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Kelly Gay With OnBoard

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KellyGayKelly Gay is the chair of OnBoard and immediate past chair of Venture Atlanta. She also serves on the boards of 1105 Media, the Atlanta CEO Council, ATDC, and Acivilate.

Kelly has led companies ranging from billion dollar organizations to startups. As CEO, she has led both private and public companies, all of which resulted in successful exit transactions for shareholders and employees.

Kelly is the former head of Vertical Markets for Sierra Wireless (NASDAQ: SWIR), as well as co-CEO and COO of Numerex Corp (NASDAQ: NMRX), which was acquired by Sierra Wireless in 2017. She joined Numerex with the acquisition of Omnilink Systems, where she was president and CEO.

Prior to leading Omnilink, Kelly was chair, CEO, and president of KnowledgeStorm, and led the company from startup to acquisition by TechTarget (NASDAQ: TTGT). She also led IBM in the media, entertainment, advertising, sports, music, publishing, broadcast, and cable markets as vice president of IBM’s North American Media and Entertainment division. Under her leadership, this division grew to $1.2 billion in annual sales, with 18% annual growth over a three-year period.

Kelly’s management and accomplishments have been recognized by industry-leading publications and organizations, including The Indus Entrepreneurs’ inaugural Atlanta Top Entrepreneur, IoT Now’s first Top Women of IoT, Connected World’s inaugural Top Women of M2M, and Pathbuilders’ first Inspiria Award. The companies Kelly led were recognized with Inc.’s Inc. 500, the Deloitte Technology Fast 500, BtoB’s Media Power 50, and Software Magazine’s Software 500.

Kelly serves on the boards of directors of OnBoard, where she is the chair; Venture Atlanta, where she is the past chair; 1105 Media, where she is the lead digital marketing director; Acivilate, and the Atlanta CEO Council. She also serves on the governing board of the Advanced Technology Development Center, named by Forbes as one of the Incubators Changing the World.

Kelly is a magna cum laude graduate of Tulane University with a bachelor’s degree in economics. She was the first Newcomb College recipient in the school’s history to receive the Murphy Prize in Political Economy, awarded by the Murphy Institute.

Connect with Kelly on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • The transformation of Atlanta’s tech community
  • Advice to up and coming female technology leaders
  • Perspective on where the future of Atlanta’s tech ecosystem is headed

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio brought to you by on pay built in Atlanta. OnPay is the top rated payroll and HR software anywhere. Get one month free at Onpay. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:31] 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 on pay. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories today on the Atlanta Business Radio. We have Kelly Gay, who is the first female that was awarded the John Imlay Leadership Award. Congratulations and welcome, Kelly.

Kelly Gay: [00:00:55] Thank you, Lee. Thank you so much.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:57] Now, before we get to 400 things, can you let our listeners know a little bit about your career? It spans a year or two and then the history of Atlanta, the technology scene. But you have such an interesting background. Can you share a little bit of the highlights?

Kelly Gay: [00:01:13] Yes, absolutely. So highlights I. Hi, my Atlanta and my non Atlanta, a portion of my career, my non Atlanta portion of my career, essentially this of IBM starting as a marketing rep or sales rep at IBM and partying after 19 years with IBM from Atlanta. Actually, by then, we’ve been moved back to Atlanta or to Atlanta, departing as the vice president of media and entertainment for IBM. And that meant serving the industries that made up media and made up entertainment, not not dealing with the media in in terms of marketing. So always using all these customer facing love that. And in Atlanta, I have run two venture backed companies and sold both of those two public companies. One was knowledge, storm one was Omni Lane, and then I was asked to sell the public company to another public company, which was Sierra Wireless out of Canada. And that has all occurred. While I’ve lived in Atlanta, I would say the most significant part of my Atlanta. Her tenure, though, has been the joy and the involvement I had had in this Atlanta technology community. Lee, as you know, I’ve been very involved in the Technology Association of Georgia over the years then to Atlanta, where, well, I was the chairman of the tag. I was chairman of Venture Atlanta involved in on board, which is an organization focused on women moving women forward in both their leadership opportunities as well as helping them get on board. And then Techbridge and early days with Sidetrack and Atlanta CEO Council and HTC, et cetera, et cetera. Just those are the kind of things that this technology community affords all of us and I have taken full advantage of it.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:15] Now, how have you seen the community evolve over the years? I know women in technology. We’ve been involved with that group for a long time and that was the, you know, born because of the lack of women in technology, and they needed a place to kind of hang out together and help each other. How have you seen kind of females fare in technology over the years?

Kelly Gay: [00:03:38] Great. If you don’t mind, I’ll start with technology overall in the Atlanta community and then add to it with the what I’ve seen for women because it all a continuum. When I first became involved in the Atlanta technology community with the 1999 2000 kind of time period, the fabulous entrepreneurs are fabulous companies. You know, that was the heyday of of DSL and internet security systems coming of age and certainly MSA and, you know, early successes, lots of fabulous entrepreneurs and executives. But it wasn’t all bundled up, shall we say, as a community that relied upon each other and built off of each other’s successes over time. It was a little more wild, Westy, just because that’s where we were at that time in terms of the development of the technology community in Atlanta. What I see now is a clear understanding by the leadership and the base technology base of people who work in this industry in Atlanta, a clear understanding. We are all pulling each other up every penny, the rest of the companies of every venture firm that has a great exit or invest in a unicorn or lead the unicorn. The rest of the venture community by virtue of the airtime that it creates for the city and and that investing community overall startup community, we are second only to New York. So I guess we’re third and San Francisco, but we’re in terms of raw volume of startups.

Kelly Gay: [00:05:33] It’s pretty funny that we’re in when you’re when you’re being mentioned and have that kind of success in the startup community and then we have a whole set of organizations and community, well, community organizations that support that community, the sort of community and those entrepreneurs. And what I see is it’s all we’re all working together to create this phenomenal technology community that Atlanta has, which then leads to women. We have got so many, just so many talented, capable women leaders, women executives, women CEOs, women engineers. You can go on and on in the city. And I think the technology community, the business community overall and our industry here in town have all rallied around. This needs to be a moment to start recognizing. And I don’t mean with awards, I mean, recognizing the talent and the contributions that not only women, but all underrepresented communities in this in Atlanta can contribute to our growth and our success and on the brand of Atlanta community technology community. And I’ve said a number of times if we can’t in Atlanta, take advantage of the fantastic, underrepresented, very diverse, very broad technology community that we have here in Atlanta. What city can? And I, you see it all coming together and and that does include women.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:10] Only now do you think that something that kind of leans in our favor here in Atlanta and I think Atlanta is unique compared to the other cities you mentioned that are kind of these startup communities in that Atlanta has such a diverse economy and there is there’s multiple industries that touch technology and it’s primarily be to be like there’s not a lot of B2C companies in technology that are the household names, but there’s a lot of B2B companies that are kind of running maybe those B2C companies or they’re or they’re the kind of the background of those B2C companies. But the fact that it’s B2B may be kind of a little more anonymous and not kind of front page news that allows leaders to kind of jump maybe from one company to another a little easier here in Atlanta than maybe in these other areas.

Kelly Gay: [00:08:04] Yeah, I think there’s there are both good and bad to what you just said in terms and you know, somebody who’s on the other side of the equation as you just outlined it, there’s good and bad on that side, too. I actually don’t think that this Atlantic technology community in general, I don’t think I don’t think we took jobs like in general, like you see happen in San Francisco. I do think there is a higher level of, you know, loyalty will use that word or commitment to what you’re doing. And part of it is we’re not as big as San Francisco or the New York communities because we’re not as big a city in terms of technology and the respect of community matters and your reputation matters and people are aware of that. Additionally, we have a pretty youthful community here, which is a great strength of ours, just a fabulous strength of ours. And many of them are joining smaller entrepreneurial companies where they can make a real difference. And then you’re very invested in the difference that you make and and you become a critical, critical part of the growth of a company. And people aren’t going to switch jobs when when that’s your situation.

Kelly Gay: [00:09:19] So those are the good things related to the B2B and the size and scope of what we have. You are right. We are more the things that make it all work. There’s nothing wrong with being the things that make it all work, like being so, so big in the city with us being the number one financial payment processing clearinghouse, Atlanta being the number one Georgia, really because there are some outside of Georgia. So outside of Atlanta, the number one payment processing, clearing technology stations, shall we call it, in the world? That’s not glamorous, that’s not A. But it generates billions and billions of dollars of revenue, some of which much of which gets infused back into the Atlanta community. So I do think there are some things. No, we don’t have the big big retail names or the big consumer names that do your brand. So that’s a little harder to come by when you don’t have it. But. But you know, to me, the B2B element with Atlanta, overall, we’re very functional city. We’re a very practical city. We are. Pragmatic in our approach, we’re not showing General as a city. It all comes together to me.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:37] Yeah, and I had a funny thing happen to me. I was doing broadcast from Fintech South a few years ago and that was a global conference and people were coming from all over the world to come to Atlanta. And I would ask some of these people who were when they were leaving their country and they were saying, Hey, I’m coming to America for this big global fintech conference. And and I said, when you told them you were going to Atlanta, did they know like what was their take on that? Because I’m sure their assumption was, Oh, this has to be in New York or in Silicon Valley or in Boston. But Atlanta, you know, for people who don’t know, like you said, this were the world where all the action is in that space. But it’s not just common knowledge and and it’s frustrating. I remember at the time when you were beginning, you know, Atlanta always had kind of a chip on the shoulder that, hey, why aren’t we getting any of this attention? There’s a lot of great things happening here. And it’s like you said, when we’re the people that are running kind of the companies that are making headlines, it’s frustrating that we’re not getting our due. But I think. But just by doing the, you know, grinding and doing the blocking and the tackling of the work that it is starting to come, you know, everything is kind of leaning our way nowadays. So many people are exiting and staying here and doing more to help the community grow. It’s really kind of a golden age, I think, for for the city when it comes to technology.

Kelly Gay: [00:12:04] I completely agree with you and on a point you said about people growing and being successful and staying with the city. We’re so fortunate that we have people willing to do that. That is how San Francisco became. San Francisco is in terms of technology, is this wealth of knowledge and capability and expertize that you need there and grew the next thing and next thing. So we’re very lucky on that. It is frustrating. At one level, we we have to beat the drum seven times more loudly. To do that, we are worth the city. That’s bad in terms of the contribution we’re making certain industries. Technology is one, but communications is another. Iot is another distribution, technology, transportation. I mean, there are a lot of great hub for that’s bad. Good of it, however, is that we don’t have a hyper. We don’t have a tulip bulb bubble occurring because everything is here in Atlanta. It’s more rational. It’s more pragmatic. If at a time, a company at a time, a person at a time. And so it just generates a better result in terms of our growth.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:21] Yeah. Like our foundation is strong and it’s diverse so that it can withstand, you know, a downturn in any one given market where we have enough infrastructure here that’s going to support us.

