave everything behind overnight. I didn’t have any business experience whatsoever. But my father has always been an entrepreneur in Colombia, South America, and I just decided to leave everything behind. And I’ve given some thought to what kind of company I wanted to do. And I know my passion was to help people work better together. And so that was kind of like the baseline, that trampoline for me to, to, to get going. And, uh, you know, for the first two years, I just knocked in a lot of doors and, and I was able to not take a salary for 2 or 3 years, and I was able to get my first contract within one year of starting the company. So that was kind of the launch of that of, of, uh, of the company. And I do remember that the first service that we, that we received, it was $50. And then things just kind of kept growing from there on for the next couple of years.

Lee Kantor: So when did you kind of develop this methodology around culture?

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: So the, the, the mission, it was something that I wanted to do. But um, once I started the company, it was kind of based on the dynamics and things that, that we were seeing in the marketplace. Uh, the, the suddenly quitting or they just people just leaving workplaces because of the culture. So from there, we created our own model of culture optimization, qualitative and quantitative Approach. And fast forward to two years ago, we decided to create our own software and how to analyze the culture in natural language software. So he has been an evolution for us to get to where from where we started, which was very tactical and very manual to be able now to to have something that that we can use and stand behind and have the credibility to do so.

Lee Kantor: So, um, how does kind of an engagement with your firm work, what pain is your client having right before they contact you.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: So different things can happen? Either they’re having a hard time attracting talent, the people that they have are leaving or companies have, um, ethics or just general HR complaints. So they’re trying to figure out is kind of like what is causing the issues is a is it a managerial, is it a policy? It’s a process problem. And then that’s kind of where we go into doing the qualitative and quantitative analysis, the one on one interviews, the the focus groups and really kind of going through all the policies and procedures to really understand the root cause of the problem, because there’s a big difference. With full disclosure, I love donuts, okay. Especially Krispy Kreme hot donuts. So there’s a big difference with with one person saying, well, I do want I do not want to work for X company because they do not provide donuts for us to have every day with their coffee versus having a group of employees five, 15 or 20 say that we want the same thing. So we really try to isolate what is the big root cause of the problem and what is causing that, and how does that align to policies, processes and procedures.

Lee Kantor: So now, um, when you’re working with a company, does sometimes do you have the feeling the person who hired you might be part of the problem that, um, because like you said early on, you don’t most people don’t quit jobs. They quit bosses.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Yes.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: It can be a very difficult, very difficult situation that we have had some instances. One of the agencies that we did a cultural assessment for, it was the US mint, and we actually ended up in a newspaper. So if you Google Verbatim Consulting, you will find, uh, you know, you will find an agency that that agency that we did work for. And there has been many other agencies where where the leaders who have hired us to, you know, to find out what is causing the the toxicity in the workplace Have been part of the problem. And then when you conduct a cultural assessment and you provide the results. They challenge the methodology or they might challenge the the, you know, the items, the that we have looked at artifacts. So it can be it could be it can be quite challenging and actually fascinating at the same time. Because yes, you might be cause of the problems, but it’s all about improving what you can do as a leader to create a better place.

Lee Kantor: Now, can we talk a little bit about your new book, Reclaiming Your Worth? Um, what was kind of the impetus of writing a book? Uh, that’s a, you know, that could be a job by itself.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Mhm. Mhm.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: So in addition to leading a company, I am a Navy veteran. I am a service disabled veteran. I served in the US Navy for. For a little over four years. Many years ago and over that time, I was sexually abused, assaulted and harassed. So I suffer in silence for for 20 years, which included depression, suicidal ideation and, uh, in many mental health issues. So the book really came about me reclaiming my worth because for many years, suffering in silence. And nobody knew about it, not even my husband of 30 years. What I was going through, and I was outsourcing my, uh, my mental health to other people and hoping that they would fix it. So it wasn’t until back in, you know, late 2022, when I decided to reclaim my worth, which is me taking ownership and stop outsourcing it to people around me to fix it, that I decided to take control. And, uh, in January of this year, I was finally in a place that I could write a book about my story and how I could help other sexual abuse, you know, people. And I just kind of, like, hunkered down in January and I wrote 50,000 words in four weeks. 35,000 of those in one week. So that’s how my work came about, is my story of abuse, empowerment, and how I was able to to build my life on my own terms and stop relying on people to, to resolve my issues. And that’s a long winded answer, but that’s kind of how it all came about.

Lee Kantor: So it it’s a book about your what went on personally with you. Is it does it have any kind of ties to your business at all, or is it about just as an individual kind of reclaiming your worth through that trauma?

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Well, it is it is my story as I reclaim my worth to the trauma. But it also details the fact that as I was creating my business, executing my strategies, and being what we call and define as a successful professional in the corporate world. I was suffering in silence and nobody knew because all they saw was somebody who was motivated to grow, somebody who presented themselves well. So there is a story within the story.

Lee Kantor: So now the readers who are kind of learning about the book and reading about the book, are there kind of tactics for them to kind of take control of their lives, or is this something that it’s like, well, it’s your story and this is how you dealt with it, but are there lessons from this that other people can learn from?

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Yes, yes. So the book has 20 chapters and it tells my story, but it also shares a lot of tips in in how you can reclaim your worth and just just really quick. So I have the book has been released in English and Spanish, and I also released a children’s book in December. So some of the tools that I have for the book is, um, you know, stop outsourcing your worth to people. It’s not the responsibility of anybody around my circle to to make me happy, because that just led to disappointment and unhappiness. Uh, the other thing is, as a business, as a business owner is for me, there has never been a plan, you know, a plan B, because I always have a strategy and how I’m going to execute plan A, and I’m so committed to it that I don’t even think about about plan B. Plan B means that you you’re not fully committed to plan A, and, you know, there are other things is that that I’m finding out and, you know, and you might be able to speak to this too is something that my mom taught me is surrounding yourself with cheerleaders and protectors. That’s a big one. That’s a big one for me as a business owner, as a as a as a person and realizing sometimes not all the time, that regardless of where you are in your journey of success or not, that people may only be happy for you when they’re happier than you.

Lee Kantor: So let’s talk about that a little bit. So are you saying that it’s important to have supporters and celebrators around you, or are you saying that you. That’s nice to have, but don’t kind of over rely on them and you need people maybe to tell you some hard truths as well.

Lee Kantor: Like.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Yes, yes.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: So my analogy of the the cheerleaders and protectors is that I travel a lot. And sometimes when you travel a lot, you have to become loyal to to an airline to get, you know, perks. And, uh, the one that resembles the most for me is I like Delta, and I know that with when you’re flying, you know, you do have choices, but sometimes it’s based on what you can afford. So if you do take that that that the money aspect of of the selection, you have first class, you have comfort plus and then you have main cabin. So you have three choices. So for me I look at it the same way. I have my protectors who are going to be having those tough conversations with me when I need to face the truth. I have the true leaders who are always rallying around me, and I’m talking about all the cheerleaders, you know, like 2000 followers on on Facebook and all that stuff. But I’m thinking about the people who are going to protect me when I am not in the room. And then you have the acquaintances, which are the your main classes, that those will come and go, right? They will come and go and, and you know that often you can rely on them. And those may be the people who are happy for you when they’re only when they’re happier than you.

Lee Kantor: So I think this is an important, um, point that you’re making. And I think that a lot of people don’t really, uh, lean on their team and the people around them in the most effective ways. Like sometimes you need your team to just cheer you up, and that’s all you want from them is just say, good job. You know, just appreciate me and just let me kind of vent here and just say, good job. And then other times you need their real truth. Tell me if there’s something in my teeth, you know, tell me the truth. Let me know if I’m off the mark here.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Or.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: If I’m coming out of the bathroom and have toilet paper, you know.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Right.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: And you tell me, will you tell me if, uh, if, uh, in, that’s when I go back to people will be happy for you and they’re happier than you. You know, if I have a if I have, uh, a spinach in my teeth, will you be will you tell me or will you just let me walk away and have people make fun of me.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Right. So.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Um. And I have become I think it’s part of my mental health journey. And also as a business professional, once I decided to reclaim my worth, I truly cleaned up my circle. I have a couple of protectors. I call them like my two, 3 or 4 maybe. I have like five cheerleaders. And then there’s the other, the the the acquaintances that I have. It’s nothing bad, it’s nothing good. But I’m just going to be very picky in how I spend my time. And spending time with me is a privilege.

Lee Kantor: Well, this is really, uh, really important things that we’re discussing here. And I hope the listener really appreciates, um, what you went through in order to have this kind of wisdom right now, I’m sure you, as you were going through this difficult times that, like you said, maybe other people weren’t aware of it, but obviously you were learning from it, and for you to be able to articulate these important messages is so important. And thank you for sharing.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Mhm.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: And Lee, one other thing that I want to touch on when I, when I, when I say stop outsourcing your work to people around you. How many times have you, have you had somebody who, uh, you know gets a gym membership? Let’s just be real and talk about the beginning of the year. They get a gym membership, they go to the classes maybe once a week. Uh, you know, they’re still eating bad and unhealthy food. Then they cancel the membership because I’m not seeing any results. Or. Or you are expecting the people around you to make you happy. Yeah, it is. And that’s kind of what I did for a long time is I was I was going to the, the therapist, I was going to the, the psychologist and I was not using the tools. I was not using, you know, the the items, the things that they were giving me so I could get better. And then I blamed them for that, for not improving. And it is not the responsibility of my team to make me happy. I have to find that. And that’s why I talk about self. That’s that’s why I talk about self-worth. Because self-worth is all about your self love, self value and self respect. If you can find that within yourself, you’re always going to be looking for things in a different place and you’re always going to be disappointed.

Lee Kantor: So if somebody wants to learn more about your consulting firm or get their hands on this book, what is the website? What is the best way to connect with you?

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Tiara. Beetham. Uh w-w-w at tiara. Com is the website. And then if you want to purchase my book, you can go to w-w-w, reclaim your now.com. Or you can go to Amazon. The book actually has been a best seller. And my goodness I have received so many. So much feedback from men and women that are telling me this resonates. Yep, this happened to me. Thank you for telling your story. So that’s what I’m trying to do. I’m trying to create awareness to people so people can feel safe in telling their story, but also getting help.

Lee Kantor: Well, Jean, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Jean Kay Ibanez Payne: Oh, thank you for having me. It means a lot. It means a lot to me to be able to just talk to you and then also share my story.

Lee Kantor: All right, this is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on High Velocity Radio.

Jessica Mortarotti With Carmela Ice Cream, SUN LOVE Skincare, Story of a Startup

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Jessica Mortarotti is an entrepreneur with a knack for identifying market trends and a track record of successfully launching start-up businesses. She founded & developed a farm to table ice cream company called Carmela Ice Cream in 2007, when she rightfully predicted the rise of specialty ice cream.

She was credited by KTLA in July of 2024 with starting the artisan ice cream trend. Carmela Ice Cream is to this day considered one of the top ice creams in the nation and has won numerous awards and accolades.

More recently, she worked in the wellness space when she identified a niche for a fast casual sauna concept. She developed an infrared sauna studio brand that became a best in class, industry leader that currently has over 20 locations nationwide.

Her expertise in identifying emerging trends, creating strong, impactful brands and her ability to launch concepts has led her to her newest endeavor, SUN LOVE, which is a holistic suncare business carving out an untapped niche within the $160 billion dollar skincare industry.

Jessica has been a guest lecturer on the topic of entrepreneurialism at UC Santa Barbara and was featured in a “trailblazers” event for female entrepreneurs by Voyage Magazine. She has been asked to be an expert panelist at a female entrepreneur’s event and has been the subject of many interviews on the topic. She is currently the co-host of an entrepreneurial-focused podcast Story of a Startup.

Connect with Jessica on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • New ventures: SUN LOVE, Story of a Startup

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Pasadena, California. This is Pasadena Business Radio. And now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here for another episode of Pasadena Business Radio. And this episode is brought to you by Xavier Inguanzo, realtor. Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties. Today on Pasadena Business Radio, we have serial entrepreneur Jessica Mortarotti, and she is with Carmela Ice Cream, Sun Love Skincare, and the Story of a Startup Podcast. Welcome.

Jessica Mortarotti: Thank you. Thanks so much for having me.

Lee Kantor: I am so excited to learn what you are up to. Let’s start with ice cream because everybody loves ice cream. Tell us about Carmella ice cream. How did you get that started? And kind of what was the genesis of the idea?

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah. So I started Carmella Ice Cream a long time ago. I actually started it in 2007, and I’ve always been very entrepreneurial, so it was disappointing for some people to hear, but I actually had no experience with ice cream before I started it. It was really more of an entrepreneurial endeavor for me to start a business and learn from the process of starting a business. I happen to be really into food at the time and just kind of saw a niche for kind of, you know, artisan or handcrafted ice cream. At that time, that wasn’t a very common thing at all. And so I just sort of was intrigued by creating sort of an elevated ice cream experience and had to basically teach myself how to make ice cream as my first step in that. Uh, so exercise.

Lee Kantor: So take me back to back to that. So you’re at your house and you’re like, you know what? There’s no super high end, you know, kind of farm to table ice cream. And then you just like, go on. I don’t know, was YouTube even a thing back then at that time, do you even honestly not really know how to do that?

Jessica Mortarotti: It totally. Yeah. So it was, it was really just like, oh, let’s I’m going to start an ice cream business. Had that decision. And then it was like, well, how do you even make ice cream? And so I actually started looking around for classes, kind of like you’re saying like to teach me and just sort of I think I went to one at Sur La Table and kind of watched them make ice cream. And then I ended up going to this course in Pennsylvania called the Penn State Short Course, which is. Right.

Lee Kantor: So they’re known for making, you know, ice cream or teaching ice cream around the northeast, at least, I don’t know. I guess you had heard of them here from the West Coast, but they’re known in that space. So you so you really kind of said, I’m going to educate myself. I’m not going to just try to wing this. I’m going to learn from people who are experts at doing this.

Jessica Mortarotti: Well, yeah, that’s what that was my idea. So then I went I went out to that course in Pennsylvania, which lured me in, I guess, because it was it’s famous as the place where Ben and Jerry went when they got started. So I was like, this is perfect. I’ll just go and learn and it’ll be great. And then I pretty much went to it, came home and was more confused than when I had left because it was much more geared towards bigger manufacturing and, you know, like focusing on things like what kind of stabilizer do you put in your ice cream and like preservatives and like cleaning, just stuff that, like, I wasn’t interested in doing as a small kind of craft ice cream. I wanted to make a really high end product. So I had to kind of take a step back. And I ended up actually teaching myself, um, at the end of the day, I was hoping to learn, but then I ended up just sort of going, okay, well, how hard, how hard can it be? And um, and then essentially just started tinkering around at home with recipes and found, you know, got to the point where I was happy with the flavors and recipes that I was coming up with. So I, I assumed other people would be, too. And of course, I tested on, you know, friends and family during that time as well. But do you start with.

Lee Kantor: Do you start with like a vanilla base, like what is the what is the beginning? Like, do you say, okay, let me do vanilla, let me get that down. And then I can add, you know, things to it and make it, uh, different from that point. Or do you say, look, let’s add let’s do a flavor. Let’s start pistachio or chocolate or something that’s more complicated or like what was the the 1.0 version of this?

Jessica Mortarotti: The very first flavor I ever made was rose rose petal ice cream. Um, and that was just kind of because that flavor was one of the ones that inspired me on my business to begin with. I was very into like, floral infused ice creams, um, uh, ice cream that used like, fresh herbs and spices and things like that and like seasonal fruits. So I actually made Rose as my first flavor. But the way ice cream works is basically there’s a base and then you kind of add flavor to it. So, um, I, uh, you know, basically like once you kind of have your base down, which is what gives you the texture and the mouthfeel, it’s kind of like how much sugar, how much, um, you know, egg, there’s egg yolk usually in ice cream, how much egg yolk and just kind of getting those basics down. Then you can kind of tinker with flavor. But um, but yeah. So actually the first flavor was, was Rose, which um, yeah, not not vanilla.

Lee Kantor: So is there still Rose today?

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah, I still do. Rose. Today we actually do it. Um, we try to do it in February. It’s a little tricky because we use, um, we use real roses that are grown in Pasadena, and we try to have it in February for like.

Lee Kantor: Valentine’s.

Jessica Mortarotti: Day and stuff like that, but, um, but yeah, so we, we actually put real roses, um, in our, in our ice cream that are grown for us in Pasadena because we have to have them specially grown without pesticides because most roses are heavily sprayed. So we’re not trying to, you know, infuse pesticides into our ice cream.

Lee Kantor: So then, uh, so you have this and you start developing flavors, you testing it on friends and family at that point. At what point do you say, you know what, I think I got something here. This is now I’m going to try to sell this now and see if people will buy it. It’s one thing to give it to your neighbor and they say, thanks for the ice cream. And the other thing is to get someone to, you know, cough up some cash for it.

Jessica Mortarotti: So yeah, as someone who had zero experience in ice cream and also starting a business, I basically didn’t have a lot of credibility at that time to go out and like get a big investor and like, open my own shop and do all the things that would be would have been nice to do. Um, so I had to really figure out a way to start super small. And so I actually, um, started renting kitchen space behind a pizza shop downtown LA. Like this is again, 2007. So it was like before it was cool. And it’s like now it’s like, I don’t even know if it’s cool anymore. But you know, there was a phase. Um, so it was like pretty sketchy, but. So I’d go at night and like, make ice cream in the back of this pizza shop and then took and I started selling at one farmer’s market a week. Uh, and that was how I wanted to get started, because I figured it was a good way to kind of market with like a low without really.

Lee Kantor: Not a big risk. But then you’re getting the market’s going to tell you if this is good or not. You’re getting strangers to test to see if they really like it.

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah. And you can literally like sample and hand us, you know, a spoon of ice cream to somebody and look them in the eye and kind of get their reaction.

Lee Kantor: And get immediate feedback. Right? Yeah.

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah. So it actually ended up being really good. And it made sense for Carmella Ice Cream because we’re kind of like a farm to table ice cream. So I would actually work with the farmers market vendors to use their produce and then put it into our ice cream. So it was like this nice kind of synergy that we had with that. Um, so it kind of worked out really nicely.

Lee Kantor: And then, um, at that point, was it a hit at go, like the first day you’re there, you sell out or did it take some tinkering to get the right flavor mixes that people liked?

Jessica Mortarotti: I mean, I think when I first started, yeah, I had a handful of flavors. I remember that I when I first started in the farmers markets, I didn’t even have a chocolate ice cream because I couldn’t figure out how to make it. I couldn’t figure out a good recipe for chocolate. So I just started, which is crazy as an ice cream company, but, um, I didn’t. I was like, I don’t know, I just have these other flavors that’ll do for now. But, um, it started slow, but like, actually not that slow. So the first year I think I was in the farmers market, and then I expanded to some other farmers markets around LA, um, and we were, we were voted, uh, I think best of LA. I’m trying to remember it was the first year we were there, but it was like very early on. We were picked up by like Bon Appetit magazine. Within the first year, as you know, they had us featured. And so I think it was just I think we had good timing. I think we had a unique product at the time that was, like I said, wasn’t really out there at that point. It was kind of like during the froyo era of popularity. Um, and so artists and ice cream just wasn’t a thing yet. So we were kind of timed right to be interesting. And then, um, and then, yeah, it was kind of also timed with, I guess it was like sort of the slow food movement where people were very into, like where their foods came from and like kind of the craft behind it. Um, so, so yeah. So we ended up getting a lot of recognition just simply by being out there at the farmers markets in LA and getting featured in a lot of like publications and, and shows and things like that. So yeah, now.

Lee Kantor: That’s a dream of every entrepreneur. They start a business and they get picked up by the media and they get some, uh, you know, excitement built around the brand. Was that something that just was pure luck, or did you have contacts in the media business? You had experience in marketing? Like like, did that just happen, or was it something that you were able to leverage a network to help achieve?

Jessica Mortarotti: It was honestly, I think, you know, looking back, I realize how fortunate I was at that time that that all went off so well. And again, I think it had a lot to do with just what the brand was and the product we were doing and the timing of everything. But I didn’t have, um, I didn’t have contacts in the media. So it was really just like meeting people. Again, a lot of people just out at the markets or wherever and just kind of making connections. And, um, and just figuring it out. You know, I think when I opened my first location, the shop in Pasadena, I just basically had, like, hired an intern who worked for free, who sent out a I wrote my own press release and had her send out, like announcing the shop was open and this and that and and just sort of like, fake it till you make it a little bit.

Lee Kantor: And then, I mean, I’m just trying to get for an entrepreneur that’s listening. You don’t have to be an expert and you don’t have to be, you know, this mega influencer to be successful. You have to have a good product. I mean, if you didn’t have a good product, I can’t believe that this would have all happened the way that it happened. I mean, you you had a quality product and then you grinded. I mean, you were going to the shops at night just trying to make something happen. I mean, it’s a great success story. You should be super proud.

Jessica Mortarotti: Oh. Thank you. I mean, yeah, I agree, I think you have to have a good product and then you also have to have what I always call like fierce determination. Like you have to basically not have, you know, failure as an option because you do just pretty much have to grind. And I and I definitely did when I started Kamala, I was it was a full on thing. I mean, I had my I had my daughter. I, I had gave birth to my daughter, went home 12 hours later and was like hauling her around to the kitchen to, you know.

Lee Kantor: Time to make the ice cream.

Jessica Mortarotti: Right. This is not nothing stops for this, you know. So it just it takes kind of being a little psychotic and, like, just not being willing to, you know, compromise any energy on just moving forward. I think momentum for entrepreneurs when you’re starting a business is really, really important, um, to keep the momentum moving. However, however you can.

Lee Kantor: Now, it sounds like you also had a support system that people were kind of rooting for you and giving you kind of the bandwidth you needed to get that escape velocity. Um, no.

Jessica Mortarotti: Not so sure. I mean, most people thought I was crazy because they were like, why would you make an ice cream business? Because you don’t know what how to do that, you know, you don’t even know how to make ice.

Lee Kantor: So you were fighting that. So you.

Jessica Mortarotti: I was fighting all that too. Yeah.

Lee Kantor: Well, so. But you were determined. I mean, you didn’t have you. You believed in this so much, you were investing a lot of time, energy and resources in this. This wasn’t something that’s like, oh, I’ll give it a shot. And you, you try it one time and you’re like, oh, that didn’t work out. Like you were. You put all your cards on the table and you, you went kind of all in on this.

Jessica Mortarotti: Kind of all in. Yeah. And just basically a very strong vision. And, um, this is something I always tell people too. It’s like you just have if you have like a really, really clear vision of kind of your end goal of what you want to be creating and what you want to be doing, and then you just basically as you move forward, just keep asking yourself, like, is this step I’m taking right now getting me closer to that goal or not? And then just, you know, and then you just take one step at a time and keep keep moving along and figure it out as you go.

Lee Kantor: Now how did Son Love kind of pop up here? Was this something that happened at the same time or you had gotten stabilized? Carmella where it’s it’s successful. It’s doing what it needs to do. And then now let me do something a little different? Or was this an opportunity that bubbled up, like, how did this come about?

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah. So like my actual my actual story is I had Carmella kind of kind of rolling at a certain point and then because again, like, I’m not I don’t see myself as only an ice cream person. I see myself more as an entrepreneur. I started as a second business based on an interest I had at the time in wellness, which was an infrared sauna studio called hotbox. And, um, I didn’t give you that information earlier because I don’t I’m not involved in it currently, but it was basically another business that I created from scratch and got got launched and then ended up, long story short, sort of getting purchased by a business partner. Um, but so that one was just based on, you know, my, my desire, you know, to like, you know, like wellness trends that I saw happening and things like that. And, um, so I created, like a franchise, uh, sauna studio business. Um, and then Son Love is actually about to launch. I haven’t quite started it yet. Um, it’s about to launch this spring, and it’s something I’ve been working on for probably very kind of on a part time basis for a couple of years now. Um, but it it’s a skincare business that sort of it’s sort of in, in more of that wellness vein like the other business I started.

Jessica Mortarotti: Um, so it’s just again, it’s kind of like based on personal interest, but I always look for, um, a niche within the market to kind of carve out, uh, something that’s a little more, a little bit more noteworthy, I guess. So in terms of Son Love, it’s a skincare brand. Um, that’s going to be a direct to consumer skincare brand, uh, that focuses on sun care. But it takes a different approach to sun care. It’s Its not a sunscreen brand, its more of like a holistic sun care brand, and I kind of was inspired off that because I live in Palm Springs part time and was in the sun a lot, and realizing there’s a lot more that goes into sun care than just putting on sunscreen. Um, and you want to, you know, take care of your skin in terms of like, hydration and like things you can do after you’re in the sun to kind of nurture your skin and things like that. And so, um, yeah, we’re working with, like a really cool ingredient that’s in all of our products. And, um, at the end of the day, it’s been a little similar to starting Carmela, I guess, because I, I’ve created, um, I’m creating formulations, which is kind of reminding me a bit of creating ice cream recipes.

Lee Kantor: And then this is something that you didn’t have a background in creating this. You’re learning it or you learned it or partnered with experts that knew this business.

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah. Like same same thing. I don’t have a background in this at all and have had to learn along the way, which I guess is why it takes me a little bit of time to, to get it going because, you know, and I’m still running Carmella simultaneously right now as well. Um, so yeah. So I’ve had to kind of learn about the whole industry of skincare. And there’s actually we actually are doing a supplement component to the business too. So we’re so I had to learn about supplements and also topical skincare products and just everything about those industries. And um, yeah. So that’s kind of the part I like though. It’s it’s like the fun challenge of, of learning something new and, and getting something created and launched.

Lee Kantor: Right. Like you’re figuring out a puzzle.

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah. Yeah. It’s kind of like the fun part. Now, I don’t really love the ongoing operations after that, but I like the beginning part.

Lee Kantor: Now.

Lee Kantor: How did the podcast come about? Is that is that are you kind of documenting your, uh, Your your journey.

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah, exactly. So, um, it was an idea to like, I love entrepreneurs, I love talking to other entrepreneurs. I feel like they’re my people, you know? And, um, we I can relate, and I find it inspiring. And I think it’s also the best way you can really learn about, you know, starting a business is by just hearing somebody’s story about how they started. So the idea behind my podcast is, um, yes, it’s actually it’s in real time, sort of something where I document and talk about the process of starting Sunlove, um, which I think is pretty, pretty cool because I think a lot of times people keep things close to the chest, and I’m trying to be a little bit more just like open about the process and, um, share as I go, you know, the process of, of creating this business and getting it launched. And then but I co-host it with my brother and then we also interview other, you know, basically startup entrepreneurs or entrepreneurs who have started businesses and we interview them. So it’s a mix of that and talking about the story of of starting Sunlove.

Lee Kantor: Now, is Carmella is there franchising on the horizon for that, or is that something that is going to be what it is, uh, today?

Jessica Mortarotti: Uh, I am figuring that out right now. Carmella I originally started with my now ex, who when we sort of separated, I ended up having I ended up sort of retaining Carmella for myself. And so now, um, that’s been relatively recently. So now I’m just actually deciding what I want to do. And yeah, like figuring out how I would like to grow that business and, um, the best path for it at the moment. So, so I’m not really sure right now, actually, I’m kind of like it’s a little bit in a startup phase in a way, with, with that business, even though it’s been it’s been existing for a long time.