Kelly Gay: [00:13:37] Yeah, you’re absolutely right. And our infrastructure, you know, we’re a we’re a backbone to so many of the things that travel on the internet was quietly, just quietly in the background being this this, you know, infrastructure city that makes the internet work makes companies make payments work. You know, I don’t know that we mind being this quiet. You know, megatropolis in terms of technology and that contribution, because we wouldn’t attract the companies, we have been able to protect this city, all we were doing was yelling right here.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:20] Well, and you’re seeing the ripples go beyond Atlanta in terms of the southeast now in Nashville and Birmingham, Chattanooga. There’s other kind of areas sprouting in technology. And, you know, we might have been the catalyst to get it going or at least kind of have people looking in this area of the country, at least. But you’re seeing some of the ripples, you know, appear throughout the southeast.

Kelly Gay: [00:14:48] You’re right about that. And while not every city recognizes that Atlanta is a bit of a hub, not with not the we’re the only ones in the southeast. There’s one or two, shall we say, in Florida. And then burgeoning burgeoning success in Nashville and Charlotte and that kind of thing. But if you look at, for instance, just center Atlanta, we had over 400 applications from 16 states to come to Atlanta, and any venture conference in the southeast will tell you that venture. Atlanta has figured out the formula to to showcase. Hard southeastern companies, certainly Atlanta based companies, both early states and more world stage companies, over 60 percent of the presenting companies on stage at Venture Atlanta, of which there were almost 100 presenting companies ninety one overall. But of that, 91 over 60 percent were from 12 different southeastern states, with a little bit over to the West as well. And get this late fifty nine percent of the of the companies that ultimately presented were led by underrepresented founders back to where we started with both women and diverse populations. And we in Atlanta can can attract that and showcase it. Yeah, very unique among the southeast

Lee Kantor: [00:16:13] And not only unique, it’s important because there’s a lot of folks out there that fall under that category that deserve a chance to be seen and heard.

Kelly Gay: [00:16:23] You’re completely right. I wish I’d been here to the punch on that critically important. And beyond the critically important. You see, Atlanta has always had such great corporate leadership outside of technology as well in terms of being good citizens, being proper shepherds of the human race. And you see companies overall, yes, many in technology, but many not in technology and in many consumer brands, for instance, looking at each other and saying, you know, we’ve an obligation and an opportunity better for a company and our community by lifting up this population of diverse, talented people that we represent. You see it happening all over the city. And technology is just one of the places that has been smart enough to take advantage of the great base of both leadership and a base of employees from every walk of life.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:27] Now, if you look into your crystal ball, what are you seeing coming into 2022 and then beyond as we hopefully get out of this pandemic? And then we go back to some sense of normalcy, even if that normalcy is just dealing with these kind of an endemic at this point?

Kelly Gay: [00:17:45] Right, right? You know? I think we all would like to believe there will be a moment it’s over. I think we all would like that. We’re desperate for that. I don’t I do think we’re headed towards an endemic, but I don’t think it’s fun and it will. You know, the flu is an endemic olarinde and endemic. There’s a set of things you can just not wipe out. The flu is a great example, but we manage it and we manage it fine. I think technology stands at a wonderful place in terms of being able to deal with whatever comes our way because people can work remotely. We have the technology to work remotely. We are all about providing populations with the ability to do your job with with great tools from wherever you are. That’s the great strength of technology, much of the work. Yeah, it’s much work technology companies being able to do that work from wherever you are and, you know, so many collaborative tools and and the ability for those teams to work collaboratively. I think that we will. No, I’m not worried about technology industry in the population of industries that Atlanta and its very diverse set of industries represents will be fine as an industry. I think that our big industries, let’s just use fintech and payment processing as an example. I think those will continue to thrive because there is no question that scale drives scale.

Kelly Gay: [00:19:25] And I hope it continues at a rate that can be consumed properly by the city, by the employment base, by the number of companies that are created so that we don’t create, you know, the equivalent of a Dutch tulip bubble and some trouble. I don’t think it will. We’re just too practical a city and too diverse for us to lean all in on one thing and create a problem for ourselves. So I do I. We’ll continue to drive scale. I think that the our diverse population. Is it down? And I think there are many technology companies realizing it’s a gem and there as a group that is a gem of humankind, that other companies in other cities would love to be able to replicate where they are, but they can’t. And so you see a fair number of companies. Yes, many of them are smaller. Moving to Atlanta and Georgia, but certainly the Atlanta metropolitan area to be able to capitalize on the opportunity of. Having a diverse workforce, which, you know, has so many benefits, it has so many benefits to your current employees, you know, who want to live in that kind of a world. And so I do think that we’ll see companies continue to to move to Atlanta to participate in this in this fabulous environment that we have.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:06] Yeah, I mean, it’s it’s a true melting pot, and I’ve been fortunate to do some of the radio for ATC and Georgia State University’s Entrepreneurship Institute and to see those the startups that come out of each one of those are totally different, even though there are just a few blocks apart, you know, from there just down the road from each other. But it’s a different group of people, a different kind of mission and different kind of activities that interest them and they’re good at. And it’s just fascinating to see them both have a place to grow and learn, and people are investing in them and helping them get to new levels. And I think that that is, you know, that raises all boats, that kind of effort and that type of collaboration. I think that’s what we need here in Atlanta. More of and that’s what the country needs as a whole.

Kelly Gay: [00:21:54] Mm hmm. I completely agree and you said an important thing, but the populations are different and the support and raising up is probably a little different. But the strength is in all of us. No one of us, the strength is and the strength is in the diversity. And I mean that broadly, not just underrepresented communities. And that’s an important point that you just make.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:21] Well, thank you so much for all that you do, and congratulations on the John M. Leo Award. We really appreciate you and your work here in the city and beyond. And if there’s anything we could be doing for you, please let us know. We think your work is important.

Kelly Gay: [00:22:38] Well, thank you. Thank you so much, Liane. Thanks for the time.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:41] All right, this is Lee Kantor Willis Hale next time on Atlanta Business Radio.

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Vanessa Abron With Agency Abron

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VanessaAbronVanessa Abron, the founder of Agency Abron, is an artist who has several years of experience working in corporate environments.

She spent a vast portion of her life studying dance, music, theater, visual, and media arts, possessing both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in arts management but also has more than 15 years of experience in marketing and public relations after working with companies and firms such as Atlantic Records, Ch’rwed Marketing & Promotions, Weber Shandwick, Hill + Knowlton Strategies, Ebony/Jet magazine, Fashion Fair Cosmetics, and Nielsen to name a few.

Connect with Vanessa on LinkedIn and Facebook and follow Agency Abron on Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Marketing
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Branding
  • Music/Creative Arts

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studio in Chicago, Illinois, it’s time for Chicago Business Radio brought to you by Firm Space, your private sanctuary for productivity and growth. To learn more, go to FirmSpace.com. Now here’s your host.

Max Kantor: [00:00:20] Hey everybody, and welcome to Chicago Business Radio. I’m your host, Max Kantor. And before we jump into the show today, I just want to thank our sponsor firm SpaceX. Without them, we could not be sharing these important stories that we do. And speaking of important stories. I’m excited to talk to our guests today. She is the director of agency Abron. Please welcome to the show, Vanessa Abron, and welcome to the show, Vanessa.

Vanessa Abron: [00:00:45] Thank you for having me.

Max Kantor: [00:00:46] Of course. Thanks for being here. So let’s dove right in. Tell me a little bit about agency. What do you guys do?

Vanessa Abron: [00:00:53] Well, Max, you caught me at a great time. So Agency Apron is a creative direction company. We started primarily doing public relations, helping agencies and businesses and things of that nature with their public relations initiatives, especially getting them into medium. And since then, we’ve expanded beyond that. So that also includes even management and development consultations, creative direction, concept development and things of that nature.

Max Kantor: [00:01:26] So I saw that you yourself used to be an artist. Is that right?

Vanessa Abron: [00:01:33] That is incorrect. I am currently an artist.

Max Kantor: [00:01:38] You did get me there. Yes, of course. You’re currently an artist. So how did you kind of pivot from maybe doing the arts one hundred percent to then doing what you do now?

Vanessa Abron: [00:01:49] Oh, my gosh. That’s a loaded question, but let me see how I can make this really quickly. So growing up as a kid, my parents put me in dance and music lessons and I carried that over into high school college. I wanted to focus more on the development of the music business, did work in music right after college and right when I was in grad school working with an agency called Shrewd Marketing, Shrewd Marketing and Promotions, where we did marketing for Def Jam, Interscope, Bad Boy, Virgin, to name a few. The record industry had took a pivot and it was recommended that I should explore PR. And when I was in college, when I was an undergrad, a PR teacher said the same thing. So I was like, I need to give it a try. I started working in public relations full time after that, working at agencies like at Hill and Knowlton. Then I transitioned to working with Ebony magazine well, actually with Johnson Publishing Company, which had Ebony Jet, Ebony Magazine, Jet magazine and Fashion Fair Cosmetics. So working with the magazine got in touch with the music industry again because a lot of the artists that were on different labels were working to get interviews in Ebony and Jet magazine. So it kind of got my feet wet again there, especially working red carpet events and things of that nature for the publication. So that sparked my interest again. After that, I did a quick corporate stint before transitioning into being an independent consultant. And from there, I started to attract a lot of other artists, and just organically, the artists within me started to get revived again.

Max Kantor: [00:03:41] Wow, Vanessa, that that’s a crazy, cool story. And if you I don’t know if you have a Wikipedia page or not, but if you did, it would be huge. You’ve done so much in your career, and it’s very cool to see how kind of each step in your career has led you to what you do now.

Vanessa Abron: [00:03:58] Yeah, I mean, I don’t have a Wikipedia page, I think you can’t start your own Wikipedia page from what I heard, I don’t know, but no. So if you want to go start one for me, go for it.

Max Kantor: [00:04:07] Gotcha. So for agency Abrams, who is your ideal client?

Vanessa Abron: [00:04:14] Oh, my gosh. So that’s a really good question, and I really was just talking to a friend of mine earlier today about how I really want to make sure that everyone knows the agency isn’t for everyone. First and foremost, while this may sound very esoteric, I just like to connect with other individuals that we kind of have like this this connection that you can’t quite put your finger on, if that makes sense. So it’s usually like you have like this synergy that is that you can’t quite describe, and that is very important to me. I like to have I like to have clients that’s looking for a relationship as opposed to, Oh, give me, I’m going to give you my money and you execute this, and that’s it. Like, I really want my clients to feel like they’re part of a family. So, for example, just this past summer, I had a client. She is a musician and she did a listening event in L.A. I was there and I helped her with it. And when I was there, like her friends and family mentioned to me that although I had known her for only a year, our connection seemed like it was one that we have for years and years and years. And that is that. And that meant a lot to me that I would like to have that connection with my clients, but I’m also looking for those if we’re going to. So that’s the esoteric, you know, fluffy but very important aspect of it. But also, I’m looking for clients that’s looking for nontraditional ways of meeting their goals. So and actually just thinking about exploring, you know, exploring outside of the box and willing to take some risk while also combining that with some traditional means as well.

Max Kantor: [00:06:05] So you mentioned goals. What are some goals that your clients have brought to you? So some examples of those.