Lee Kantor: So if somebody wants to connect with you and learn more about Carmella or Sunlove or check out your podcast, what is the websites or coordinates for each of those?

Jessica Mortarotti: Yeah. So, um, yeah, my you can do like Instagram. Jessica mortara is my my name. Um, or you know Carmella. Carmella ice cream. Com uh sunlove is Sunlove skincare.com and story of a startup. Uh is I think it’s just story of a startup podcast. Com.

Lee Kantor: Well, Jessica, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such amazing things and we appreciate you.

Jessica Mortarotti: I appreciate it I appreciate you taking the time to chat with me. Thank you so much.

Lee Kantor: All right. This Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Pasadena Business Radio.

Lizette Ibarra With Latina Chief | Diversity Executive Search

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DTLLogo-Blue-Bannerv2As the Founder and CEO of Latina Chief, Lizette Ibarra specialize in providing professional recruitment services for middle to senior-level management roles. Their mission is to transform leadership landscapes in North and Latin America, strategically emphasizing advancing Hispanic and Women Leaders.

Latina Chief is a pioneering force in Executive Search and Diversity-focused hiring. With over two decades of industry experience, she have successfully matched exceptional talents with high-impact roles across diverse industries, facilitating more inclusive decision-making within organizations.

In addition to her professional endeavors, she serve on several non-profit and for-profit boards that align with my purpose as a catalyzer for a more inclusive world. These board roles allow her to extend my impact, mainly focusing on the advancement of Women and Hispanics.

Her passion for tennis symbolizes my competitive spirit and commitment to strategic agility. She is unwavering in her  advocacy for women’s advancement and Hispanic/Latino inclusion in Corporate America.

She is open to meaningful collaborations and conversations that align with her vision for a more inclusive leadership landscape.

Connect with Lizette on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • About Latina Chief
  • Kinds of clients she have worked with

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in South Florida. It’s time for South Florida Business Radio.

Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of South Florida Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show, we have Lizette Ibarra, who is with Latina Chief Diversity Executive Search. Welcome.

Lizette Ibarra: Thank you Lee. I’m happy to be here. Thank you for having me.

Lee Kantor: Well, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about Latina chief. How are you serving folks?

Lizette Ibarra: Oh, of course. Well, we are an executive search firm. That means that we help organizations finding the talent they need in their leadership roles to be more successful. That’s the way I can sum it up. But we do have a focus on diversity. You know, it’s been proven time and time again that diverse leadership teams are more successful, are more innovative, are more productive. So we make sure that in our processes we cast the net wider and or that our talent pools are, you know, inclusive of, you know, race, gender and so that the client gets the best candidates out there, you know, to do the job, but also bringing diversity of thought to the organization. So that is what we do at Latina. Chief.

Lee Kantor: So what’s your backstory? How did you get involved in this line of work?

Lizette Ibarra: It’s it’s funny, you know, I’ve been involved in talent acquisition in some shape or form ever since I started my professional journey. I’ve been working for 30 plus years. My first 12 years were in corporate. I was born and raised in Mexico, and when I graduated, I started working for Eastman Kodak. When Eastman Kodak was like the Apple of nowadays, and I was in charge of leading the talent acquisition strategies for Mexico and Latin America. And then I worked for another world renowned organization, also in talent acquisition. And then about ten, 12 years in, I became a mom. So I decided to take a career break from corporate because, you know, it was very difficult to to deal with corporate and motherhood. So that’s how I became an entrepreneur. So instead of going back to corporate, I decided to start my own executive search practice. Given all that I knew already about what what organizations were looking for in the talent market, and that’s how I landed in this business. So, so 15 years in, I’m still up and running.

Lee Kantor: Now, when you made that switch from corporate to being an entrepreneur, what led you to lean into this diversity?

Lizette Ibarra: Well, actually, the diversity space I leaned into this four years ago when I started my search company. It wasn’t specific to the diversity space, but what I did do was I hired women to my company that, like me, had to step out of corporate to become moms for 1 or 2 years, and then they weren’t finding a path back to corporate. So that was very personal to me. So I brought a lot of these women to my organization. I taught them the search business, and together we built one of the fastest growing boutique search firms in Mexico. And then I moved to the States 11 years ago. And when I started realizing the powerhouse that Latinos are to the US economy and how underrepresented we are in corporate, that’s where I decided to shift my practice and making sure that corporations understand the power of diverse leadership teams.

Lee Kantor: Now, in the corporations you work with. Do you have a niche or is it kind of industry agnostic?

Lizette Ibarra: It’s industry agnostic, but a lot of we have a focus more on functional roles. We do a lot of searches within the HR, finance and supply chain space. That’s that’s our comfort zone. But in either process that we’re undertaking, we make sure the candidate pool is diverse. That’s what makes us different from a lot of the search firms out there.

Lee Kantor: Now, what does it look like when a client contacts you? What kind of, um, challenges are they facing where it’s it’s a good idea to call Lisette and her team. Okay.

Lizette Ibarra: Yeah. So, um, we are called when the company already conducted the search and they couldn’t find the right candidate for the role. Uh, or either this is a confidential search. Sometimes it happens, like, let’s say the CFO. They have to make changes there, and they you know, this is a critical, sensitive process for the organization. So they need confidentiality in that process. That’s where, you know, companies bring us to the table and also for very specific strategic searches, you know, searches that require a lot of technical expertise or a combination of industry backgrounds, those sort of aspects that are not easily find on LinkedIn or databases. That’s where we are brought to the table. So basically strategic searches, not easy to find candidates that that’s where we come in.

Lee Kantor: Now. Do you have any advice for the candidate. How what could they be doing today that will help them be found by you and your team tomorrow?

Lizette Ibarra: Yeah, that’s that’s a great question. You know, I believe that a lot of the candidates, especially the ones that are being successful out there right now, uh, let’s say you’re working at a corporation for seven, ten, 12 years. You’re successful. You don’t have the need to go to go out there to network. And all of a sudden you lose your job. Right. So networking is key at every point of your career, not only when you’re unemployed or not only when you are seeking your next big role. And that is something that I see a lot of the times, especially with folks that are more seasoned in their career 15, 20 years into their into their professional journey. Um, they want to make a change and they haven’t built a network where they can rely on, you know, building those relationships, uh, like true, honest relationships from the ground up, uh, to, to be able to build these bridges to their next step of their career. And also, I believe a lot of people want to have a more personal touch in, in, in their quest when they’re seeking, um, again, a transition, a new role. Because nowadays everything is, you know, so automatic. With LinkedIn and AI, uh, candidates get very frustrated that they’re not able to speak to a human being. And that’s where we come to the play. You know, as a boutique search firm, what we do is very personal, because even though you you see a resume and you can see, uh, you know, people with similar backgrounds, every story is different and every candidate brings something different to the table. So again, what I would say is network, network, network early on in your career, build meaningful relationships early on.

Lee Kantor: And is there any tactics you would use to build those relationships? Is it as simple as just, you know, getting mentored by somebody or reaching out to a thought leader in your space and building a relationship? Like, how would you go about kind of building and enhancing your network.

Lizette Ibarra: Of course it’s it’s a combination, as you very well are, you know, are you finding mentors is is key to your career, but also getting out there to your community. That’s a great way to connect. Like find something that you’re really passionate about, what inspires you and connecting your community, whether it’s that, like in my case, I’m very connected with the Hispanic community. So I connect to the chambers of commerce. I volunteer for their, uh, for their community work, and I’ve met incredible people along the way, and I’ve made incredible businesses along the way because you’re building the relationship from a from outside of an interest, if you know what I’m saying. And also, um, participating in, in industry conferences, just, you know, getting out there, what is being said? What are the people that are out there in your industry? What is happening? And LinkedIn is also a fantastic tool to network. I believe there’s still this misconception that LinkedIn is to look for a new job, and that is not the case. Um, when you’re on LinkedIn and when you invest 1 or 2 hours a week on LinkedIn, you know, saying, you know what other people in your industry are saying, connecting, commenting, posting, you know, what do you think about the trends in your industry? Those are great ways to connect and to network early on, and also find ways to give back to your community. Networking. It’s not about what you can get, it’s what you can give so that you can receive in return. So it has to be both ways.

Lee Kantor: And that’s great advice for young people, especially, um, when you join an organization or you are part of a trade group, don’t just sign up to be a member. You got to kind of volunteer and you got to you have to do some of the work. You don’t just sign up and then get a result. You have to kind of lean into there and do the work to demonstrate you are a leader.

Lizette Ibarra: Exactly, exactly. Get involved. Get involved. Not only participating, but giving. Always think what you can give to that group, what you can give to the organization. And you know, nowadays a lot of organizations have their ERG groups. So you can find a lot of groups and within your organization to connect. And eventually those people are going to probably leave to other organizations. And you have built that relationship already. So yes, it’s get involved and do not think of networking, of just of receiving, of what you can get in return, but what you can give so that you can eventually collect that relationship.

Lee Kantor: Now, earlier you used the word transitions. That’s also the name of your new book. Can you talk a little bit about the book and what we can learn from it.

Lizette Ibarra: Of course.

Lizette Ibarra: Well, translations is very close to my heart. That’s going to come out in the first quarter of next year. And um, transitions is, you know, during my professional journey as an executive recruiter, I’ve seen so many people go through difficult transitions in their lives, whether that’s, uh, getting a promotion too early and not being able to fulfill their expectations or losing a job, you know, after unexpectedly, you’ve been in a company 15, 18 years and all of a sudden you’re let go or, um, transitioning through motherhood early in your career. You know, those are huge adjustments in every, every person’s life. And they’re not easy to, to go through. So changes changes are external events, situations that happen and often they alter the status quo. While transitions is the internal psychological and emotional process that people go through in response to those changes. So the true power is, you know, when going through a transition is that you can recognize that changes might be outside of your control. You have the ability to shape your transition. And the journey can lead to growth, resilience and a deeper, more authentic version of ourselves. So what is that is what I’m trying to transmit in transitions, but very specific to professional transitions.

Lee Kantor: And to really understand the things you can control and the things that maybe are out of your control.

Lizette Ibarra: Yes.

Lizette Ibarra: Um, yeah. So let’s say, um, you talk about the different scenarios that you can go through.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. I’m just trying to, you know, give the reader a sense of what they can take away from reading the book, because transitions are going to happen in everybody’s life, and some things are out of your hands and some things you do have some control over.

Lizette Ibarra: Exactly. So the things that you have the control over is what happens internally to you. And, you know, when people go through transitions, almost inevitably when there are difficult transitions to go through, you think you’re alone and you’re the only person going through that transition. So that is the first realization that you have to be aware of that you’re not the first, you’re not the last, and you’re not the only one. And that’s some sort of a of a reassurance in your life. And then you, you know, during the book and reading through the stories and the anecdotes of that other people have gone through, um, you start to gain some control and some certainty that after that transition you will become a different version of yourself. And oftentimes that version of yourself is going to be a more authentic and more wise version of yourself. So that’s that’s what it’s important to. When you’re going through a transition, you recognize that you’re going to be in a different space but a better space after that transition.

Lee Kantor: Now, can you share a story maybe that illustrates what it’s like to work with you and your team? Is there a story you can share? Maybe. Maybe, um, share. Don’t name the name of the company, but maybe share what they came to you with, what challenge and how you were able to help them identify the right person and help them kind of get their organization to a new level.

Lizette Ibarra: Of course.

Lizette Ibarra: So very recently we helped this organization in the real estate space. This is a very successful Organization. And but they had this challenge. So all the knowledge of the organization was in individuals. They didn’t have this automated system to transfer that knowledge to the rest of the organization. So every time a new person comes to the organization, they relied on the leadership team to train to do the actual training to these new folks. So they wanted to hire someone that was able to build the to democratize that knowledge and to build and to bring in the technology and the resources to be able to expand that that knowledge throughout the organization. And that was a very challenging search, because this is not a role that you typically find, um, in the market. So we had to search for different skills, different, um, backgrounds in people. Then we were able to find, The company just interviewed two candidates and they said, these people, where did you find these people? Like, this is the combination of expertise that people bring to the table is just fantastic for the role. So that is that is one very recent experience that that we have with one of our clients.

Lee Kantor: Now, if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team or even kind of get on the waitlist for the book, what is the website? What is the best way to connect with you in the team?

Lizette Ibarra: Of course you can reach out to me. You can either my company website, which is latina.com, or you can reach out to me on my personal website. It’s lizette.com, and in there our folks can also find resources, free resources to go through their transitions, their career journey. Because as a part of the work that I do, which is recruitment of leadership roles, I become a career strategist. I’ve advised so many people about, you know, when to move and what not to move, how to negotiate. And, um, this transition, this, this knowledge that came through this to becoming a career strategy is available to these, uh, folks for free, uh, on my website. So it’s listed.com. It’s another way to reach out to us. Linkedin. I’m super active on LinkedIn. You can find me there. You can direct me, direct message me on LinkedIn as well.

Lee Kantor: Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Lizette Ibarra: Thank you so much, Lee. Thank you for having me and looking forward to staying connected.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on South Florida Business Radio.

Maggie Ishak With Focal Point Coaching

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Maggie Ishak is a Certified Focal Point Business and Executive Coach and a Certified Trust Edge Partner. She educates and empowers her clients to reach their professional and personal goals: to grow their businesses, to engage their teams, to manage their time, and to maintain a healthy work/life balance.

Before launching her business coaching practice, she enjoyed a 28-year corporate career at Michelin North America, holding senior leadership roles including VP of Supply Chain, VP of Operations and Director of Customer Experience.

She left a lasting impact not only on the business results but also on the teams she coached and managed and the customers she served. She has a BS Chemical Engineering from MIT and an MBA from Wake Forest University.

Maggie lives in the Atlanta area with her husband and three teenage sons.

Connect with Maggie on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • About Focal Point and how she serve her clients

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studio in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio, brought to you by Kennesaw State University’s Executive MBA program, the accelerated degree program for working professionals looking to advance their career and enhance their leadership skills. And now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio. And this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Kennesaw State University’s Executive MBA program. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on the Atlanta Business Radio, we have Maggie Ishak and she is with Focal Point Coaching. Welcome.

Maggie Ishak: I late? It’s great to be here.

Lee Kantor: I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about your focal point coaching practice.

Maggie Ishak: Sure. So my coaching practice is almost a year old, so I’m really excited about that. I maybe I’ll take a step back and tell you how I got here. I started my career as an engineer, spent 28 years in the corporate world, and realized what I enjoyed doing was actually coaching my teams. When I look back on those 28 years, I don’t necessarily remember the business results. I remember the people and the careers that I was, the trajectories that I was able to change. And so that’s when I realized that that’s really where I need to be spending my time. So today I have my own solopreneur coaching practice, and with that I work with two primary groups of clients. One is female business owners. They might be solopreneurs like myself, or maybe they founded a business and they’re trying to grow it, or they’re trying to be more efficient with it. But I’ve also found that I’ve had good success working with teams very similar to the ones that I managed in my corporate life. And so I’ve been able to work with both of those groups and really enjoy that.

Lee Kantor: Now, in your career prior to coaching, were you working for a large enterprise level firms or were you working for kind of entrepreneurial organizations?

Maggie Ishak: So the majority of the time I was working with a very large enterprise company that was based out of Greenville, South Carolina. I spent my time in a supply chain and operations and basically grew into senior management roles there. Towards the end of my time there, I had the opportunity to work at a much smaller company that this larger company had purchased. So I spent time working in an environment that was much more entrepreneurial, a little more kind of let’s just figure it out as we go along. And so I’ve had experience working in both kinds of environments, the structured enterprise environment, as well as the smaller, more entrepreneurial environment.

Lee Kantor: Now, when it came time to kind of launching your own coaching career. Why did you choose Focal Point rather than just say, you know, I’m going to be Maggie Coaching Inc. and I’m just going to figure it out that way.

Maggie Ishak: Awesome. Yeah. Awesome question. So I did a lot of research and I talked to a lot of people, and I met several coaches who were already working with Focal Point. And one of the things that really stood out to me about Focal Point was the sense of community that they offered, even though I was going to be on my own and have my own business, I had a whole network of other coaches that I could lean on. As part of that, I went through a process with them to get certified and trained. I was part of a training cohort of 13, so I had 12 other colleagues that I went through training with, and I still keep up with them. And they’re almost like, you know, my little business family, um, we kind of went through that training program together, so we bonded over that. Um, another thing that focal point offered was the ability to have a mentor coach. So, you know, one thing I tell my clients is even as a coach, I have a coach. And so they provided that as part of their program. And I’ve got access to this whole suite and library of materials that I can use with my clients. I can take it off the shelf, I can use it as is. I can customize it. Um, and that’s typically what I do, is I take that content and customize it to meet, meet my clients needs.

Lee Kantor: So when you were deciding when you were at that point in your career where you’re going to, you know, change directions a little bit here, there was a was there a period where you were like, okay, I can do this on my own, but I’m going to do my due diligence and research. And then you found Focal Point, and then you really became enamored with their processes and systems and then decided to go that way. Or were you always kind of going, okay, I’m going to find somebody that has already been there and done that so I can kind of work with them.

Maggie Ishak: It was the former. Um, I spent about six months doing research, and in fact, I probably drove them crazy because I took so long. Um, but I did do quite a bit of due diligence and, and then it took me a while to even pull the trigger. Um, it almost feels. And I think anybody that starts a business feels like this. It’s like you’re standing on the side of a cliff looking down, and you think there’s a net down there and you think you’re going to jump, but then you’re like, okay, is there really a net? How is this going to work? Um, so it did take me quite a bit of time to make that decision. But once I lined up with Focalpoint and did that research, then it became clear to me that this was the way to go.

Lee Kantor: Um, I’m sorry to belabor this, but I think this is important for a lot of people that are in that same spot as you are, where you have obviously the knowledge and expertise to do the work, and you don’t really need, um, help in that area. But a sense of community was an important component of the decision, it sounds like.

Maggie Ishak: Absolutely. Having been in that corporate environment for almost 30 years, I was used to having people around me, and the thought of doing this 100% of my own really scared me. And I think a lot of solopreneurs probably get cold feet because of that. And so launching this business with Focal Point gave me the best of both worlds. It gave me an, you know, a place where I could kind of go pursue my entrepreneurial bug and go have my own business and work for myself. But yet I still had that community behind me. And, you know, one of the nice benefits of Focal Point is if you have a question about something, you literally can call up any coach and they will spend time with you. Um, I’ve talked to dozens of other focal point coaches and everybody is always willing to help. Everyone is willing to lend a hand. And and the sense of community is such that none of us are competing against each other. Um, there’s enough business out there for all of us. And so we kind of take the approach of all boats rise with the tide.

Lee Kantor: Now, how did you kind of land on your niche and or the two niches that you serve the teams and the women owned businesses? Was that something by design as you were going through the training, or was that something just in your heart that you were like, okay, these are the groups of people that I want to serve.

Maggie Ishak: So I’m going to say a little bit of both and I’ll share that. So I knew when I started this business that I wanted to focus on women. Um, just because having been a female in the corporate world, I oftentimes was the only lady in the room. Um, and it was tough. And I also realized that over that time, I may not have managed my time very well. I had periods where I was like, okay, I’m just about ready to throw in the towel. I saw many other women through the course of my career kind of give up on their professional goals. Um, or they became burned out. And as I started networking in the community, I met lots of other fantastic female business owners, and many of them were really strong and really capable, but just needed a little bit of help to kind of move things along. And so that’s that’s a real passion of mine, um, to work with and support and empower other women. The team piece, I will tell you, almost came a bit accidentally. Um, as I was out there networking, I had a couple of opportunities come my way and I realized I enjoyed that, and it kind of brought me back to when I was with my teams in the corporate world. So that’s where I’m spending the the focus of my time is between those two areas. But but it kind of came the female piece of it came very deliberately. The team piece came organically.

Lee Kantor: Now, can you kind of talk us through what it’s like to work with you? What is like, say, I am I have a woman owned business and I am what am I struggling with where it’s probably a good idea to contact Maggie. What are my frustrations? What, like how does a relationship begin?

Maggie Ishak: Fantastic question. So, um, typically I’m going to I’m going to break it up into kind of four areas time, team, money and strategy. So what somebody might say is something like, oh my gosh, I’m working 70 80 hours a week. I don’t have time to do Fill in the blank. I don’t have time to go to my kid’s soccer games or baseball games or whatever. Or I can’t take a vacation. So there might be something around where they’re spending their time. When it comes to team, it might look like I can’t seem to hire the right people. I can’t get them on board. They don’t seem to understand my vision. Money. It could be okay. I’m growing my revenue. My profits don’t seem to be growing. I can’t seem to get any growth with my business. Um. Or strategy? Uh, I set goals. Can’t seem to achieve them. My to do list is way too long. I can’t prioritize effectively. Um, so those are the kinds of things somebody might say that would then trigger, hey, you might want to call Maggie. She could help you. So then once I have an initial contact with somebody, my first meeting with them is typically 20 minutes. It’s typically just a discovery conversation. Tell me about your business. Um, and I like to ask the question, Lee, to open the conversation of if you could change one thing about your business, what would that be? So if you had a magic wand, what would you. What would you fix change, solve? And that typically gets the conversation going where I can understand like what is the most painful challenge that they have.

Maggie Ishak: And then I’ll ask a few more questions and try to basically confirm that what I bring to the table can help solve their their challenge. But I’m also looking to them to see do they have a willingness to change? They have a willingness to listen, um, and to maybe take somebody else’s perspective into consideration as they approach their business. If that’s all positive, what I will then do is schedule something called a strategic business review with them. I have a document that I send them to ask them to think strategically about their business, asking them questions like what are their strengths? What do they struggle? Um, what are their top three business priorities? It’s a couple of pages and it may take them, you know, 15, 20 minutes to fill that out. And then I use that for the next conversation, which is typically about an hour, um, hour, an hour and 15 where I really dig deep into their business. And it’s in that conversation that I try to bring some value to them, and I try to provide some insight into what it’s like to work with me. I do ask a lot of questions. I’m going to ask you to be introspective about your business, but I’m also going to challenge you to think through some things. And so typically in that first conversation, that second conversation, the PSBR, um, most clients will start to get a sense of the value they can get in working with me.

Maggie Ishak: Then at that point, we will then decide what program is best for them. So could it be one on one coaching? So this is very individualized, very personal and tailored to them. And we typically with clients like that, I meet with them once a week for about an hour. Or is a group coaching program more aligned with their needs? I have a couple of flavors of group coaching programs. One of them is kind of like a boot camp type program, where it’s eight sessions over about 12 to 14 weeks, where we go soup to nuts from the beginning and end up coming out of it with a strategic plan, a dashboard to be able to measure progress on their business sales plan and a marketing plan. Um, or if something like an assessment may solve their needs. So I use things like Disc assessments which assess communication styles and behavioral strengths. And in some cases, if it’s a team or maybe an organization that’s got a number of people working there, sometimes starting off with the Disc assessment works really, really well. They can understand their team strengths and behavioral styles and use that to drive an action plan. So typically those are the entry points in terms of how I start working with clients. But I do tailor and customize the program based on what the client needs.

Lee Kantor: Now when you’re in coaching, you know, obviously aligning your superpowers with their needs creates that ideal client fit. Is there anything that’s kind of a red flag where you’re like, you know what, this isn’t the type of, uh, client for me. I’m going to have to pass, and I recommend you go somewhere else, because it’s important to be able to be clear on your yeses, but also be clear on your nose.

Maggie Ishak: Absolutely. That is, uh, very, very important. So, um, I’ll maybe use a couple of examples. So in in one kind of scenario, the person may not be open to change, and they may not be open to being introspective about their business. I had somebody tell me once, um, I’ve tried goal setting. It doesn’t work. So I’m not going to do that again. I said, okay, uh, so that that likely would not be a client. That’s a good fit. Um, the other thing that may come up is if clients are bringing things to me that are really outside of my lane, and in those cases, I will refer them to another coach that I know. So for example, if somebody is really struggling with things that are, um, like all mindset based, I do do some mindset work, but I’ve got some great partners that that’s all they do. And if I think the business itself is sound, but but it’s a mindset question that I’ll refer them to one of my partners, that that’s all they focus on. So those first two conversations that I mentioned, the 20 minute and then the one hour strategic business review, that’s where we get to the bottom of that, and that’s where I can assess. Are they even a fit for coaching to begin with and or does it align with my strengths in terms of, um, really focusing on, on the operations of their business, the leadership of their business, the team aspect of their business?

Lee Kantor: Is there a story you can share that maybe illustrates how you work with somebody, maybe their problem they came to you with and how you were able to get them to a new level. Now, obviously don’t name the name of the client. Yeah, but just the problem in the solution.

Maggie Ishak: Sure, sure. I can give you a couple of examples. And these are both relatively recent. Um, I was working with a client, and one of the exercises that I do with them is to understand who is their target client. Who are they really serving? Some people know that really well, and some people really struggle and need to, you know, we spend a lot of time kind of talking through who is your target client. And one of the exercises that I do with that is something called the good, the bad and the ugly. Um, and don’t worry, doesn’t have anything to do with the movie. Uh, it’s just a little moniker that we use. Um, and the idea is to understand who’s your best client, best client or clients? What are the attributes about them that make them a good client for you? And then who would you call a client? You know, somebody that maybe you prefer not to work with at all? Um, maybe they’re not as profitable for you. Maybe they just take a lot of energy from you. And then the ugly ones, the ugly ones likely make you money, but maybe there are a lot more time consuming. And so I was going through this with a client, um, not too long ago, and she was actually pretty specific about describing her good client.

Maggie Ishak: And we went through and described all the attributes of her good client, and then she talked about her, her bad ones. And then in that same conversation, we were talking about where their marketing funds were going and what kind of activities they were spending their marketing money on. And, and I asked her just a very simple question, what kind of client are you getting from this particular marketing activity? And she literally just froze. She looked at me and she said, oh my gosh, that’s going to get us more of our bad clients. And so it was in that conversation made her realize that their marketing activities need to be aligned with attracting more of their good clients, which tend to be profitable, easier to work with than their bad clients. So that’s one example. Um, another example, and this is also pretty recent. Um, when I start working with clients, one of the first things that I do is conduct a risk assessment, which, um, disc is around understanding communication style and behavioral strengths. And there are four primary disc styles. Generally each person is strongest in one, maybe two. And what most people tend to do is address the rest of the world as if they were just like them, which is obviously not the case.

Maggie Ishak: And so this one particular client was very proud of telling me he’s like, oh, I fire clients. And I tell people, you know, as I’m having a discovery call with them, we’re not we’re not the place for you. And as I dug into this conversation with him, what became really apparent was he was discounting clients that just weren’t like him from a disc perspective. So his disc approach was to be very fast paced and make quick decisions. And not everybody’s like that. And so he also had one of these aha moments of, oh my gosh, I probably just need to be a little more patient with some of these other clients, as opposed to automatically thinking they’re not going to be good clients because they don’t make decisions as quickly as he does. And so those are kind of just maybe two examples of, of, of recent interactions where those clients came away with some, some pretty strong value in terms of understanding what they’re doing and, and how just very small tweaks, they can either drive more revenue, spend their marketing funds more effectively, or be able to work with a broader range of clients and perhaps grow their business even more quickly.