Vanessa Abron: [00:06:13] Well, most most importantly, everyone wants to get more visibility, and that’s different for every person, every everybody, every company, every brand. They want more exposure. They want more visibility. And what that looks like is very different for each client. So one client may want more followers on social media and or some somebody, but I going back to the ideal client, I would prefer to have the client that’s looking for more engagement on social media versus the client that’s looking for more followers on social media so that, you know, that is some goals. And you know, and so engagement is the how much are people connecting with you? You can get those followers, you can buy followers. That means absolutely nothing. But if they’re connecting with you and engaging with you and talking to you and commenting and sharing and supporting you as a result of being a part of your community, then that speaks volumes and I would prefer to work with that type of client. And so. So that’s one that’s a goal. For example, some clients may want media exposure. They may say, I have a dream of being on Good Morning America or something local like Wendy City Live, which is now, you know, Wendy Weekend. So something like that or just ABC, your local ABC or NBC affiliate. Some people may come to me and they just want their goal is I’m trying to create a video and this I’m having a hard time coming up with what that looks like visually. So I will work with that client to visually lay out what the concept is of that video. I have another client where this weekend I have to give him feedback on his upcoming album, so it’s different for every client.

Max Kantor: [00:08:20] Mm-hmm. And I know that, you know, especially in the arts visibility, getting an audience that’s so important. So the people who are coming to you, do you get a range of people with levels of followers? So like, are you getting people with 10 followers on Instagram and people who have a million followers? Is it broader? Are you focusing more for people who are just starting out?

Vanessa Abron: [00:08:44] I wouldn’t say I’m working with those in the millions, however, I do work with some corporate brands, so I want to say that I have worked with artists and I do work with small businesses. I work with some non-profits as well. And I do work with other, like other larger agencies on bigger corporate clients. So it it it varies, to be honest with you. And it just depends on. I mean, so when a customer, when a client comes to me, I have them go through an exploratory call and through that exploratory call, I really like listen to what it is that they’re trying to accomplish. And I think about, OK, what? What are your goals? What are you trying to do? And I am I able to feasibly help you accomplish those goals? And depending on where you are. So someone can come into the door and they can have 10 followers and it can be a brand new startup. And. And but if their goal is I just want to get up to one hundred followers on social media, I want to, you know, media placements. I want to do a couple of speaking engagements. I want to do some. Then that’s like, OK, I can work with you. But if a person with 10 followers comes in is like, I want to be on Good Morning America. That might be a little bit of a stretch, but if a client comes in and they already had some traction in there and they’ve been doing a lot of things before me, and it’s like, and they’re like, OK, this is all the things that we’re done. We’re ready to level up, we’re ready to go. And Good Morning America, the Today show, then I can say, OK, that’s possible.

Vanessa Abron: [00:10:19] So it depends on where someone is in their journey. I will say personally, I like the I like the MIT startup, so I noticed that like when you’re like a brand new startup, it’s like it’s harder because it’s like, OK, this is like your business is your baby, right? This is your baby, it’s your pride and joy, and you want everyone to look at your baby like it’s the most beautiful baby in the whole entire world. And unfortunately, that’s not the case because there’s a million babies out there and everybody. I mean, they may look at your and like, Oh, that’s great, we applaud you. Congratulations, and then they keep going. So it’s not about so it’s like it’s like getting people to understand or clients understand that you have to build the foundation and grow from that to really get to where you’re trying to be. It’s not it’s not as cut and dry as you would like it to be. Sometimes it isn’t, but oftentimes it’s not. So it’s like, OK, I have this brand new baby and I want this baby to go to Harvard. Let’s say, you know, it’s like your baby’s not going to be at Harvard in two or three years, but through growth and development and with the right, you know, with the right, whatever, you can get it to this Harvard level status, right? So I’m using Harvard as a metaphor, right? Or, you know, or I just like, I just want to. Maybe it’s not Harvard. I just want a child to college, right? So it’s like, what does that look like? So I hope I’m making sense because I feel like I’m rambling a little bit.

Max Kantor: [00:11:51] No, no, I’m totally following what you’re saying, and I think your business is so cool because you’re not just working with one type of artist. You know, it’s not just musicians or it’s not just videographers going through your website. You see, there’s such a broad spectrum of people that you can help. And so for you, that must keep things so interesting and so fun.

Vanessa Abron: [00:12:12] It does it does in a lot of different ways. It keeps me on my toes, it keeps me somewhat cool, especially with my nieces and nephew by having, you know, my finger on the pulse of what’s going on in today’s culture and being able to not just have my finger on the pulse, but being able to help influence it and tell the stories that’s going on in today’s culture. Like, I think one of the most invigorating things is like when you see other people talking about something that at one point they weren’t talking about before or was under the radar or, you know, just getting it to a level where it wasn’t before. And that’s pretty awesome. Mm hmm.

Max Kantor: [00:12:58] So I’m curious about this. I know for Google, you can pay to get more views, like on YouTube. You can promote your video on Tik Tok. You can promote your video. Do you recommend that to artists when they publish content? Or are you looking at other ways? Yes, you do.

Vanessa Abron: [00:13:18] I do, but I recommend I. I definitely recommend integrated marketing approach. So, yes, like if you’re well and it depends on how you’re paying. So if you’re doing like paid ads and promotions, absolutely, you want to be able to have some ways that you can be. You can guarantee that you’re going to you can reach a new audience and have your eyes on have your brand on eyes that have never seen you before. And it’s like a commercial. Like when you look at a commercial, you, you look at it, you see it and it’s like, and you remember it and you see it over and over and over again. And maybe even if you can’t invest in that particular brand or product or service at the moment that you see it by seeing it over and over and over again through commercials, you remember it when it’s time for you to get something. So, for example, you know, I’m in Chicago and that five eight eight two three hundred empire like that, that the phone number is embedded in my memory forever. Yeah, you know, so if I was looking for carpet and I made, I may or may not go to Empire, but it is. I know I can call five eight eight two three hundred to get Empire. So there’s definitely value in doing some form of advertising on YouTube and Instagram and Facebook and things like that. Do do measure your due way in your expectations, right? So what I’ve noticed, like I had one client tell me that she can get more sales by doing promotions on Google, which makes more sense because on Google, if you type in something you’re probably looking for to buy when you do ads on like Facebook and Instagram and things like that.

Vanessa Abron: [00:15:03] It’s more of a visibility standpoint, so people may not instantly buy on Facebook or Instagram right away. Unless you’re doing a whole lot of marketing, you know you’re putting a lot of dollars in that for them to see that. But I’ve noticed, like if you’re doing a promotion or something like that or you have like a free event that people can register and sign up for Facebook and Instagram, as are good for that, especially as an artist too. Like if you have a video or a music video and you put some promotion behind it and that video pops up and someone’s ad. Even though they may be watching another YouTube video, if your video comes up in the ad and it sounds good, they may keep watching it and listening to it because you caught their attention when otherwise they may not have seen you. So, yes, I do agree that pay promotions is important and you tie that in. You should everyone should have a 360 approach. You should have some pay promotions. You should be doing some sales initiatives. You should be doing some public relations initiatives like you should you should be actively on social media. And I think that’s the one thing that’s, you know, goes back into making sure you level set your goals. Because I think a lot of times when a company is a small business or a fresh new small business, as I should say, they’re trying to operate as if they’re this, you know, like another company that has a huge investment and can invest in all of these different areas.

Vanessa Abron: [00:16:29] And sometimes you can’t do that with the limited budget and you’re new. And so I’m very honest with my clients, like if I turn clients away because I’m like, Look, what’s you’re trying to do and where you’re trying to go, the money that you can invest in me, I think you will get more traction if you did some pay promotions and then at some point you do grow past that and you do do some pay promotions and you do some public relations initiatives and you do some social media and you do some sales, you know, sales things and things like that. So you have to grow and see what is important to you right now. Somebody may be like, I just need people to. Is know who I am like, I love the client that says I want to be in media to give me credibility, that’s the ideal client when a client is like, I want to be a Meethi because they think that’s going to equal sales. That’s a red flag for me, because that doesn’t happen all the time. Like a person has to hear a brand or hear a name or hear a company at least seven times before they commit to trying to invest in it, or at least remember it. Of course, if you do events and things like that and you have them on the spot, you know you have a better chance because they have that engagement factor. But a person has to at least hear your brand seven times before they even remember it.

Max Kantor: [00:17:56] Wow, I did not know that. That’s that’s that’s a very interesting statistic, but it makes sense. You know, when you hear it the first time, you’re like, Oh, you know, whatever, I don’t know what this is, but the more you hear it, the more ingrained it becomes. And then soon you recognize it. And I guess seven times is the magic number.

Vanessa Abron: [00:18:11] Right? So if you’re doing a combination of paid advertising, public relations initiatives, you know, all sorts of marketing, then you’re increasing the opportunity for that person to hear your name at least seven times, right?

Max Kantor: [00:18:26] So from your agency, do you want to share your biggest success story with us?

Vanessa Abron: [00:18:33] Hmm. What is my biggest success story I have? Hold on, let me think

Max Kantor: [00:18:40] I know it’s a big question. It’s a loaded question.

Vanessa Abron: [00:18:46] Ok, I don’t have a big success story, but this is what I’m going to give you, I’m going to give you a memorable moment. You know, one of my most memorable moments. So I worked with an agency called Burrell Communications from time to time, and they do some things with McDonald’s. And through that, I’ve helped them with the all star, some all star PR management that they were doing during all star weekend when the NBA all star was here in Chicago. So during that time, we did some things with Magic Johnson while he was in town, and I remember he just made jokes about how short I was, which I’m which is, you know, really funny because he’s really, really tall and I’m really, really short. So to see was next to each other, it’s like very obvious. But like, I just like there’s pictures of him, like pointing at me, you know, it was like, it wasn’t good fun. But of him teasing me about how short I am. So that was that was super cool. And he was just like a really great guy. Like, I think the funny thing about it, what I will say is working in the industry that I work in, I’ve had the opportunity to meet a lot of celebrities and some are super cool and some are not super cool.

Vanessa Abron: [00:20:16] And I and one of the things that I noticed about Magic Johnson was that he was super cool, mega successful. You know, has like this amazing career that he’s developed, both in NBA and beyond the NBA as an entrepreneur as well. And just very humble and down to earth, like talking to him. It’s like talking to your uncle at a Thanksgiving dinner, right? And so and it was just amazing to me because it made an impression on me because I’m like, if someone like Magic Johnson can be super cool and down to earth and very personable, there’s no reason why anyone else try to treat someone else like they’re less than right. And so I kind of carried that with me as far as like always knowing your value because people that are really remarkable value people, regardless of where they are in their life, right?

Max Kantor: [00:21:15] Well, Vanessa, you have been a wonderful guest today. And for any artists who are listening right now, how can they learn more about agency apron or contact you for maybe scheduling a consultation?

Vanessa Abron: [00:21:28] Well, I highly recommend going to my website agency apron. That’s a g e n c y a b r o n dot com and i really highly recommend it because I want to make sure that you look at the website and make sure that it resonates with you. I really worked really hard to make sure that the website spoke to the ideal client. So if you’re the ideal client and you go to their website and it speaks to you, please reach out. Some people go to the website and they don’t get it, and that’s what it’s supposed to do as well. So if it goes, if it speaks to you, please go to the contact form on the agency EBONY.com website and set up a consultation with me. Or you can email me directly at new clients at agency bronchi.