Lee Kantor: Now, before we wrap up, is there any advice you can share right now? Maybe a person’s not ready for coaching right now, but there’s some things that they can do that are actionable. Um, you know, some low hanging fruit that anybody could kind of at least explore a little bit right now.

Maggie Ishak: Yeah. That’s a that’s a great, uh, that’s a great question. Um, for me, for anybody that’s open to coaching, they are open to learning. And there’s a lot of places that we can gain education from. It could be a podcast, it could be a book. Um, it could be doing one of these assessments and then just reading the report and reflecting on that. Um, so I do have clients like that. I may recommend some podcasts or some books to them just to get their brain going. And then at the end of that, you know, maybe a couple of months later that they come back and say, okay, now I get that, now I understand this, and now I’m ready to to dive into a little more detail.

Lee Kantor: And now, is there a place for someone to go if they want to learn more and connect with you? Um, have a more substantive conversation. Do you have a website or is it social media or LinkedIn? What’s the best way to connect?

Maggie Ishak: A little bit of both. So I am on LinkedIn pretty easy to find. So Maggie Isaac is h a k. And so I’ve got um, some things on LinkedIn where somebody can see what it’s like to work with me. I do have a website as well. It’s Maggie Isaac, Dot Focalpoint Coaching.com. That link is also found on my LinkedIn profile. Um, also on both of those places is a link to book a discovery call. So if somebody is just curious about coaching, wanting to have just a very introductory no obligation phone call, you can find links on both my LinkedIn profile and on my website to book a discovery call.

Lee Kantor: And that’s Maggie e I s h a k correct. Well, Maggie, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Maggie Ishak: Lee, thank you so much for having me. It’s been a pleasure.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Atlanta Business Radio.

Walter Griggs With Bambhu Innovation

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Walter Griggs is a visionary leader and innovator in the packaging and sustainability industries. As the Founder and President of SquarePac Services LTD, he has pioneered comprehensive, sustainable material handling solutions, specializing in returnable packaging and pallet racking.

He also serves as Co-Founder and SVP of Engineering, Sales, and Global Outreach for BamBhu Innovations, where he develops eco-friendly materials like ecoPolymer to reduce environmental footprints across industries.

An entrepreneur with global experience, Walter holds a degree from the Tuck School of Business and is Six Sigma certified. His passion for aligning technical expertise with business strategy has positioned him as a trailblazer in renewable packaging solutions, driving measurable impact and industry transformation.

Connect with on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Revolutionizing Sustainability: How ecoPolymer is transforming packaging, automotive, and single-use plastics
  • The Business Case for Going Green: Economic and environmental benefits of renewable materials
  • Bamboo’s Role in Sustainability: Unlocking its potential for a greener future
  • Impact in Action: Key achievements in reducing GHG emissions, managing waste, and preventing plastic pollution
  • Challenges and Successes: Overcoming barriers to lead sustainable change in manufacturing
  • Educating for Change: Your mission to inform and inspire through renewable solutions and upcoming resources
  • Award-Winning Innovation: What being “Best in Class” means for BamBhu Innovations

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studio in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio, brought to you by Kennesaw State University’s Executive MBA program, the accelerated degree program for working professionals looking to advance their career and enhance their leadership skills. And now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio. And this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, CSU’s executive MBA program. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Atlanta Business Radio, we have Walter Griggs with Bambhu Innovation. Welcome.

Walter Griggs: Ali. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here and share the work that we’re doing with Bamboo Innovations, where we like to focus on something. What I call is the perfect convergence between purpose and profit. Our mission is to create materials that help businesses achieve their sustainability goals while driving real, measurable impact. And I’m so thankful that I that you give me the opportunity to share our message. Thank you for that.

Lee Kantor: And can you share a little bit about your backstory? How did this innovation come about?

Walter Griggs: Very good question. So thank you for that. So I’ve been in the material handling space for the last 15 years where I would go into warehouses, our company Square Pack services, we would go into warehouses and figure find ways for them to be more efficient, whether it was through the racking, through the, um, through the containers they were using. So I’ll give you an example of when a car is made, a vehicle, an automobile, when it’s manufactured, it’s manufactured over a thousand different pieces. And if each one of those pieces required a box, it would take up so many boxes and our landfills would be full of so many, so much more cardboard. So in industries like that, they they use what’s called returnable and reusable packaging. So that’s what I was doing. I was figuring out ways to reduce the amount of items going to the landfill. So this was basically, um, kind of a natural progression. But something kind of amazing happened. You kind of you remember the pandemic? I know everyone remembers that. But something different happened for me during the pandemic. We made a shift, you know, where we were providing PPE items to our clients like the Southern Company, Marta, you know, different large organizations, but also to the general public.

Walter Griggs: And we felt good about that work because those were really hard to come by items. And what happened for me during that in the process of donating. Giving. Someone gave me a really genuine thank you and receiving that thank you was really life changing because you know, we all do business to make money and blah blah blah. But when you’re doing something, when when people are thankful or appreciative for what you’re doing, it made me kind of want to get into that business, if that makes any sense. So just kind of I ran into, uh, but, uh, our CEO, Mr. Amara Lama, um, he reached out to me a few years ago, um, and we started discussing bamboo and its roles and how it’s a super plant. Um, and we came up with some great technology that we’re excited to share with this country and the world. Um, our bamboo eco polymer and our bamboo eco pole. And both of these are designed to keep items from going to the landfill. So I’m just trying to stay true to what I’ve been doing for the last decade and a half, and just trying to be as helpful as I can to the community and the planet, my friend.

Lee Kantor: Now, can you explain to the listener what makes bamboo so special in this regard?

Walter Griggs: Very good question. So bamboo by itself. So we can start with the growing of the bamboo. All right. So bamboo is one of the fastest growing plants. Um, it grows to full maturity in 5 to 7 years. Um, bamboo has the same tensile strength as steel, so it’s very, very strong. So, um, what we’re doing with this is we’re attempting to combat deforestation and some other things. So when bamboo grows, um, it actually cleans the soil. So if the soil was contaminated with urine or certain metals or toxins, the growing of the bamboo can actually clean cleanse the soil. So as we take this very strong bamboo plant that sequesters carbon and we turn it into a polymer or a composite, um, the base material because of the bamboo is so super strong. Um, it has a lot of very positive properties, my friend. So the bamboo is just a super plant that can do so many things, and it has so many different applications in the construction and just so many different spaces. There’s really no limit to what we can do. Anything we can do with wood, steel or concrete, we can basically do with bamboo.

Lee Kantor: Is it easy to grow or does it only grow in certain environments?

Walter Griggs: Oh, very good question. Very good question. Um, bamboo is one of the easiest things to grow. Um, there’s over 1600 different species of Bamboo, but there are several different types. So when you think of bamboo, people are going to say, oh, it’s so invasive. Oh my God, you can’t control it. That’s that’s the running bamboo that it basically just grows and tries to interconnect with every other piece of bamboo that’s on the planet. So that grows. But there’s also there’s also a different species, what’s called clumping bamboo. So it doesn’t grow so erratically. It stays compacted in its own general, um, in its own general space. So bamboo is one of those things. Um, so if you compare it to a, a tree, an oak tree, an oak tree is going to take anywhere from 30 to 50 years for this tree to grow, where we can do anything with it. Bamboo is going to grow to maturity in 5 to 7 years. And the processes that we do with the bamboo, we can use the cellulose because it has the maximum amount of cellulose when it’s about 24 months old. So there’s not a long life cycle. Um, it’s very regenerative. Um, it’s immune to a lot of bugs and plants. So, I mean, as our technology grows, um. It’s cool. It’s a good opportunity for farming and different things because, um, it’s a really good plant for for our community and our planet.

Lee Kantor: So where are you at in the life cycle of your business? Are you actually, um, producing some of the packaging that you’re talking about, or are you at the stage where you’re getting investors and you’re growing bamboo? Like, where are you at?

Walter Griggs: Very good question. Very good question. So right now we’re at the stage where we have two initial products that we’re leading with. Um, the first product is the eco polymer. Um, it’s a next generation biodegradable alternative to traditional plastics. Um, some of the key features is it’s made of 70% renewable bio material. Um, it’s biodegradable, nontoxic. It leaves no microplastics whatsoever. Um, we have several different types of this resin. So we’re looking to replace HDPE, ldpe polypropylene polystyrene and ABS. So there’s really, you know no limit to the industries because if you’re using plastic then we can replace that plastic in most cases with a biodegradable solution. Um there’s no retooling required. It works with the existing production equipment. Um, and imagine a material that works on existing machines and requires no change of infrastructure and eliminates microplastics. That’s what bamboo eco polymer is. So that’s our first product. Do you have any questions about that one?

Lee Kantor: Well, um, so who is the ideal, um, purchaser of that product?

Walter Griggs: Very, very good. Very good question. So, um, a lot of companies have sustainability goals where they’re trying to lower their carbon footprint. Um, there’s even something called, uh, the EPR, which is the extended producer Responsibility act, and the Extended Producer Responsibility Act shifts responsibility for waste management, waste management from the government to the producers, and requires them to manage their products at the end of life impact. So what that means is a lot of companies that are putting packaging into the world, plastic packaging, are being deemed for that packaging not being some form of recycled, recyclable, biodegradable, um, so they’re actually being deemed on negative impacts to the environment. So when you say who is the, um, intended client, it’s anyone who’s using Plastic made out of an oil based resin. Um, this this resin that we have, this bamboo, um, biopolymer. It can be blow molded, extruded. It can be thermoformed. Anything that you can do with a PCL or PCR or anything like that, we can do the exact same thing with this polymer. Hence the difference is at the end of life. Um, this the finished product will not sit in the landfill and take 5600 years in order to degrade, which is going to in turn, um, provide microplastics and nanoplastics our product is going to buy, excuse me, it’s going to biodegrade within two years, leaving nothing, nothing negative. Um, we’ve done testing on the soil for the soil degradation, the plant degradation, what it does to, uh, animals and earthworms. So it leaves nothing negative to the environment. So, um, with minimum changes, we can really change the way everyone does business. Who does? Who deals with plastics?

Lee Kantor: Now, are you looking to, um, kind of handle the entire supply chain of this in terms of a growing your own bamboo, or is this something that you’re looking to purchase bamboo and then bring it in into the community here?

Walter Griggs: Um, very good question. Um, we’re going to start with a hybrid model. Um, because we are importing some of this technology from across the pond. But as we do, as we start to commercialize and localize our manufacturing efforts, we would like to work with the local farmers and develop a network, because there is a, um, there’s a whole network of farmers that’s growing bamboo presently. Um, and really have no outlet for it. So we could we could definitely easily start, um, start a farming association here and push forward.

Lee Kantor: So do you have any advice for maybe those organizations out there that really are would like to be more sustainable. And they really haven’t tapped into the benefits of bamboo just yet. Like, what is some, um, easy way to ease into this?

Walter Griggs: Mm. Well, a very good way to ease into it. So it’s several ways to ease into it. Um, from a business appeal. Um, take a look at the. So whatever product you’re making. Okay. You need to take a look at the end of life. If you’ve done any type of LCA life cycle assessment to understand at the end of life what happens to your project. What happens to your product? So let’s kind of interject this for a minute. So there’s a lot of focus on recycling. And recycling is a beautiful thing. I mean at my home we separate the garbage and recycle. I mean, we take the time to do that. Um, but my research, um, leads me, um, to understand that out of the totality of what’s collected, less than 10% of those items, um, that are collected are actually recycled. So everything’s pretty much still ending up in the landfill. All right. So and if we don’t do anything different, um, we’re going to keep getting what we’re what we’re getting. And this is why this is so important. Okay. We we spoke about microplastics, but if you Google microplastics or nanoplastics, you will see that more and more Americans are having are finding microplastics in their bloodstreams, in their food and the air we breathe.

Walter Griggs: I mean, this is a serious, serious problem. And if we don’t do anything about it. Yeah, I mean, we’re in our 30s or. No or older. But honestly, if we don’t do anything about it, our grand great grandkids and great great grandkids are really going to have an issue because the concentration of this stuff is only going to increase if we don’t figure out a way to change the problem. And a lot of times, you know, when you want to make a change, you have to think about how it’s going to affect everyone involved. And the beauty about, um, the eco polymer is we can start at the manufacturer level, change the substrate, and there’s no effect to the end user. Our our polymers can be recycled, but when they’re done at the end of life, you put it in an anaerobic condition. The enzymes from the soil start to activate. And it’s, and it’s, uh, it actually disintegrates within two years. So only thing I’m saying to you is if we do nothing. The problem is it may not affect us, but it will affect someone in our family down the road.

Lee Kantor: So what do you need more of? How can we help you?

Walter Griggs: Let me see. What do we need more of? Well, we really need to find. So I want everyone, if they don’t mind, to kind of take a look around for the next few days and ask yourself anything that you see that’s plastic. When you’re in, when you’re in your kitchen, when you’re in your wherever you ask yourself, does it break down? Um, is this going to cause microplastics? What? What? And then you start to tailor what you’re buying based on how it’s packaged. I mean, what’s the end of life? And be proactive about that. And from a business standpoint, if you’re producing some kind of plastic whatever, whatever industry And you have an issue where it’s going at the end of life. Then we can help you with that. We would like to have a conversation with you. Um, we’re working with one of the largest, um, community in the communication space right now. Um, there’s a lot of, um, not a lot, but there is some noise in the, um, biodegradable single use items. As far as the knives, the forks, the spoons, different things like that. Um, we’re in more of, like, the industrial space. It’s not very noisy there. We want to understand how to help, you know, the UPS, the Fedex create, um, biodegradable stretch wrap, stretch film or pallet wrap that can go outdoors. That’s not going to disintegrate. Easy. Think about all the packaging supplies that are, um, Are ending up in the landfill, and that’s where we’re going to start. Um, so any of those companies that that are in the warehouse business that has a tremendous amount of packaging supplies, who have sustainability goals that they’re trying to meet. We would love to partner with them and see what and see what we can do to take them to the next level.