Max Kantor: [00:22:21] Awesome. Well, Vanessa, thank you again. So much for being our guest today on Chicago Business Radio. Thank you and thank to all of you for listening and we will see you next time.

Intro: [00:22:34] This episode is Chicago Business Radio has been brought to you by firm SpaceX, your private sanctuary for productivity and growth. To learn more, go to Firme Space.com.

Tara Griffin With G&A Partners

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Tara Griffin with G&A Partners, works with HR departments for 1-500 employees to strategically manage all aspects of the employment life cycle. Including: HR compliance, benefit program design, safety & risk management, compensation plans, payroll processing, hiring systems, and employee relations.

Follow G&A Partners on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • About G&A Partners
  • How G&A has helped businesses during the pandemic
  • G&A in helping businesses with recruiting and retention
  • Tapping into new industries
  • Post pandemic workplace

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:07] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studio in Denver, Colorado. It’s time for Denver Business Radio. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:23] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Denver Business Radio, and this is going to be a fun one today on the show, we have Tara Griffin with G&A Partners. Welcome, Tara.

Tara Griffin: [00:00:34] Thank you very much.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:36] Well, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about Gina. How are you serving, folks?

Tara Griffin: [00:00:42] You bet. So Jana Partners is a full service P.O.. The term P.O. stands for Professional Employers organization. And so basically, that means that we work with other businesses and they outsource functions such as HR benefits, administration, payroll and risk management to our teams to help help their businesses grow and be competitive and, you know, help with employee retention and things like that.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:15] So now what types of companies are good fits to have a PPO?

Tara Griffin: [00:01:21] You know, really it isn’t industry specific. It has more to do with kind of the mindset and the desires of the business itself. We work with small, medium and large clients. I’ve got clients that I work with, with five employees. I have clients that I work with, with over 400 and 500 employees, and I know some of my counterparts work with even businesses larger than that. So really, it has more to do with the business’s own goals and how we can bring our expertize to the table to help them fulfill those goals rather than a specific industry. However, I will mention that there is a specific industry that we have recently started working with, and that is the cannabis industry. And in the past there have been some challenges that have now been overcome so that we can really serve those types of clients as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:17] Now the companies that tend to use POS. Is it that they started out maybe trying to do everything themselves and then they realized, Wow, this has a lot more complexity than I anticipated, or I’m not able to offer some of these benefits that my competitors are, and I’d like to get away. Find a way to be able to do that. Like what is typically the reason a company chooses a CEO from however they were doing it originally.

Tara Griffin: [00:02:46] You know, it’s all of the above all those things that you said were all valid reasons. So some people have experience working with the CEO in a in a prior work life. And so in a new work life, they may talk to the other people and say, Hey, let’s explore the options of a CEO. Maybe we can find some expertize there that can really supplement what we’re doing or help us with our employee lifecycle and an employee engagement or others might look at it and say, Hey, you know, benefits are really a tough thing right now. Let’s see what a CEO offering looks like. Some people just find themselves in a scenario like you brought up at the beginning where they say, I’m overwhelmed. I have so much to do to grow my business. And some of these things, like payroll and trying to keep up with the ever changing landscape of employment compliance these days is just too much for me. I need help and they go seek out help.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:39] Now, where does kind of these online payroll places fit into kind of your like what you do? How how is that different? How is it the same?

Tara Griffin: [00:03:52] So when you say online payroll places, give me an example of maybe something

Lee Kantor: [00:03:56] So like somebody goes, you know what? I don’t want to do payroll, so I’m going to just go to one of these, you know, kind of national branded payroll companies. And then they say they take that. Is that also a P.O. or is that they’re just doing kind of one part of what you guys do?

Tara Griffin: [00:04:15] So it depends. So they could go to a national or a local provider, and some of those national and local providers simply do payroll, and it’s a lot of self service. The business owner or whoever at the business can go online and utilize some type of software or system to produce payroll. And they just interact with them like a typical vendor. I’m buying this particular thing from you. I’m using it to produce payroll. It goes out the door. There are some situations like that where it is a P.O. and a P.O. arrangement. The difference between like just simply a payroll situation and a P.O. situation has to do with the term CO employment. And so an RPO situation, a company like GNC Partners actually enters into a contract where they became become a co employer of those employees. And so it kind of expands the scope of the interaction or services that can be offered to a client in that we can be the sponsoring employer for benefit packages and utilize economies of scale to offer more along the lines of a benefit package that a large company could offer and invite a small to medium sized business into our offering and take advantage of some of those economies of scale, if that makes sense. So that’s kind of the difference between maybe just going online and getting some payroll done. Jana Partners really looks for truly partner with our clients, and as much as they invite us to be part of their business and complement their strategy and their goals, we expand into benefits, risk management, HR consulting, you know, lots of things in any area that touches the employment lifecycle.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:13] Well, it sounds like you’re not you don’t really like kind of have a vendor relationship. You have more of a partner relationship that you’re there to be a trusted advisor to help them, whether it’s recruiting new employees, keeping existing employees, just helping them grow their business so they can focus in on their business side. And you’re kind of helping them focus on the people side.

Tara Griffin: [00:06:35] Absolutely. In fact, the team that I lead is one of the teams that is solely focused on that relationship with the client, and we know that it takes some time to build the trust so that we can be perceived and looked at and invited in as a trusted partner. So, you know, really starting with fulfilling the needs and accurately and timely and over time, we start to build trust and our goal is always to be that partner and to be in a consultative role with them and understand truly their needs so we can fulfill them.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:09] Now, a lot of times during a crisis is where some of this trust is built. Can you share how the pandemic, how you were able to help your clients kind of weather that and maybe help them kind of deal with the the post-pandemic issues of these hybrid workplace? Or, you know, some people going all remote, no remote, some remote and kind of navigate those waters because that’s been tough for a lot of folks.

Tara Griffin: [00:07:34] You bet. So if I may, I’ll start at the beginning of the pandemic and answering that question and really one of the most important things that. And reasons why we were able to help our clients so much is that the leadership team at GSA Partners is really built, a solid company where they didn’t have to worry about their own foundation. So we were able to just immediately mobilize and be the type and the quality of the professionals and people who work. Fit and partners mobilized very quickly to understand the laws and the regulations and things like PPP loans that were being thrown at us at lightning speed. And really, you know, work around the clock developing things that would help clients get things like PPP loans. So for example, we had a local community theater and one of our regions that we have an office and they had hundreds of employees and immediately they were out of work. They ended up being one of the very first companies to get a very large PPP loan to keep those employees paid, and we were able to help them get it back quickly because of how fast we mobilized to create the kinds of reports their banking institutions needed to approve such a such a loan. As time moved on again, we just within general partners designated different groups to become experts and to really study each new law or bill that was passed and how it would impact our clients so that we could disseminate that information through our organization and have answers and and help guide our clients with things like employer tax credits and and COVID, sick pay and different state compliance things that rolled out.

Tara Griffin: [00:09:27] For example, I’m in Colorado and Colorado had its own specific requirements in response to some of the COVID needs. You’ve also brought up that, you know, now talking about hybrid workplaces and things like that. And some of the results of the pandemic that we’re currently living and very involved with its client base to address those kinds of issues. How do we talk about employment engagement? What has changed? We’ve kind of changed from monitoring employees to really needing to facilitate a mindset of empowering employees because most of them are working remote. And a lot of our clients find themselves in situations where they would love to return back to the office and and see their teammates and people. They’re working together, but they find themselves in a situation where a lot of employees are saying time out, if you require me to come back to the office, I’m not going to continue to work here because there are other options and they have found working from home to be very beneficial to themselves. On the flip side, there are certainly employees who have been saying, I can’t stand working at home anymore, please send me back to an office and then they return to an office. But yet they’re not really surrounded by their teammates, which is something that feeds them. So there’s a lot of those types of dynamics that we’re hearing about from our clients and our HR professionals really have been working closely with them to help develop the policies that fit their particular need and and workforce.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:09] Now for your new clients, are they typically going from one IPO to a new IPO or are they going from no IPO to your IPO? Are they frustrated by a certain situation? They say, Hey, we need kind of help, like what is usually the spark that triggers a new relationship for you?

Tara Griffin: [00:11:30] That great question, so someone on the sales team may correct me, but from the new client sign ups that my team sees. I would say that probably seventy five percent of them are coming from a different relationship with either a different CEO or an accounting firm that’s been doing their payroll or a payroll relationship with just strictly payroll. I would say the majority of them fall into that category. There’s less of them that fall into the category of they’ve been doing it themselves and realized that in order for them to grow their business, they need to outsource some of these activities.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:15] So now what is what are they frustrated with that solution that they thought they had?

Tara Griffin: [00:12:22] Typically, it’s customer service and the ability to really talk to a specific individual that’s assigned to their account. We’ve seen in, you know, with our competitors and heard a lot of feedback from clients who joined our our company, our team, that the personal touch is starting to go away more and more and that they find themselves for all things, including payroll, having to call a general number. And it could be a different person processing payroll every time that they don’t have anybody direct number as their go to person. And so one of the things that Gina is committed to and continues to be committed to is that there are a couple of very specific points of contact that every client account has. And one of those is somebody for my team, which we would refer to as a client advocate, meaning that your go to person for anything that you don’t really answer to, or if there’s something that needs to be escalated or you feel like you want some additional service or you want to understand what’s available to you at Jana Partners, the people on my team really work at addressing those issues and having a relationship and an understanding of that particular business’s needs so it can translate to all of the specialists within our organization. The other specific contact that they always have by name is a payroll specialist, dedicated payroll specialist who certainly works on other client accounts besides just their own. But that is their go to person, the same person that always will process their payroll. And then the third consistent point of contact is a benefit specialist. If they participate in our benefit programs, they have a dedicated benefit specialist that both they and their employees can reach out to for assistance. For something as simple as getting a medical ID card all the way to, I’m really struggling to have a claim process the correct way. Can you please help me deal with the insurance carrier or make a short term disability claim or something like that? So that’s the big thing that I hear the most from clients who joined Gina and have just left a competitor of sorts.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:38] It’s what what was once old is new again, right? That that level of customer service and customer care is being automated out of everybody’s system to save themselves time and money and people. And that’s what people are hungry for, is that level of care.

Tara Griffin: [00:14:57] They are hungry for a level of care, and at the same time, there’s got to be a balance with those systems systems and some consistency in process, which are cyclical in nature at times, simply because the compliance piece of our world has continued to change and expand and get more complicated, that there are things that are necessary for an audit trail, so to speak, and to see who agreed to what. But you can’t really replace that human aspect where a human who’s got enough business acumen to understand the needs of their clients business and why it would even matter to them to have a competitive benefit strategy and translate that over to how they can fulfill that need and alleviate the time and the burden of that business leader so that they can go and continue to do what they got into business to do in the first place and grow their particular business.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:53] Well, if somebody out there that wants to learn more, what is the website?

Tara Griffin: [00:15:58] It is G and a partners,

Lee Kantor: [00:16:03] And that’s G. The letter n a partner’s

Tara Griffin: [00:16:08] Not as accurate. Correct? Yes.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:10] Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You doing important work and we appreciate you.

Tara Griffin: [00:16:16] Well, I appreciate your time, and thanks for inviting me to be here. All right,

Lee Kantor: [00:16:19] This is Lee Kantor will sail next time on Denver Business Radio.

Steven Howard With Caliente Leadership

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StevehowardSteven Howard with Caliente Leadership, is the award-winning author of 21 leadership, business, and motivational books and the editor of nine professional and personal development books in the Project You series. His latest book is How Stress and Anxiety Impact Your Decision Making.

His book Better Decisions. Better Thinking. Better Outcomes. How to go from Mind Full to Mindful Leadership, received a Silver Award from the Nonfiction Authors Association. He also wrote Leadership Lessons from the Volkswagen Saga, which won three prestigious publishing industry awards (2017 Independent Press Award, National Indie Excellence Award, and San Francisco Book Festival Award). He is also the author of Great Leadership Words of Wisdom.

Howard is well-known and recognized for his truly international and multicultural perspective, having lived in the USA for over 30 years, in Singapore for 21 years, and in Australia for 12 years. He currently resides in Southern California.

Connect with Steven on LinkedIn and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • How leadership is changing today, post-pandemic
  • Leadership skills needed to emphasize to grow business
  • Prevent or minimize The Great Resignation of 2021

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:02] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Coach the Coach radio brought to you by the Business RadioX Ambassador Program, the no cost business development strategy for coaches who want to spend more time serving local business clients and less time selling them. Go to brxambassador.com To learn more. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:32] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Coach the Coach Radio, and this is going to be a fun one today on the show, we have Steven Howard with Caliente leadership. Welcome, Steven.

Steven Howard: [00:00:42] Good Day League. Did it meet you?

Lee Kantor: [00:00:44] Well, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about coanty leadership. How are you serving, folks?

Steven Howard: [00:00:50] Well, we do a leadership mentoring leadership, coaching one on one and also some leadership training. Plus I I’ve read a lot of books. I try to help people through the written word as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:02] So what’s your backstory? How did you get involved in leadership?

Steven Howard: [00:01:06] I had a job with Citibank many years ago at twenty three people reporting to me when I was living in Singapore, and fortunately, they sent me some good leadership training programs. And when I left Citibank, the company that we use as a training company, hired me to facilitate for other companies. So it was quite a stroke of luck, quite frankly.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:27] So what have you found regarding leadership over the years, is this something that everybody kind of has in them and it’s just a matter of getting it out? Or is it something that in times of trouble, this type of leadership qualities appear?

Steven Howard: [00:01:43] Oh, that’s an excellent question. I think everyone has the potential to be a leader. I don’t think everyone has the desire and part of getting them into leadership is stroking that desire. On the other hand, a lot of people are really good at individual contributor work, whether they’re a researcher or a chemical engineer or a scientist, and they just don’t want to lead people. They don’t want to deal with the people issues of it. So I call leadership in art. In fact, then I differentiate what a good leader is and a great leader is, and I think that’s what the art of leadership comes in.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:14] So you feel that some people just hard pass on being a leader, that they’re they want to be a cog in the machine and they don’t there’s no place for leadership for them. Or is that something that there is a place for leadership skills in everybody?

Steven Howard: [00:02:31] Well, there’s a place for everybody because you have to lead yourself. But when it comes to like leading other people, you know, leading other people about how do you motivate people, how they give them direction, how they give them great feedback, and now some people just don’t want to do that, quite frankly. And I wouldn’t call them this. They a cog in the machine as much as, you know. Like I said, if you’re a chemical engineer, I’ve known quite a few good chemical engineers in places like Shell and ExxonMobil, and that’s what they want to do. They want to be in, they want to be in their laboratories. You know, they work with colleagues. They don’t want to lead colleagues. They want to. They want to do the research, they want to write their research papers, they want to write their findings. They want to get their patents filed with the government. I think that’s a fine career path, if that’s what they choose to do. I think a mistake organizations make sometimes is putting those people in the leadership. I mean, I’m sure you’ve known people who are really, really good salespeople and then you make them a sales manager. They don’t know how to lead people. They know how to sell. And that’s probably if that’s what they want to do, that’s where you should leave them.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:32] So how as a leader of an organization, do you kind of discern who the people are that have potential and desire to be leaders and who should be kind of left to for themselves?

Steven Howard: [00:03:45] A lot of one on one conversations that you can you can take up leadership skill. You see the people who have an inclination for leadership. They’re the ones who, you know, they’ll start small, they’ll lead a task force the team into something. Or maybe maybe they just lead a team bonding session, you know, or they do the team, you know, Christmas party or something like that. The leadership skills will rise to the surface if given the opportunity. I think, like I said, I think most people candidly, I think almost everyone can be a leader. But for those who don’t, you’ll see them shy away when you ask them, Hey, could you go mentor this person? No, no, I don’t want to do that. Hey, could you? Could you lead this group task force on this new research study? No, no, no. I don’t want to do that. And you pick up those clues as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:29] So now has the pandemic kind of created more leaders, less leaders? The same amount of leaders created more?

Steven Howard: [00:04:39] I doubt it. I think it’s creating a different breed of leaders, at least those who are going to be successful coming out of the pandemic. They’re going to have to use a whole bunch of different leadership skills as they’ve had to use during the pandemic. I think leading during the pandemic is very different than leading before the pandemic. And when people start going back in the office place and you have everyone co-located again, it’s going to be you cannot go back to the old leadership skills that you relied on. There’s going to be a new subset of skills that are going to be extremely important to be successful sustainably going forward.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:14] So what are some of those skills?

Steven Howard: [00:05:17] Empathy, empathy would be number one, and I think it’s even taking empathy to to a level of compassion, quite frankly. You can’t just empathize with people’s situation. You’re going to have to show compassion. I think leaders have to understand that’s probably the silver lining coming out of the pandemic is that we have to realize that people have. Not only do they have lives outside work, they have responsibilities outside work. And I think that’s one of the things you’re seeing with the great resignation that’s going on right now with the organizations and leaders who don’t recognize that and don’t respect that they’re the ones who are losing their employees. The number one skill, though I would suggest coming out of the pandemic and for the next three to four years is the ability to handle ambiguity and uncertainty. You know, we used to we we measure leaders on their ability to execute to a plan, and that’s all been well and good in the past. I think now we’re going to have to measure leaders on their ability to adapt to a plan to handle the ambiguity, the uncertainty of what might happen six months from now, what might happen nine months from now? And be able to craft plan a Plan B, maybe even Plan C and D, rather than just focusing on executing a plan that they’ve already got in place.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:37] Well, the people that are comfortable in that level of chaos, that might mean that they might have to admit they made a mistake or that the path they initially started following with less information is now no longer valid. And now we have a new path with new information. Do you think like kind of politically in an organization that that type of I don’t want to say it’s wavering, but just adjusting to new information is acceptable in today’s world.

Steven Howard: [00:07:06] I think it’s going to have to become acceptable. But I will agree with you that there are going to be many organizations and the dinosaur type organizations who who won’t adapt, who won’t be willing to adapt. I mean, I don’t know about you, but one of my favorite philosophers is Yoda, and Yoda has a great said phrase that says You have to unlearn what you have learned. And I suggest that leaders coming out the pandemic, particularly those of, you know, those of us who are over 45. You know, we’ve done it one way for so many years. We’re used to it. We’re comfortable with it. But we’re going to have to unlearn some of the ways we learned previously and pick up some of these new skills. And and also the organizations are going to have to evaluate people and reward people differently. You can’t reward somebody because they executed a plan when like like you just said it may not have been a mistake, a decision that somebody made me think about this two years ago, all the wonderful plans that were being put in place, strategic plans in 2019, how people are going to do so well in 2020. And then came March of 2020. It doesn’t mean their plans are wrong. They just didn’t anticipate the future. They got surprised. And you can’t get surprised by the future anymore. Or can it get taken by surprise, I should say.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:26] Now, for a while now, leaders have been encouraging some of their people to maybe take risks and to, you know, think outside the box and that type of kind of verbiage, at least lip service towards that. But whenever there is kind of an inclination towards action, there are going to be times when you do make mistakes and that you did choose the wrong path and you, you have to self-correct. Typically, in the larger organizations, you’re kind of penalized for that mistake. Are you going to see more empathy and acceptance for that type of risk taking that’s going to be needed when there is such an ambiguity?

Steven Howard: [00:09:07] Absolutely. Again, by the companies that make that change, I would advocate to you that they’re going to be many companies who will not make that change, and they’re going to be the ones we talk about 10 years from now, 15 years from now. Oh, weren’t they successful at one time? I mean, you know, this is not new, necessarily. I mean, the newness now is the fact that the change has been created by a pandemic. In the past, the change has been created by technology. You look at people like Kodak. Kodak was the leader in digital film at one point in digital photography, but they were making most of their profits from chemicals. And so they ignored the trend, and they made the mistake of ignoring the trend towards digital photography. And you know, look where Kodak is today. And, you know, thanks to Steve Jobs and others who put cameras on phones, people don’t need to go to the CVS, you know, go to your local CVS and print sorry print pictures anymore. That’s where Kodak made its money when we used to print our pictures at CVS or any place else. So it’s not it’s not new. The newness now is the fact that the pandemic has forced the management leaders to to leave remotely and lead in the uncertainty caused by a pandemic which has been government influenced in terms of the management of the pandemic. But before you know you could have called technology, you could have called digital technology a pandemic for certain industries.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:40] Now why do you think that there’s very few examples of like a company say, like Netflix that started out in one way, you know, mailing you DVDs to compete against blockbuster totally blow up that whole model and say, Now we’re this new thing and then and then adjust after that to a new new thing that seems to be rare. Why don’t you think that there’s more people out there that can do that type of major pivot and major adjustment based on what they’re seeing in the marketplace?

Steven Howard: [00:11:16] It takes risk, and I think it takes it takes the ability to understand what the trends are. And but more importantly, like I said before, if if. People were being measured on their ability to execute a plan, and that plan didn’t include pivoting into a new industry or to a new distribution channel. Then they didn’t do that. And it’s interesting that analogy you made, you know, that Blockbuster could have bought Netflix for a few hundred million dollars at one point, and the board of Blockbuster said nobody wants to get their DVDs in the mail. People want to come into our stores and get the VRC the videos and buy their popcorn and buy their M&Ms, and they want to know what they’re getting. Whereas Netflix, originally when you got your DVDs in the mail, you know you had a list of 10 and you’d get it two or three in the mail, but you didn’t know which two or three of the 10 you’re going to get. So you didn’t know what you’re going to watch on Friday night or Saturday night until you open the envelope. Blockbuster did not think Netflix’s Business Strategy business model was going to work. Well, guess who won that? I think there’s one blockbuster left the entire country. I think it’s in Oregon somewhere now.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:27] Now, how do you help that leader that wants to be that bold? What are some what some counsel to make those kind of bold choices and to, you know, pivot and take the risk?