Lee Kantor: Well, if there’s somebody who wants to learn more and have more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, is there a website or a way to connect?

Walter Griggs: Oh, without a doubt. Um, it’s ww ww w Bamboo Innovations. That’s b h, you know, I’m sorry. That’s b a m b h u I n n o v a t I o n.com. Please reach out to us on the contact on the Contact Us page. Let us know what we can do. Um, you know what? What’s really beautiful about what we’re doing. Like I said earlier, um, we believe that this is something that will make a big difference down the road. You know, if we can get a decent amount of manufacturers to switch from these oil based fuels, these fossil fuel based resins, and switch to something more environmentally friendly. You know, our grandkids are really going to thank us for that. So that’s the mission that we’re on right now. And just thank you so much for letting me spread our mission.

Lee Kantor: Well, Walter, thank you so much for sharing your story. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you.

Walter Griggs: Well, God bless you and your team. And thank you so much for sharing. And. All right.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor for Atlanta Business Radio. We will see you all next time.

Sara Beth Brown Prendeville With Brown & Co. Jewelers

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Sara Beth Brown Prendeville is the President of Brown & Co. Jewelers, where she previously served as Director of Sales and Vice President. A graduate of both Auburn University and the Gemological Institute of America, she returned to the family business in 2013 and became President in 2022.

Since then, Brown & Co. has flourished, opening a new location in Buckhead Village and soon launching a standalone Patek Philippe boutique. Under her leadership, Brown & Co. continues to be Atlanta’s premier destination for fine jewelry.

Connect with Sara Beth on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Navigating leadership as a woman in a male-dominated industry
  • The unique challenges and rewards of running a generational family business
  • How Brown & Co.’s personalization techniques stand out amongst the industry

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studio in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio, brought to you by Kennesaw State University’s Executive MBA program, the accelerated degree program for working professionals looking to advance their career and enhance their leadership skills. And now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio. And this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, CSU’s executive MBA program. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Atlanta Business Radio, we have Sarah Beth Brown, who is the president of Brown and Company Jewelers. Welcome.

Sara Beth Brown: Thank you. Thank you for having me, Lee.

Lee Kantor: Well, for those who aren’t familiar, can you tell us a little bit about Brown and Company?

Sara Beth Brown: Yes. So Brown and Company was started by my father in 1974. So we are celebrating our 50th anniversary, and we are Atlanta’s premier jewelry destination in both Roswell and Buckhead. We service everything you may be looking for within the jewelry world, whether it’s watches, diamonds, fashion, jewelry, custom design, you name it.

Lee Kantor: So can you share a little bit about the backstory? What inspired your father to get involved in the jewelry business?

Sara Beth Brown: Well, let’s see, I grew up in the industry and ever since I was a little girl, five years old, was on the sales floor and would be helping run around during the holidays. Every summer. I worked here and I went to college at Auburn and decided at the end of my college career that I wanted to remain in the jewelry industry, but wasn’t necessarily certain. I wanted to stay in Atlanta, And so I went off and did my own thing for a few years, worked at a jewelry company in San Francisco and then in New York. And then before I knew it, I ended up coming back here to Atlanta in 2013. I love the industry, and I’m so glad that I found my way back home to my family’s company.

Lee Kantor: So was that done on purpose? Cause I know a lot of family businesses send their children off to learn from other places around the country before they come back.

Sara Beth Brown: That is a great question. And I think a lot of people actually assume that it was done intentionally, but it really wasn’t I. I really didn’t know if I was going to come back to Atlanta. I was ready to head to, I don’t know, Paris was on my mind on my radar at the time when I kind of started getting the phone call from my sister when she was recruiting me back home. So to be honest with you, no, it was not intentional, I. It all worked out as it should. You know, I had a wonderful experience and learned a ton that I would not have learned otherwise. That really allowed me to bring a lot back to the table when I came back to the family business.

Lee Kantor: Now, can you share a little bit about the jewelry business as maybe from a macro standpoint? What separates kind of good jewelers from great jewelers?

Sara Beth Brown: You know, it’s so easy to focus on quantity over quality. And I think that’s where we make the difference here at Brown and Company. I, we our team is extraordinarily particular about what we have on our showroom and what leaves our doors. And, you know, that’s a main difference. And also the fact that we are independent and family owned, that we bend over backwards for our customers and our customers become clients for generations. And, um, I always say that I will not let a product leave this store, that I would not be proud to wear myself. Um, and it’s really a testament to our customers understanding that it’s quality over quantity here. And we take a lot of pride in that. And I think that that differentiates us from everybody else.

Lee Kantor: So how do you curate kind of what goes in the store. How do you kind of scour the world to find what is going to be, you know, the classics, what is going to be the next hot trend? How do you kind of navigate those waters?

Sara Beth Brown: Um, another great question. You know, we go to a number of different jewelry shows around the world each year. And I, we draw a lot of inspiration from those shows. Um, a big one being in Geneva and Las Vegas and New York. Um, and, you know, I feel like every year we are getting better and better at curating our collections. Um, whether or not that has to do with our Browning Company core collection, like you said, the classics. Um, or where we’re looking for something a touch different. But, you know, that’s something that we know our clients would love to adorn. It’s not to way outside of the box. But you know, one advantage we also have is that we do a ton of custom jewelry. So we know that even if we’re inspired at, um, you know, one of these shows by a certain designer, but we’re not ready to go all in. We can still draw inspiration from that and create our own pieces for our customers. That makes.

Sara Beth Brown: Sense.

Lee Kantor: So how does that work? Like, if I’m a potential customer and I’m thinking, I’m not sure what I want exactly, but I want to work with someone to kind of create a unique piece. How does that kind of conversation go? How does that working arrangement go?

Sara Beth Brown: Yeah, so it’s a ton of fun, honestly. Um, so the customer, you know, comes in, we typically start by. I mean, it depends if you have an idea in your head, we start there. Um, or if you’re like, okay, I maybe have a family heirloom that is very sentimental, but it’s a, it’s completely outdated. Um, something I’m not going to wear. I mean, there’s there’s a ton of, uh, different situations that may come about, but we typically start to look around the store, um, look in the showroom and kind of draw inspiration from those pieces that we have. And then we will sit down. We’ll gather a couple pieces that we like from the showroom and then really just start talking. And I, you know, I’m no real artist, but take a pen to paper and just sketch out a few little ideas, and then we’ll work with our master jewelers and, um, and come up with a concept and essentially it will become it will become reality. We, um, do everything in house, including our CAD and our, um, gemstone setting and our polishing everything. Um, so, you know, the customer can be as in, deep into the process as they want, or a lot of people just trust us and say, okay, like, if that’s the vision, I know you can make it happen. I, I trust that you know what I want, and we we do it. Um, the process once, once we have approval from the customer, it takes about, um, anywhere from 4 to 6 weeks, usually on the four week side, just depending on how detailed the product may be.

Lee Kantor: So, um, what does your ideal or who does your ideal client look like? Are they kind of first time buyers that maybe this is the first engagement ring they’ve ever purchased, the first big kind of jewelry purchase? Or are they kind of celebrities or executives? Who is that ideal client for you?

Sara Beth Brown: Um, to be honest with you, we’re we love when anybody walks through our doors. Doesn’t matter who they are or where they come from. Um, you know, yes. I think when somebody walks in for their first time, that is incredibly exciting for us. Um, we love to learn. Why did they come in? How did they hear about us? And really expose the Brown and company culture to someone for their first time? That is really something we get so excited about. Um, internally. But, you know, our ideal customer is somebody that is, um, you know, they’re looking for a jeweler, they’re looking for a lifelong jeweler and a lifelong relationship. Um, and, you know, hopefully they’ve heard good things about us, and that’s why they come in. But I think another leg up that we have is that we can offer something of everything, whether it’s designer jewelry, the diamonds, like I said, maybe it’s a state jewelry, maybe it’s a jewelry repair. Um, and you don’t know who to trust. You know, I and we have a, um, a very full, in-depth, full service department here. And, um, our shop has windows where you can watch our jewelers work on your product. And, you know, I always say we if if you couldn’t trust us, we wouldn’t be here for 50 years. So I think that’s also something that we can offer to people that may not even be ready to take that first step for themselves into investing in a piece of jewelry. They may have something that they need repaired. And that’s, um, another reason a lot of people will step into the door and, and then we hope, hope from there that we’re able to, um, to expand upon their knowledge in the jewelry world and, um, understand that they can trust us.

Lee Kantor: Now, is there any advice you can share with maybe other women owned business owners who are in a male dominated industry? Is there anything so far you’ve gleaned, or anything that maybe you feel is now a unique selling point for your team and company?

Sara Beth Brown: You know, it’s interesting. I was asked this question, um, not that long ago, and I said, you know, it’s funny, I am a woman in a male dominated industry. However, I think you just have to put your head down and work hard and not think about being a woman in a male dominated industry. You just do what you do and you don’t. You don’t need to look around you and see, okay, what is this competition doing? Or what is this doing? You know what’s going on in this other market that you understand what your visions and your goals are, and you don’t let anything get in the way or anything become a distraction. Such as, you know, maybe other males in the industry that you think may be doing bigger and better things. But the truth of the matter is that that’s not always the case. So don’t waste your time trying to, um, just, you know, kind of think about being that only woman in the male dominated industry. Just really keep your head down, work hard, build a good team around you. It’s all about the team. And, um, continue to do the right thing and things will things will come around and things will eventually work your way. No matter. Work out your way, no matter how long it might take. Just don’t give up hope.

Sara Beth Brown: All right.

Lee Kantor: Well, how about if we reframe that to not just a male or female, but when it comes to family owned business, how do you keep your team and especially the leadership team that maybe aren’t part of the Brown family? How do you keep them motivating, knowing that they’ll never kind of, uh, sit in the big seat?

Sara Beth Brown: You know, I like to think that my our management team. They are. I mean, really, our entire team is pretty much a part of my family is what it feels like and we treat them that way. I think that that is an opportunity for us, that we’re not this big corporation. We’re not owned by private equity. You’re not treated like just a number. Um, and that will never change. We have no intentions of ever changing being independent and family owned. Um, but, you know, if you were to be a fly on the wall at one of our management meetings, um, I think that you would understand how we collaborate from one another. We have all grown up in our own roles. We are constantly challenging one another, and I am ensuring that no matter what, they are happy in their workplace, they are feeling fulfilled by the work that they do and that they are compensated competitively within our market. That’s something I’m always looking at. Um, and that, you know, I always say life is short. So when you’re with Brown and company, give us your all. And we in turn will give you our all. And we’ve had a multitude of employees who have stayed with us for 15, 20 plus years into retirement. And we’ve also had multiple employees who have left us and then come back, which I think speaks volumes. So I think it’s all about the way you treat your team members. Um, and also the way that you empower them. I mean, yes, I came into this position, um, you know, by working hard and, and again, trying to do everything I know to do the right way. But this company wouldn’t be where it is without its leadership team. And I try to remind our management managers of that all of the time that we wouldn’t be here without them. And, you know, I hope that they, um, believe in that and believe in our vision and know that if they give us their all, we’re going to give them our all as well.

Lee Kantor: Now, for someone who’s out there shopping. You mentioned that there’s a lot of jewelers that are really part of private equity, that ownership is maybe more opaque than yours is. Can you explain kind of the benefits of going with an independent like Brown and Company versus one of these, um, more corporate, more, um, national firms?

Sara Beth Brown: There’s a lot of reasons. Um, I mean, first and foremost, you know, we are here in the store making decisions on at that very moment. So a lot of customers will come in and they may have a request that no one’s ever heard of before. But we like to try to never say no. And also we don’t have to go through layers upon layers. And, you know, not to mention the time that that takes to get to whoever may be at the top making those decisions. Um, our management team is empowered where they know that we want to have big dreams and let our customers have big dreams and that we make them happen. And I believe that being able to make those particular moments happen in real time is a game changer. Um, you know, we are essentially you walk in you if you want to talk to the ownership, you can talk to the ownership, you know, um, and so not to mention that being independent, we have relationships that we have had with all of our vendors for decades. And not to mention that designers that have wanted to work with us, that, you know, they know our reputation, they know that we are good people in the industry, that maybe if we start working with them now, that that those vendor relations will go on for decades as well. And so that those relationships, they actually benefit our customers as well, because we are able to essentially negotiate on behalf of our customers to ensure that we are getting the best of the best product that may be above and beyond the quality of product that that that that vendor typically delivers elsewhere, if that makes sense. So I mean, those are just a few examples, but I think the fact that we’re real people, it’s not this, this corporate, you know, black and white atmosphere, it is very, um, organic and genuine. And, um, you know, we have a culture here that we hope our customers can experience every time they walk in.

Sara Beth Brown: Is there a.

Lee Kantor: Story you can share? Maybe somebody came to you with an idea or this was a meaningful piece and you helped them create a memory?