Steven Howard: [00:12:39] I think it’s understanding the trends. Looking at history when I think one of our shortfalls and leaders today is their sole focus on dealing with today and trying to prepare for tomorrow, they don’t look at historical trends, they don’t see what’s happened to other companies, other industries in the past. And they don’t. Therefore, they don’t think the lessons are relevant to them. Secondly, I think as we talked earlier, the ability to handle ambiguity and certainty in the building and say, OK, we’re going to go take Netflix as your excellent example. They’re, you know, we’re going to go down this road, we’re going to deliver DVDs. Oh, you know what? We can do something else we can. This streaming service that looks interesting. Well, why don’t we let people download and watch their movies on a streaming? Ok, that’s kind of interesting. Oh, technology is now now streaming. We could create a TV channel. We could create a TV channel that streams. Ok, let’s go in that direction. So it’s not just when you admit mistakes and you pivot. I think it’s also when you when you see technology becoming alive or anything becoming alive. The new distribution channels new customer trends and say, Let’s go give this a try. Let’s see how this works. And then when it starts to work, being not being afraid to drop a business unit, Netflix dropped the DVD distribution business unit for something that was going to be better in the future. Kodak refused to drop the chemical business or diminish their chemical business when they saw digital photography came. They stuck to what was working for them and didn’t realize the marketplace was changing.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:21] Now, do you have any advice for the leaders of an organization on choosing other leaders, like what are some of the kind of green lights and red flags when you’re assessing a potential leader?

Steven Howard: [00:14:37] I would say right now the number one red flag, if I can turn your question around slightly, number one red flag would be do not promote the bully, do not promote the person who gets results at all costs, who burns out his staff or her staff. Do not get the one who you know, and we all know who they are in the organization. Don’t promote the one who who throws the tirades and yells and screams and uses profanity because they’re the ones are going to have a high employee turnover. So turn it around. The green flag is promote the person who does both. And as I said earlier, the difference between a great leader, a great leader will either focus on results or focus on people. And if they focus only on people, they don’t necessarily get the results. A great leader will focus on both and and great leaders are not just in the C-suite. Great leaders can be supervisors. They can be team managers. They can be first line leaders. These are the people you need to promote, the ones who can, who can balance leading for results and leading people and leading people development. Those are the leaders that you want in your organization.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:47] Now what advice to a young person maybe that just graduated is entering the workforce. What are some things they can be doing today that can signal that they’re going to be a leader?

Steven Howard: [00:15:58] Well, put your hand up. Volunteer, it could be something simple. It could be leading a project. It could be leading a small task force. It could be as simple as leading the Christmas party or anything like that. Demonstrate your leadership skills whenever you get that opportunity. And obviously, when you’re first starting out, those leadership skills are all about driving results, so you’re not trying to become a great leader. Try and be a good leader. And you’re obviously the first step is to show that you can deliver show that you can that you can overcome obstacles. Resiliency is an important part of leadership today show that you don’t give up just because you hit a hurdle. And then as once you get your first leadership position, realize that you have three hats to wear, you’re going to be wearing the hat of a manager, and that means you give directions and dictate what people should be doing. You also going to have to continue doing your own individual contributor work so that your second hand, but your third hat. Once you get into leadership, you now need to start coaching people, mentoring people, developing people, communicating feedback, all that kind of stuff. So understand that there’s three distinct hats that you’re going to wear when you have your first leadership position.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:14] Now, when you’re delivering your service to your clients, are you delivering them through kind of training in some sort of workshops that are, I would imagine nowadays virtual, in-person? Or is it through your books? How do you typically deliver your coaching and your work that you do?

Steven Howard: [00:17:33] I deliver it through four channels. So you’re right, it’s now mostly online virtual workshops, with some hybrid work starting to come out now that would be number one and and part of what I do when I do training, I don’t just do training anymore. I always combine some element of coaching. I’ve been working with a major retailer right now in the United States with their IT department, and so we’ve been doing 90 minute workshops and then once a month we do 90 minute group coaching sessions for them where they get a chance to more interact and bring up their issues. So that would be one. The other would be one on one coaching again. Right now, it’s all virtual. Then most of the coaching has been virtual for many years now. You don’t need to sit down face to face to do that. The the books obviously are the third channel. The fourth one is and this goes to those young leaders you just talked about. I’ve got an online, self paced leadership development program that’s eight modules, and it comes with two years of monthly coaching sessions. So that’s for the, you know, the young people like to learn through video. They like to learn through self pace. They like to learn on their own. And so that program allows them to go through each module, send me questions if they have send me work workbook assignments when they want for me to review. And then we we get together once a month and answer their questions and develop them one on one. So it’s kind of a hybrid model as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:56] Now are you seeing coaching becoming more accepted as a tool for leaders of organizations that can be disseminated throughout the organization rather than just kind of at the highest levels?

Steven Howard: [00:19:10] Absolutely, absolutely, I. One company I work for right now has saved up five hundred and fifty employees there in the services business there on the West Coast. I’ve been coaching there. He started when I started coaching him. He was the chief technology officer. I’m sorry. He was the IT manager and now he’s the chief technology officer. He’s now in the executive team. I’m now coaching one of his direct reports now that he’s moved up to like assistant it manager. And I’ve got one of their regional sales managers that I’m coaching as well, who’s not on the executive team. So he’s on the second layer. So it’s not. It’s no longer just C-suite type individuals who are getting coaching. So this one organization is a great example. Three three of their mid-level managers are all going through coaching, and I know several others in the organization are using other coaches besides me. So it’s part of the ethos, part of the culture of that particular corporation.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:08] Are you finding that that’s happening more and more, that it is becoming part of the culture and it’s built into what’s attracting people to organizations that when they do have a robust coaching program?

Steven Howard: [00:20:20] Yes, definitely. It’s it’s one of the things that attracts them. And right now, I think it’s one of the things that’s keeping people in this organization because I asked this question the other day, the nine people who are receiving coaching are all staying with the organization. They have lost about four or five people during this. You know, this great resignation as people are calling it, none of those four or five at the same level had coaching had personal coaches. So I know it wasn’t so much that it wasn’t. I think it partly was. It wasn’t offered to them. And also they didn’t take it up. But yeah, definitely. The retail company I just mentioned earlier, they’re now offering coaching. To their second line and first line managers as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:03] Well, Stephen, thank you so much for sharing. What you do is if somebody is interested in learning more, can you share the website?

Steven Howard: [00:21:10] Yes, it’s client leadership calling Lee Kantor, as you probably know in Spanish, means hot, but the second definition is passionate. So I’m very passionate about leadership and leadership development, so it’s client leadership. My email is Stephen at Caliente Leadership. You can find me on LinkedIn under Stephen Howard. I think it’s as Greater Los Angeles area, but you can find me pretty readily.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:35] Well, thank you again for sharing your story. You’re doing important work, and we appreciate you.

Steven Howard: [00:21:39] Well, thank you, Lee. I appreciate this and I appreciate. I’m sure your listeners appreciate the opportunity that you’re giving people to share this. And before we sign off, I just want to wish you and your family all the best during the forthcoming holiday season.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:52] Yep, you too. Thank you. All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Coach the Coach radio.

Elizabeth Carter With Elizabeth L. Carter, Esq., LLC

by

Leah-Davis-Ambassador-logo1

Elizabeth L. Carter is a crowdfunding securities attorney who represents investment companies, small businesses, nonprofits, cooperatives, and other social enterprises with the legal strategy and compliance of raising capital from both accredited and non-accredited investors.

Her most recent work includes assisting a driver-owned ride-share cooperative with the legal compliance of its $1.07 million debt crowdfunding offer through Regulation Crowdfunding (Reg CF). Similarly, she assisted a consumer cooperative with the amendment of its by-laws and articles of incorporation in order to prepare it for an upcoming capital raise from non-member investors.

She also assisted a number of investment funds with the securities legal strategy and compliance of a SEC Rule 506(c) crowdfunding offer, including a cooperatively-owned investment fund that offered $2 million in equity to accredited investors, as well as a community development financial institution that offered $1 million in slow equity to mission-aligned accredited investors

Connect with Elizabeth on LinkedIn and follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Legal Fund
  • The importance of representative legal services for underrepresented entrepreneurs using crowdfunding
  • Legal matters in crowdfunding

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:06] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in the Bay Area. It’s time for Bay Area Business Radio. Now here’s your host

Lee Kantor: [00:00:17] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Bay Area Business Radio and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Leah Davis, coaching inspiring women of color to claim their wealth legacy. Today on Bay Area Business Radio, we have Elizabeth Carter with Elizabeth L. Carter, Esq., LLC. Welcome, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:00:39] Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:41] Well, I’m excited to learn about your practice. Tell us a little bit about your practice. How are you serving, folks?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:00:46] Yes, thank you. So Elizabeth L. Carter, Esq., LLC is a crowdfunding securities law firm that represents investment companies, small businesses, nonprofit and cooperatives with the legal strategy and compliance of raising capital from investors.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:02] So for folks who aren’t familiar, can you talk a little bit about crowdfunding? I’m sure everybody’s, you know, heard of Kickstarter or Indiegogo or go fund me where there’s, you know, people go out to the crowd or grow it to people they know and say, Hey, I got this project or I got this thing. But there’s also a place for it in, in business and in the investment community as well, right?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:01:24] Yeah. So crowdfunding is a particular area or specific area of the law concerning capital raising and to be more sort of specific. So you have the business law, right, which is an area of law and underneath business law, it’s securities law, which is more specific in the area of business law. And then underneath the securities law is crowdfunding law. So security securities concerns the legal rules and federal state rules regarding private fundraising from investors. So not the GO Fund Me, which is more donation and not the Indiegogo with your rewards, but actual securities or when you’re giving money with the expectation of significant return. Right. So that’s the difference between a donation. You’re giving money. You’re not expecting things. Return rewards. The only thing you’re expecting in return is sort of a small token, really. You’re just there to support the business. But the investment piece as an investor, you are actually expecting some type of return, whether it’s in no time is guaranteed. But the idea is that I’m giving you money so that you can work hard and provide some return or money back to me, plus whatever gave you plus interest or something, right? And so with crowdfunding does is basically is that area of the law. But there are exemptions under the Securities Act, which is the securities law that we’re speaking about, that allows that business to raise capital from investors without having to register with the SEC or do ongoing reporting requirements, which again can amount to hundreds of dollars a year. So crowdfunding designed for small businesses to cost effectively raise capital from investors.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:08] Now this type of raise is kind of new, right? Because historically, the only people that can get involved with investing in small businesses in this manner were kind of accredited investors. And those are people who had, you know, a certain amount of wealth that was kind of vetted and kind of deemed that they were able to take this kind of risk. But now through this vehicle, people that aren’t accredited can invest as well, right?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:03:40] Right, exactly. So crowdfunding in a nutshell, there are two aspects to it. One is the fact that now, as you’re mentioning, a business can raise capital from non accredited investors just as they would accredited investors. So accredited investors are defined as investors, individual investors as people who have over $200000 in income, annual income, or over a million dollars in excluding the value of someone’s home. So these are just people who have investments elsewhere that are amounting to more than $1 million and then not accredited. That’s basically 90 percent of the rest of the population, right? Most people are not accredited investors. They do not have over many dollars a net worth, nor do they have possibly over $200000 in income and so would allow a small business to publicly advertise. That’s the other quality so publicly advertised to non accredited investors without having to register previously. And this is since 2012 Jobs Act of 2012. Allow for that. Previously, the business would have to have known that that investor privately. So whether a friend, family or business associate to then be able to ask them for money, what without violating any securities rules, right, whether they’re credit or non accredited. You have to know them. And so it kind of. Right, so only people who actually had wealth and people who were that, you know, right, so there’s a network thing that you are able to support, have them able to support your business. So now today, though, with crowd funding, you can go online. You don’t have to know this investor. You don’t have to be friends with them or have a long relationship with them. You can publicly advertise to them and they do not have to be wealthy, right? Just so long as you disclose properly, let them know what the offer is that they know will be businesses and do not misrepresent. So that’s what the legal or securities legal lawyer comes in to help you communicate that effectively through your disclosure documents.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:39] Now, does crowdfunding in this way have to only be equity in the company or can it be debt as well?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:05:48] That is included? That is a security as well as membership interest in an LLC operating agreement when you have that agreement and people are signing on. That is also considered a security. So right in equity can include stocks, but it also can include, again, like I said, that that operating agreement where you’re agreeing to provide money for some type of ownership stake, but that is also very commonly used. And the reason why that is included is because even though you’re not getting an ownership stake, there still is an expectation of return in the form of interest rates.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:21] And are your clients contacting you before they’ve begun this or after they began it and realized they were in over their head? And it’s too complicated?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:06:31] Ideally, before most of the time is before, and this one is more cost effective because before I have people who have gone either gone through the process by themselves and and we’re told that they need a securities lawyer or found out later like one one case. Actually, the SEC denied their filing and said it was actually fraudulent, even though the founder didn’t intend for it to be fraudulent or or misrepresenting. That’s really what it is because fraud is more intentional, but they all run in the same category. There’s a rule against misrepresentation, fraud, and so misrepresentation can simply be that you’ve been disclosed properly or you didn’t disclose fully. You miss some information, you admitted something. And so that is more costly because that particular person pay for an attorney to do that work, and the attorney didn’t do it properly. So now they have to go find another attorney and almost pay double right because the new attorney is saying, Well, I have to review everything with to start over. And so ideally, they should come before they make the offer, before they file anything, before they start asking people for money. You’ll save a whole lot of money just getting that advice and strategy going and then later.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:35] Now is this something that somebody should contact you at the very kind of beginning of their business if they’re thinking of launching? Like, should startups contact you if this is one of the ways that they might try to access funding? Or is this something that they have to have already established a business with clients? And it’s kind of ongoing and they’re trying to get it to a new level. So then they’re going to explore crowdfunding and then they would contact you.

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:08:01] Yeah, I think both legally, both. I mean, legally, so long as you have a strong business plan that shows the really lay out lays, lay out your plan to a operate, be bringing revenues and see generate returns for your investors. You have to lay that out. There should be some formula. There should be some visualization that shows the investor that if I give you X amount of dollars, which is what you’re asking for, that over time, some amount of time and that should also be laid out. You will get X amount of dollars in return or X amount of percentage in return that should be laid out. So usually the founders should have access to someone that can really work through those numbers and those financials for them, right? Whether it’s an accountant or a financial advisor that can guide them through really coming up with numbers that are more accurate. Now again, these are projections. So they’re not they’re not truly accurate or facts. They’re more saying. More likely than not, this is what you can expect. And so for me, that’s what I’m going to ask. They’ll they’ll say, I want to raise X amount of dollars and I want to know just how much I’m going to give them time.

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:09:04] So I’ll ask them, Well, how do you what did you come up with that number? How do you what was your basis? What’s your standing behind that? It’s not just you can’t just say that, right? And so I do help guide, but the idea is for them to come up with a strong team marketing accounting lawyer to then be successful. So legally, we can draft the documents, make sure they’re not misrepresenting or misrepresenting anyone. But for me, as an attorney who represent underrepresented founders where it’s already difficult to obtain capital, the traditional means, I want to make sure that they’re more successful than not. So I to the team, call them what I call the ecosystem around me so that we can make sure that they’re more successful than not. And in crowdfunding, what makes you successful is the crowd, right? Is your particular investors right or your who are also your friends, family or neighbors and then strangers that just want to support you so you want to be able to build that prior to or sooner than later when you’re starting to make your offer.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:59] Now, when you’re working with a client? Are you coming in just as this expert in crowdfunding or do you also take on some of the kind of general business law issues they might have?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:10:11] Oh yeah. So so I do. I do the general business law. And then what that looks like is I help with the strategy of choosing what type of entity or entity. Sometimes there’s a strategy to create one entity that will be the parent company. Another would be a subsidiary, especially if they’re interested in becoming an investment company or fund. Because the other part is we’re looking for an exemption. There’s two statutes that we want to make sure we exempt from the Securities Act of 1933, which concerns the act of asking people for money. And then there’s the Investment Company Act of 1940, which concerns the entity itself. So if you’re saying I want to create a fund that will then ask people to invest and then reinvest in other companies. My mind is saying, OK, you’re trying to invest in or investment fund. So if you want to prevent that sort of yearly, ongoing, costly reporting requirements, we need to find an exemption. So part of that is looking at the strategic way of structuring these entities, these companies, so that they’re exempt from both the from both acts or, you know, just generally in securities, but also just depending on what their needs and wants are right. They may have certain membership privileges for certain people, certain classes. So we do that sort of structuring the governance and then we go into the particular investment specific and structured the term sheet, the subscription agreement, the offering statement or disclosure documents in times call the Form C. And so, yeah, so it’s both so the general business governance and then the contract surrounding investments.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:37] Now, can you share a kind of one of your success stories of one of your clients that have been able to get that escape velocity and make a go of this?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:11:46] Yeah, yeah. So I’m happy to share one of my clients called the drivers pull up. Based out of New York City, created an alternative rideshare company alternative to like Uber or Lyft, right? And their model is designed to allow the drivers to be owners of the company, right? So unlike Uber or Lyft, Uber, Lyft, the drivers are more independent contractors. They’re not they don’t receive any equity. They have to have their own sort of business business model or business costs and in revenue. So it’s costly for the consumer because the profits are going to certain shareholders that are or that are not necessarily the drivers, but the drivers co-op. The drivers are actually co-owners of the Co-op or the company. And so what they did was in addition to the equity piece, which are owned by the members member drivers they. Created an offer a debt offer based upon the revenues of the company and up to two point five million, they raised over one million and they barely raised up fairly quickly, I’ll say in a couple of weeks. They raised one million dollars through regulation crowdfunding. So through that exemption, they’re able to raise from both accredited non accredited investors and they receive a lot of support all over the country. People are very interested in the co-op model, but also the fact that they’re providing an alternative to sort of this conglomerate. Big, big corporations write over and live.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:15] So that was said, they were able to kind of use that those funds to launch and then maybe are they only in New York? Are they around the country now?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:13:23] Right, so they were so the funds were designed to be set to launch to hire new staff and then to eventually to expand to other cities. That is the goal they want to expand across the country with the same model.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:35] So now you use the term co-op. Can you explain what that is and why that entity might be kind of better for these kind of projects?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:13:46] Right, right, right. So co-op is any entity that is owned and controlled by those that use the services. So if we’re talking about a worker co-op sort of with the driver’s co-op is it is owned and controlled by its workers, those that that provide labor to the company. If we’re talking about a housing co-op, we’re talking about the tenant owning, controlling the residential building where they reside. Sort of like a condo, but instead of individual deeds, it’s only one master d, so to speak, or blanket mortgage on top of the building. And then the members own a share of the company that then owns the building. And in terms of a consumer co-op, a lot of them are grocery stores. Those who consume or credit unions. Those who bank at the credit union are also co owners or, if it’s a nonprofit, just have the ability to control and vote on decisions within the entity. So that is attractive because it counters sort of this disconnect between particular worker co-op sense this power imbalance and disconnect between the owners or the employer and the employees and the workers, right? So now take away that power imbalance and the workers are the employers. They’re wanting the same.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:54] And that’s something that you help firms with as well, right?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:14:57] Yes. Yeah, so I actually thought co-ops is something that I have particular knowledge and expertize and actually was part of forming a nonprofit back in 2016 that was designed to create and support co-ops, which is why I have affiliation with a Sustainable Economies Law Center based in Oakland, which is also designed to do the same thing not only just co-ops but other economies to help support legally these new sort of alternative business structures that are more supportive of social enterprise or more supportive, supportive of something beyond profits for your business going beyond profits. And so that’s what co-ops are really known for. And yes, I have a particular expertize in creating and being being creative in coming up with unique structures to create that model.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:44] Now let’s talk about that work in Oakland. Can you talk about that Black Capital Matters legal fund and the work that you’re doing to help in that area?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:15:54] Yeah. So as I mentioned before, my firm is a mission based firm specifically to support the legal strategy and compliance of small businesses, investment companies that are owned and controlled by underrepresented founders, namely black black entrepreneurs. And the reason being is that, for instance, black women are the fastest growing group of entrepreneurs and the least likely to be supported by Venture Capital Bank financing or just generally philanthropy and et cetera. Right? And so the idea is to be able to be a resource, a representative representative resource to these companies and businesses so that we can come up with unique strategies like the co-op model, right? Or like forming ecosystems with credit unions to be able to offset or counter those disadvantages. So so the the Black Capital Matter’s legal fund is one way that the firm is doing that. We decided to create the fund to offset the legal costs of raising capital, so the firm itself already provides one of the most, if not the most affordable legal rates when it comes to securities law. But even then, it’s still the law firm and law firms. Billable rates can be out of reach for many small businesses. And so even with that in mind, we’re thinking, Well, how can we be more accessible or have you more democratized so that more businesses who are, you know, equally talented have great ideas if need that legal support and marketing support to be able to shine through and grow? How do we best do that? And so as a law firm in this space and its law firm that is particularly designed to be accessible, we want it to be able to be creative and unique to partner with a nonprofit organization, to be a fiscal sponsor to help put forth this legal fund designed to again provide subsidized legal costs while they’re raising capital. Otherwise, what happens is these businesses just go along and do it wrong or just risk doing it wrong and risk being flagged by the SEC, which could amount to financial fines or criminal penalties, right? And so we want to prevent that.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:51] Now, what type of firms should think about going the crowdfunding route, or is that you think any firm that’s thinking about getting into business that this is appropriate for them?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:18:04] Anything, anything. So crowdfunding is a means of acquiring investors. So even today, venture capital, which is has historically always been a private equity space but historically have been a type of investor that controls the deal. Right. They’ll come in and they’re the ones who provide the term sheet. They’re saying this how much are we going to invest and how much control we’re going to have? So historically, that was sort of the way these startups to get funding because again, banks thought it were too risky, like, what are you? You don’t have any revenues. You just have a business plan, right? They didn’t trust it. But the venture capital wasn’t a professional investor. And to do their own due diligence and see farther ahead in the future and say, actually looking at the market, looking at your traction, your mailing list, whatever we know, we can value this company a certain kind of way. And so we’re going to see ahead in the future, but we’re going to make sure we put terms in there that are more favorable to us so that, you know, we can cash out at some point or we can go make this company go public at some point.