Sara Beth Brown: I have a lot of those, um, I’ll say one that comes to mind. Um, and it’s, you know, it’s sad, but also bittersweet, um, that I had a customer walk in, um, her mom had passed away a few years prior, and she had a an idea that she wanted to do something with her mom’s handwriting and make. But make a beautiful piece of jewelry, not something that you can kind of get off, you know, like Etsy or something. Um, so I asked her if she had I needed a copy of her mom’s handwriting. And so her mom had this quote that she always wrote on the bottom of any note she wrote to her children or her husband or, you know, any, any birthday card, whatever. And it said, I love you so. And it was in her handwriting. And so what we did is we made these really beautiful, um, kind of like a bangle, yellow gold bangle bracelet. I’m sorry. And on that bracelet, we, uh, hand engraved and did identically to the mother’s handwriting. I love you so. And we did it for that woman. And we did it for her siblings as well as other family members down the road that also wanted it. And I’ll tell you, when we delivered that bracelet for the first time, um, I mean, there were a lot of tears shed, and, I mean, she still talks about it, and that was probably, I don’t know, five plus years ago, but that was a really special one. And so we’ve done a lot of things that have been very sentimental for for families that will become family heirlooms.

Lee Kantor: Well, if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, is there a website they can go to look around or some connections on social media? What’s the best way to connect?

Sara Beth Brown: Um, so yes, our website is Browne jewelers.com, and we do have live product there so you can shop on the website. I’m also on Instagram and it is Browne underscore Sarah Beth and I’m as active as I can possibly be, but I love getting DMs and try to write back in a timely manner. But that’s a great way to connect directly with me.

Lee Kantor: Well, sir, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you.

Sara Beth Brown: Thank you Lee. I appreciate your time.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Atlanta Business Radio.

Stephanie Calabrese With HiCast Sports Network

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HiCast-Sports-Network

Sephanie-CalabreseStephanie Calabrese, the Chief Operations Officer and Co-Founder of HiCast Sports Network, is a seasoned leader in digital media with over 25 years of expertise in web and application-based product innovation and management.

In her role, she oversees marketing and communications, user experience design, product development, and customer support, ensuring a seamless experience for both users and partners.

Before co-founding HiCast Sports, she served as a Partner at Elemental Interactive, an award-winning web design and development firm that catered to Fortune 500 clients. Her strategic leadership contributed to the firm’s significant success, culminating in its acquisition by Grey Global Group—a division of WPP, the world’s largest advertising agency—in 1999. Throughout her career, she has consistently demonstrated a commitment to innovation and excellence in the digital media landscape.

Outside of her role at HiCast Sports, Stephanie Calabrese is an accomplished filmmaker whose documentary “UNSPOKEN” delves into the racial divide in Monroe, Georgia, exploring the community’s history and the legacy of the 1946 Moores Ford Lynching. The award-winning film builds upon her earlier photography series, “Hometown: A Documentary of Monroe, Georgia,” and has been widely recognized for fostering dialogue about race and reconciliation, with screenings on Georgia Public Broadcasting.

Follow HiCast Sports Network on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • An overview of HiCast Sports Network and what inspired the company’s creation
  • How does HiCast Sports Network deliver value to their venue partners
  • What opportunities have opened in implementing and scaling their technology across different sports

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here. Another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show, we have Stephanie Calabrese with HiCast Sports Network. Welcome.

Stephanie Calabrese: Thank you. Glad to be here.

Lee Kantor: Well, so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about HiCast Sports Network. How you serving folks?

Stephanie Calabrese: Sure. Well, we are sort of a leading live and video on demand streaming platform, and it’s a subscription based service specifically for the amateur and youth sports market.

Lee Kantor: So what’s the backstory? How did this idea come about?

Stephanie Calabrese: Well, my business partner, Robert Stribling, who’s the CEO of our company, I’m the CEO. We had been friends for a long time we had each had children who were playing youth sports, multiple sports, travel sports, multiple locations. And we were kind of lamenting over the fact that, you know, we couldn’t be in one in more than one place at the same time. We were missing games from one child or the other child. And Robert’s background is very much sort of more of a mechanical inventor engineer. He loves coming up with physical products that help solve problems. I come from sort of a digital media software design background, and we got together and we thought, gosh, there’s got to be a way that we can set up one camera that would record an entire game. And then for each of us as parents, we could just go in and grab the moments of our own kids that we wanted to preserve. And so we set out on that journey back in 2010, which was before live streaming was actually even a possibility and just evolved a prototype into a product, and we’ve been building on it ever since.

Lee Kantor: So what was kind of the beginnings of this? Did you have to you went after the, I guess, the teams that your kids were on as, as beta testers, or did you find other people that were interested in pursuing this?

Stephanie Calabrese: Well, we actually started with the concept of partnering with the venue. So we figured that the best installation for like a fixed camera network solution was to capture as many games as possible using a camera that would be remote controlled. So you wouldn’t need a human manning the camera. So we partnered with a handful of venues, one of which was East Cobb Baseball Complex here in Georgia, very popular travel baseball park. In fact, one of the first in the country. And we set up our camera network and started partnering with the venues initially.

Lee Kantor: And so how did the partnership work? They just gave you permission to put a camera Somewhere? Yes.

Stephanie Calabrese: Yep. So we had venue agreements where we partner with a venue. In the beginning in particular, we would put we would invest in the equipment and the installation of our network at the venue, and then we built a platform where we could basically remote control camera schedules to make it, you know, as minimal of an impact on the venue. Right. So these travel parks really are focused on programing, running the tournaments, running the games, caring for the facility, caring for the patrons at the park. And so because they, you know, really didn’t have a lot of bandwidth to get into and understand technology streaming, you know, all that it takes to provide that video coverage, we took on the burden of all that for the venue. And so in the agreements, you know, we would set up the network, we would manage subscription sales. And then we also do revenue share back with our venues. So really it’s a win for them in that they receive a brand new amenity for their park, which is super compelling for patrons who can’t attend the games in person. It generates social media content for them and it generates income, which is always helpful for these venues.

Lee Kantor: So, um, how did you know that you were on to something when you put the camera up? Were people, like, clamoring for this? Were they, you know, sending links to their relatives around the country? Like, how did you know that you were onto something good?

Stephanie Calabrese: Yes. I mean, in the beginning, I mean, we launched the first app in the iTunes App Store back in 2017, which was very, very early, um, for live streaming in general. And so, um, we just got great feedback. I mean, at first, you know, patrons were pleasantly surprised to hear that they could remote watch games at these venues so early on. And then in the Covid years of 2020, that’s when it really became more of a, uh, a critical amenity for these venues where parents and grandparents wouldn’t be able to attend the venue. And so we really saw a lot of growth coming out of 2020. And it’s it’s been pretty rapid growth ever since.

Lee Kantor: So, um, what’s happening now? What stage are you at? Are you just trying to spread it around the country and just get more and more teams and fields and locations?

Stephanie Calabrese: Yeah. So we’re increasing our venue count by the year. So we have venues. We cover more than 30 venues, which which spans about 250 live streams across the country. So as far west as, um, Colorado, um, up and down the East coast, central US. Um, so yeah, our plan is to just continue with that growth, partnering with these venues who really are travel sports. Um, so high volume of games. Um, and we’re just a great partner for those top venues across the country.

Lee Kantor: So what are some of the qualities of a top market would have, and you’d be interested in partnering with them?

Stephanie Calabrese: Really the biggest one is volume of play. So it makes sense to install a fixed camera network where you’ve got games played, you know, daily and throughout most of the year. So we manage our camera schedules and, you know, more often than not we’re we’re running cameras, especially in the summer months when when travel sports are so high for families, we’re running cameras from seven in the morning until until midnight. So really we look for volume of play is number one. We also look for venues who really do a great job of marketing their their programing and their services to their patrons. So, um, you know, that partnership is important because they receive revenue share. So for those venues that are really motivated to, um, you know, monetize, um, the live stream. In addition to advertising on the live streams. You know we are a great fit for those venues. Those include the Ripken Baseball Parks, which is part of Unrivaled Sports. Their facilities have been great partners with us. The Jackie Robinson Complex down in Vero Beach, which is owned by the MLB. Um, we just partner with a lot of great, a lot of great venues.

Lee Kantor: Is it primarily baseball, softball, or is it expanded to other sports?

Stephanie Calabrese: We have expanded into other sports. So we initially started with baseball, softball. Um, number one, because it really gave us the most difficult, uh, outdoor weather conditions. And so we wanted to be able to build a network that would be rock solid, whether it was sitting out in lightning in South Carolina or, you know, withstanding hurricanes in Florida or snow in the northeast. And so having that rugged outdoor solution was very important to us. We also had the ability to install just one camera behind home plate, which would give us a wide angle view of the entire field of play. And then a user has the ability to come in and zoom and pan to look at the area to find their kid that they want to focus on. Um, so we started initially with baseball softball, but now we’re sort of expanding. We cover an equestrian facility, and we’re looking to be expanding coverage in that area of sports as well. We cover volleyball and basketball. Um, and we’re now just moving into soccer, lacrosse and football on these rectangular surfaces. And they’ve been challenging in that the the field of play is so wide. So you can imagine one camera can’t cover an entire field of play. Um, we’ve tried two camera solutions and that works well in some cases. But now we’re using AI powered cameras that sort of auto track the play on these rectangular surfaces. And that’s exciting as we continue to expand into those other sports.

Lee Kantor: Are they like those cameras like in the NFL games that are strung across the center of the field.

Stephanie Calabrese: They’re not strung across the center field. Hopefully one day we’ll have that capability. But the eye cameras typically are at the center point of a rectangular field. It’s an extremely wide angle view. And then the AI technology follows auto zooms and pans to follow the play, whether it’s soccer, football or football or lacrosse on that playing surface. So it’s like an auto produced feed.

Lee Kantor: So, um, no swimming yet? I would think that’s a fairly easy to capture.

Stephanie Calabrese: No swimming yet, but we’re always looking to expand into new sports. Um, we also look at sort of the growth in youth sports. Right. What sports are having rapid growth? Um, knowing that we’ll have sort of a higher market of interest for those sports. Volleyball has had tremendous growth Recently. Also girls softball is is growing rapidly as well. So we also look at the markets too.

Lee Kantor: And so as you expand, what have what opportunities have kind of bubbled up for you? It sounds like you were getting more and more partnerships with some of these larger players. Is that kind of in the roadmap just to get more and more partnerships?

Stephanie Calabrese: Yes. More partnerships with venues, definitely. Um, and I think another area of growth for us has been in the space of sponsorship and advertising. So for many of our venues, they’re already working with local sponsors. So, you know, of course, you’re familiar with you go to a baseball park, you see banners hanging on the fence, or you go into a gym and you see, you know, banners hanging on the wall. And we’ve built a very robust advertising engine within our product that allows us to serve video ads, very targeted. So we can send those ads specifically. For example, we’ve been partnering with Rawlings this year and serving, you know, ads for bats, custom gloves to our baseball and softball users targeted at the field level. Um, so that advertising space gives us the ability to help our venues, you know, further monetize to help them raise, raise more funds that allow them to then, you know, make advancements in their facilities. Um, you know, new netting, new turf, um, helps bring in dollars to support that. Um, in addition to additional programing. So the advertising space is definitely an area for growth for us too, because we can begin to sort of match up our individual users with the brands and products and services that bring them value to these families playing travel sports.

Lee Kantor: Are they advertisers? Are they mainly kind of these national brands that are just using the aggregate audience? Or can somebody, like you said in in the Carolinas. Have a local car dealer be a local advertiser on the on the videos.

Stephanie Calabrese: Yeah, that’s the beauty of the ad platform. So we can work with local sponsors, more regional sponsors. We have the ability to target those ads on just a specific venue. So if it’s let’s say, you know, a local car dealership who may have been a sponsor for a venue for many years now, we give them a digital platform to serve ads to users at that same venue. And the beauty of that is each of the ads are clickable. So the, um, the user can go directly, you know, to that product or service to learn more. We track all of our analytics and share that back with the sponsors as well. So it’s a great marriage. And we’ve been you know, we’ve been very sensitive to the fact that, you know, parents and grandparents and fans are coming in to watch live play. More often than not. We do have video on demand availability too. But what we don’t want to do is disrupt that experience. And so we’ve found a very sort of elegant way to play those ads on the pre-roll, right when you come in without disrupting live play and that balance of, you know, being able to continue to make improvements to our product without having to increase the price of subscriptions for our family. So we’ve been very sensitive to finding a good balance between, you know, allowing advertisers to help support that growth and, you know, keeping a solid, enjoyable experience for the users.

Lee Kantor: Speaking of the users, is there a way to maybe like clip highlights of their kids so they can share it on social media? Is there any tools that you’re using to help in that regard?

Stephanie Calabrese: Yes, absolutely. So anyone who’s watching the footage live, they’ve got the ability to live. Tag a moment. So let’s say I’m a parent. I’m watching my daughter play softball. She has, you know, a great hit when she’s at bat. I can quickly live tag that moment and just continue watching live without disrupting that experience. And then it saves those timestamps. So after the game or between innings, I can go back to those live tags and then turn them into highlights. So any user has the ability to download as many, you know, 62nd highlights as they like, whether it’s a, you know, a great play or, um, you know, just a wonderful moment that happened on the on the field. They can save those highlights. They can share them in social media, they can download the highlights and then create highlight reels for college recruiters. Um, that ability to really save and share those moments that matter has been core to the business since the inception.

Lee Kantor: Now, is that something that the individual has to kind of be there in order to capture it, or can you just do a search for number 12 and then it’ll pull all the times number 12 was a bat or did something.

Stephanie Calabrese: It’s not automated to that degree yet, but hopefully over time using AI technology. That’s that’s definitely on our on our roadmap. But yes, the user would watch the play. They can have availability of a game for 90 days from the date of play, so they’ve got plenty of time to go in and replay those games and grab and share those highlights.

Lee Kantor: Now talk about the subscription. So if I’m a grandparent of a child, I can subscribe and I’ll be notified whenever there’s a game and I can watch.

Stephanie Calabrese: So basically subscriptions work. We’ve got a variety of different subscriptions options. If you’re playing in sort of like a one off tournament at one of our venues, you can do a seven day pass. That seven days gives you the ability to watch live and then plenty of time to watch on demand. So when your athlete comes home, he’s got time to replay the games and save and share any highlights that were important to him. Um, we also have monthly passes which can be canceled at any time. So for some of our venues like Buckhead Baseball in Atlanta, Georgia. Those players will be playing all season, so you can start your subscription at the beginning of the season in February and cancel it in May when your season is over. So we’ve got a variety of different subscription options. We don’t have the ability to notify a family when their team is playing, but more often than not, these families know their schedules and they can come in and watch the games, whether they’re live or if they want to watch them whenever it’s convenient for them. On demand.

Lee Kantor: Now, is there a story you can share? Maybe how one of the venues partnered with you and they were able to maybe generate some revenue that they hadn’t had before and were able to, you know, uplevel their venue or their experience for their fans.

Stephanie Calabrese: Um, yes. I mean, gosh, we we share revenue with, um, you know, most of our, most of our venues are eligible for revenue share. So if we front the upfront equipment and installation cost for a venue. We will recoup that initial cost up front and then begin sharing revenue. So for many of our venues that may not have that capital up front for the installation, that’s a nice way that we can get them installed and then, you know, have them eligible for revenue share. Um, but we’ve got a handful of venues that, um, have received very nice revenue share checks, um, over the past several years. And they’re always looking at reinvesting that money back into the ballparks.

Lee Kantor: So what do you need more of? How can we help?

Stephanie Calabrese: Uh, we.

Stephanie Calabrese: Are always looking for new venues, new travel venues, um, any sport we are interested to talk to. Um, we’d also love for anyone who is playing at any of our venues. You can take a look at the venues that we do cover on our website, which is high caste sports.com/venues, um, shows, the venue list, um, anyone is, you know, is interested in sort of looking at our footage. They can subscribe and watch any games live and on demand. And of course anyone can follow us in social. We’re on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, LinkedIn. We’re always sharing our best highlights that users have shared with us across the network. And any time you are liking or commenting on a great play from a youth athlete, you are supporting that. And and of course we welcome that.

Lee Kantor: And that’s high caste sports. High caste sports.com.

Stephanie Calabrese: That’s correct.

Lee Kantor: Well, Stephanie, thank you so much for sharing your story today, doing important work and we appreciate you.

Stephanie Calabrese: Thank you. Lee. I appreciate you too.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on High Velocity Radio.

Brandon White With 3rd Brain Digital Operations and Automations

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Brandon White is the COO of 3rd Brain, a company at the forefront of digital transformation, specializing in embedding expert digital teams within businesses to drive efficiency and profitability through AI and automation.

With 3rd Brain, Brandon provides companies with a powerful, flexible approach to modernizing their operations, allowing them to scale seamlessly and gain a competitive edge without the complexities of building internal teams. His team’s plug-and-play solutions reduce costs, streamline workflows, and offer businesses an accelerated path to adopting advanced technologies.

Brandon’s career spans over 25 years in tech and entrepreneurship, beginning in 1996 with the founding of Worldwide Angler, one of the earliest online social networks and e-commerce platforms for sport fishing. He later sold this successful venture to a large media company, marking the first of two company exits. His experience extends to venture capital, angel investing, and executive roles in digital marketing with companies like America Online, all of which contribute to his unique ability to blend innovation with operational expertise at 3rd Brain.

As the host of The Brandon White Show, Brandon shares insights from his extensive career, offering listeners actionable strategies for scaling and modernizing their own companies. He’s also taught over 1,500 students his efficient, 11-slide approach to business planning and pitching. Brandon holds an MBA from UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School, dual degrees in psychology, and is a Certified Expert Tiny Habits Coach.

When he’s not driving transformation in business, you’ll find him road biking along California’s coast.

Connect with Brandon on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Building a Digital Operations Team from the Ground Up
  • The Evolution of AI and Its Impact on Business
  • Building a High-Impact Digital Operations Team with AI
  • Building a Culture of Innovation Through Digital Transformation
  • How Small and Mid-Sized Businesses Can Benefit from Automation

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Brandon White and he is with Third Brain Digital. Welcome.

Brandon White: Hey Lee, thanks for having me man.

Lee Kantor: I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about Third Brain Digital. How you serving folks?

Brandon White: Uh, well, what we do is, is we help people introduce AI and automations into their workflows in their business, really to drive efficiency and ultimately to have that efficiency drop to their bottom line so they can make more money.

Lee Kantor: So what’s your backstory? How did you get involved in AI and automation?

Brandon White: Well, honestly, I’ve been doing it a long time, probably over 15 years. As you and your listeners probably may or may not be aware, but AI and machine learning and things like that have been around a really long time. They’ve actually been around for probably 50 years, but I’d been experimenting before these large language models came out, and integrating machine learning in types of things, like trying to find out, for instance, what someone’s hobby was or what sports team they liked in from email conversations that I was having in my own email. So I’ve been experimenting and built some software applications that were used commercially in the government for this type of stuff. And most recently, I had an exit of one of my companies, and I was doing some talks on AI and automation and where it was going. And the large language models were we had had access in the beta version, so we had seen it coming for over a year before ChatGPT specifically was released. And I started doing some talks and people were really interested and people would come up after after these talks and say, hey, can you come into my company and help me? And I really didn’t have anyone. I didn’t have an infrastructure, to be honest with you, Lee. I mean, I was happy to give people advice, but I didn’t have a consulting company. I didn’t even think about it. I was really just enjoyed talking about, you know, emerging technology and if it helped people. Great. And I had known a friend, Michael Greenberg, who had been in the space as well for a while out of Saint Louis and had this company, Third Brain, and we were in a mastermind group together. And one time, one day I was like, hey, maybe can I just partner up with you and we could work together? I’ve got a lot of people asking me about, you know, coming in and doing work in their company and getting them prepared for to introduce AI and automation. And we just he’s like, yeah, of course. So we hit up a partnership. And that’s how I wound up at Third Brain.

Lee Kantor: So where is the opportunity for those small and midsize businesses to benefit from automation? Is there kind of low hanging fruit for those folks, or is this something that they got to really invest a lot of time and energy and resources in order to, to get any value out of them.

Brandon White: Well, I think it’s just based on really where you want to start. So the low hanging fruit is you could just use ChatGPT or Gemini or, you know, I don’t want to say if you’re on the Microsoft platform, maybe Copilot. I’ve heard some mixed reviews about it, but or you could use perplexity. Claude, there’s tons of anthropic. There’s tons of llms out there that you could just use to hey, help me write an email better. Or hey, I need a contract for XYZ, or read this contract and tell me if there’s any problems with it, or automating your CRM or having things connected so that you can. If somebody emails you, it can dump in your CRM along with other information that the CRM may not automate itself. So there’s low hanging fruit like that. I was talking to a small business owner the other day and they’re like, oh, well, I need to build a flier for this event. And I was like, well, just prompt that ChatGPT and say, hey, I’m building, I’m doing x, y type of event. Can you write a promotion for that? And it did it. So those are type some of the lower hanging fruit that any SMB I mean anybody even if you’re in a, you know, small or medium sized business or if you’re in a big business in a division, you can help you pretty pretty much immediately.

Lee Kantor: Now, is there a way, though, to, um, take your workflow? And then instead of having a human do the actual work, uh, have the automation, do the work, and then maybe just have the human just double check to make sure everything’s correct.

Brandon White: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that’s putting the human in the loop. The thing that we find with a lot of people is they want to integrate AI. They, they they’ve read about it, they’re excited about it. They’re excited about doing what you just described, which is, hey, I don’t have to do these manual labor anymore. I can get a form filled out automatically. I can get an order form filled out out of email. Um, but when we go in, the thing they’re generally missing is, and this is the case in a lot of small to medium sized businesses is they don’t have their operations mapped out. Usually it’s in their head or in one of the employees heads. And the thing about automating things and leveraging AI is you actually still have to know each step. You have to know each step that you do so that you don’t miss it. And I use this analogy. It was from my third grade teacher and she assigned a homework assignment. She said, go home and write instructions on how to write a, how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. And I thought, along with all the people in my class, that we were going to ace this thing, and I was like, this is the easiest homework assignment we’ve ever gotten. So I went home. I wrote what I thought were instructions on how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and the next day everybody came in.

Brandon White: They had a drop their homework assignment on a piece of paper in a box, and then all the items that you needed to build a peanut butter and jelly sandwich are in the front of the class, and everybody would go to the front of the room, pick out randomly directions, and they had to follow those directions exactly, exactly like they were written. They could not improvise. And it turns out that I forgot to say, spread the peanut butter or spread the jelly, which obviously made a really terrible sandwich. And it was a lesson that I’ve learned or kept with me for a really long time. And it’s applicable in businesses where people will say, well, we know what all the steps are, or um, or they just they think they know these things. But then when we go to implement, it turns out that they didn’t know or they missed a step. So what we wind up doing a lot of the time is going in and saying, hey, let’s write your standard operating operating procedures down. And once you have those documented, now we can start to look at how can we leverage technology, whatever that is, to make this a more efficient process.

Lee Kantor: So a lot of people kind of want to skip the first step, which is documenting the standard operating procedures.

Brandon White: Yeah, they all want to skip it. So it’s a terribly painful thing. It’s painful to do that. So yes.

Lee Kantor: Well how do you. So how does. Obviously they’re avoiding it because it’s difficult. So at some point it has to be done. So how what’s the best way to do it. And is there a way. There’s no I way to do this. You have to just kind of manually write down every single thing that you do. Is there like, can you do it like by talking it like by having someone video you? Like, is there an easier ways to do this as opposed to just trying to remember every step?

Brandon White: Uh, the answer is yes. And we go in and we have a formula that we use, a framework that we go in to interview people, and then we wind up building the SOPs for people a lot of the time, if somebody wanted to do that, they certainly could. Well, one, I think what Neuralink and Elon Musk, you might be able to plug your brain in at some point. So I don’t think we’re quite there yet, but that’s probably coming. The other thing you could do is now you could videotape yourself on loom or something like that, and, and tape those processes, and you could probably feed it into a model and say, hey, write the steps for this and then edit that. So there’s different ways to go about it. Or you could just sit down and say, hey, Lee, when you fire up a podcast, what are all the steps that you go through that you do and you know, you could do them and list them as you’re doing them, or someone could watch you. And so there’s multiple ways to go about it. We tend to go in and help clients do it just because we’ve done it over and over again. And we’re pretty good at it to go in and say, hey, let’s we interview people and we usually get it right now.

Lee Kantor: But for people who aren’t ready for you, they can just have someone videotape themselves doing one task and just start there.

Brandon White: So let’s let’s break it down. If it’s something on the computer, I would probably do a screen recording and you could use something like loom for that. Or you could record yourself on zoom and, and you know, share your screen. And I would record it and then I would go back and I, being an AI person, might try to feed it into a large language model, although I do want to caution on doing that, because when you feed those processes into these publicly available models, you are contributing your data to the bigger data set in many cases. So I probably wouldn’t do that, but I would record myself, and then I’d play it back and I’d write down all the steps.

Lee Kantor: So that would be done manually. So there’s no escaping some manual ness in this.

Brandon White: Not in general. I think that you will eventually be able there will be a model that an AI model that you can just say, hey, watch me do this and write down all the steps, just like you could have an AI come into your meeting and do summaries. But like I said, I just caution against that a little bit because if you aren’t using a a AI model that has walls around your own data, then you are exposing your your company data to a bigger data set and that, you know, has some challenges or some bad things can happen because you could be exposing proprietary things that the larger model learned that you didn’t want to expose. So to get around to your question, I think there’s going to be some things in the future where it at least has to watch you. Um, if it’s a physical thing, you could videotape yourself and and probably feed that in, again into an AI model. But right now there is there are manual steps.

Lee Kantor: So now when the person is building out their standard operating procedure for their work. How many different procedures are there typically in a business that you work with? Is this something that there’s 100 or 10, or is this something that this is going to take a minute to get it all documented.

Brandon White: It can take a minute. It just depends on the you know, that question is the variables are how big is the business? How many people do you have working in it? How complicated are the things you do? If it’s a customer service, uh, division. What you know, what are the steps? How big is the company? Do people come in by phone? Do they come in by chat? Do they come in by email? What has to be done? How many systems have to be, uh, accessed to be able to one log that call or find out the answer to that call? If this is, uh, how we take an order to build a metal building. Uh, say you build pole buildings for people. Then what is that process look like? I mean, it can be as simple as three steps or it would be complicated as 100.

Lee Kantor: Now what about the like? I can understand, like if you’re an e-commerce business and you’re putting, you know, you have a shop, uh, a Shopify or you have Amazon and you’re writing an ad and then they buy it and then you have to, you know, send it to them. There’s those seem like processes that are fairly easy to capture and then to build that document. But what if your work is like a marketing agency or an advertising agency or a lawyer where you’re having a conversation and you got to be able to listen, and then you got to be able to kind of understand what the real problem is, not the problem they said they have. And it’s it’s more complexity. And it requires kind of human ingenuity and thought and problem solving, like how do you kind of build standard operating procedures for a company like that?

Brandon White: Well, I mean, the first thing is you could just have I drop in on your conversations and listen to your notes, because it can summarize and it can give you some ideas of what’s going on. And you could train that model with your with your own data. I think I think there’s probably still some challenges around, you know, you you mentioned a whole bunch of different use cases. So I think t