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:18:57] So with crowdfunding, did was actually said no, actually, the business is going to actually control the terms they’re going to put in their own term sheet with what’s best for the business, for the long term longevity of the business and then Venture Capital Fund or others. If you want to invest, you have to agree to these terms, right? So it flips the control a bit with the investor and within investment space. And so really any business can get involved. But I say the business was a startup or small business, but I will say that it’s a startup is really interested in traditional route and going through the investment or VC funds that invest. Traditionally, they may be they may not be attracted to the crowdfunding means because again, it terms of the terms where the business is actually in control and the VC may not like that. So so yes and no, it just depends on who is that particular investor and what they’re interested in.

Lee Kantor: [00:19:50] Now, if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, what’s the website w-w-what ELC?

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:19:58] Yes.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:00] Well, Elizabeth, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you.

Elizabeth L. Carter: [00:20:05] Thank you so much for having me.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:07] All right, this Lee Kantor. We’ll see, y’all. Next time I’m Bay Area Business Radio.

 

Patricia Karam With Mission Recruit

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PatriciaKaramAs the CEO & Founder of Atlanta-based Mission Recruit, Patricia Karam is the driving force introducing human design to corporate America.

With more than a decade of experience working with Fortune 500 companies nationwide, she launched Mission Recruit with the vision of delivering best-in-class services by combining the sophistication of a large recruiting company with the heart and personalization of a smaller staffing agency.

In 2021, Mission Recruit was named one of USPAACC-SE’s Top Ten Asian American Businesses in America. Patricia’s extensive background in the HR industry started with a corporate recruiting career with a global leader in the IT staffing industry before transitioning to national staffing, as well as positions in strategy and philanthropy.

Her strong entrepreneurial spirit is a result of her parents’ influence, immigrants from the Philippines, who taught her life’s most important lessons – and above all – the significance of giving back.

As such, a pillar of Mission Recruit’s philosophy is to provide active and positive support to women worldwide through its CSR initiatives, most notably survivors of domestic violence and sex trafficking.

Connect with Patricia on LinkedIn and follow Mission Recruit on Facebook.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • About Mission Recruit
  • Life/work balance being a parent
  • Hope to change the narrative when it comes to recruiting
TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Atlanta, Georgia, it’s time for GWBC Radio’s Open for Business. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:18] Lee Kantor here. Another episode of GWBC Open for Business, and this is going to be a fun one. Today on the show, we have Patricia Karam and she is with Mission Recruit. Welcome, Patricia.

Patricia Karam: [00:00:30] Thank you so much. I’m so happy to be here.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:32] Well, I am excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about Mission Recruit. How are you serving folks?

Patricia Karam: [00:00:37] Yeah, of course. We have three primary pillars. Our first and foremost is Best in Class Recruiting Services for our midsized to Fortune 500 clients, and we specialize in I.T. and executive level positions. Secondly is our Mission to Give Back, so we give back to organizations, domestic violence and human trafficking. And third is to Keep the Human in H.R. Through Human Design, especially in these times where everyone is remote.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:07] Well, I love the fact that you kind of boldly and proudly go out there and say, mission is part of our name and mission is part of our DNA. Can you talk about what that was like when you founded the firm? What was kind of the thinking of being so upfront about having mission as part of the name and the culture?

Patricia Karam: [00:01:29] Yeah. No, thank you so much for asking that. And I think it goes along with, you know, I have a lot of experience working for huge companies as well as a small mom and pop shop. And I just realized it’s so huge for me where everybody has budget for hiring, like all companies do. It’s important for me to also give back. And then, a part of pivoting from 2020, I also had the mission to Keep the Human in H.R. too, so everything we do is with intention.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:01] So, you said when you were founding it, I’m going to have an element of the business is going to be giving back and it’s going to be something that we’re not going to just kind of do in the background. We’re going to be kind of transparent and authentic about that as well.

Patricia Karam: [00:02:17] Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So, for every single placement we make, we’ll donate $100 to a domestic violence organization and $100 to a human trafficking organization.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:28] Wow. That’s amazing. Now, in seeing a lot of headlines about this Great Resignation, a lot of folks that are kind of, I guess, sick of the grind and saying, “Okay. I’ve had enough. I’m going to kind of go my own way or I’m going to pull the rip cord and I’m not going to do anything,” are you finding that your clients are having that same challenge and you’re able to kind of help them solve that problem to make their place more desirable or a place that people want to work? And are you able to kind of counsel your other clients who are your people to match them up with the right fit?

Patricia Karam: [00:03:06] Yeah. I mean, absolutely. The Great Resignation, I’ve been hearing a lot about it for months. And I’m seeing, it’s a very real thing no matter what industry, no matter how much you’re making. I think the thing about COVID is that it’s highlighted people in what they truly desired, whether it’s working less or not working at all. But, yeah, I’m seeing it at my client site and we’re definitely there for them to help backfill anyone who does leave. But it’s a very real thing.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:37] And then, I’m hearing and I’m seeing a way to combat it is make a place of work desirable enough that people want to be part of it. They want to join the mission. They want to kind of join you in whatever that goal is that you have set for your company. And that goes to, like you were talking about your own firm, when you have a culture of mission, that attracts a certain type of person that probably isn’t part of the Great Resignation.

Patricia Karam: [00:04:08] Yeah. You’re absolutely right about that. Yeah, for sure. And I also wanted to add to that. You know, I think people are not only about salaries, too. I’m seeing with candidates, it’s not just about salaries, to your point, it’s also about the company culture and any other benefits, like remote work in, I think, a lot of people now. It’s on either spectrum. People either want to be in the office and want that human interaction so badly or they’re so happy that they can be remote. So, it’s about exactly that balance.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:44] Now, you mentioned as one of your pillars the concept of the human design. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Patricia Karam: [00:04:51] Yeah. It’s essentially a personality assessment with no questions. So, I know throughout my career I’ve taken multiple personality assessments. And based on, you know, your company culture or who your manager may be, maybe the answers wouldn’t always be as authentic as you would like for them to be or consciously would like them to be. And, also, over time, your answers may change. And so, what I love about human design is that it kind of shows you who you are personally and professionally.

Patricia Karam: [00:05:29] So, it takes the eastern and western science principle and practices, and kind of combines them together to come up with your unique human design. And so, we do this in two ways. I have a human design expert on team who actually works in the corporate environment, and she’s implemented human design at the company level and has seen major success. So, we’re offering it in two ways through individual PDF and as well as team workshops. So, they’re fine print types. And I think it would be a great exercise, especially for remote team members to come together and kind of understand each other more. So, like I said, there’s five different types.

Patricia Karam: [00:06:12] And the biggest takeaway that I say to have for people is to see how you know you’re on the right track and how you’re off track. So, for me, personally, I’m a projector and I’m on track when I see success and I’m off track when I’m bitter. And so, that goes for me personally and professionally and that’s why I truly believe in human design.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:34] So then, when you get that kind of knowledge, how does that help kind of the leaders in the organization by identifying kind of on track and off track for each of their people? And then, there are people knowing that, how does that help them kind of be more effective?

Patricia Karam: [00:06:49] Oh, yeah. It’s tremendously. Because, as a leader, you’ll see if somebody is, like, in a meeting and they’re not responding, maybe they need to be called on. So, that’s also a part of projector, they’re waiting for the invitation. So, some people by nature aren’t going to be out there and speaking up. Sometimes they just need to feel comfortable, so they need to be called on. So, that’s something as a leader to know if somebody is a projector, or a manifestor, or a generator, or manifesting generator, or a reflector. Each one has different signs how you know to motivate or step in and help someone. And, also, it helps other team members understand each other better.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:34] Right. It sounds like it really helps people who, maybe, don’t have that kind of empathy gene or that’s not their superpower. It kind of gives them almost a cheat sheet to how to kind of get the most out of their people.

Patricia Karam: [00:07:49] Yeah. Exactly. And I actually need to get you a human design PDF for yourself, too, so you could just see how your human design is.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:58] Is this an intervention? That sounds like an intervention.

Patricia Karam: [00:08:03] It could possibly be one.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:05] Well, thank you for that. I look forward to going through the exercise. Talk about your firm a little bit, you mentioned the pandemic, and I’m sure that that’s affected everybody, but talk about how you kind of were able to manage your way through that.

Patricia Karam: [00:08:20] Yeah. Oh, man. The pandemic was not easy, especially in the thick of the shutdown. And that’s one thing I saw, you know, leaving my comfy job to starting a new business. And then, the second year in business is the pandemic. Luckily, we were able to still be profitable that year, but it was tough the first half of the year, for sure. But as companies were realizing they could still run remotely, that’s where I was lucky enough where my clients were still hiring.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:53] And that’s one of those things where some companies needed help kind of managing through how to move from in real life, in-person, to remote workforce. And then, now, here we go, the pendulum swinging back again of how to move people, some of which are going back into the office again or some hybrid.

Patricia Karam: [00:09:12] Yeah. Absolutely.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:15] Now, were you able to kind of create some programing or some virtual offerings that maybe you didn’t have pre-pandemic that maybe now you have that can kind of live on beyond the pandemic?

Patricia Karam: [00:09:27] Yeah. And that’s exactly where I pivoted and started focusing on human design also, because that’s B2C and B2B. So, primarily before, I was only B2B, and so this has been a segue into B2C through human design.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:43] And that’s stuff that people can do virtually. They don’t have to kind of go to a workshop in-person and somewhere. They can be doing this virtually.

Patricia Karam: [00:09:52] If somebody wants to purchase their own human design PDF, they could just purchase it from our website. And it takes about a two to three week turnaround time to receive your personalized PDF.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:04] And then, what about kind of workshops, are you doing those kind of things virtually as well?

Patricia Karam: [00:10:08] Yes. We’re doing those virtual, and our next availability is kind of spring 2022. But, yes, we are doing those virtually. And I think it’s so great, especially now, because everyone’s remote. And so, it’s not only a team activity to bring everyone together, but it’s also understanding each other better. So, I think it’s very beneficial for companies.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:30] Now, we talked about how mission is part of kind of the name of your firm, but recruit is as well. Can you talk about, for a potential employee that maybe went through the great resignation and once they get back in the workforce, how do you kind of recommend that they set themselves apart so they become recruit-able?

Patricia Karam: [00:10:54] No, that’s a great question. And I think there’s a lot of different factors. First and foremost, they have to know exactly what they want. So, I always recommend candidates to know the top three things that are must have, and it could be anything and everything from, “I want this to be my title. I want to make this much. I want to be in this location. Or I want to be remote.” So, definitely defining their top three non-negotiables.

Patricia Karam: [00:11:20] And then, secondly, make sure your resume reflect what your target is. Because you have people who have well over five to ten years experience with one page of a resume, that’s definitely not enough information for companies to see. So, a lot of recruiting is becoming AI, and that’s very difficult if you don’t have enough room to put in tools or keywords in your resume. So, it’s very important to be able to articulate your exact experience and goals in your resume.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:56] Now, when your folks are looking for candidates, is there anything that that potential candidate could be doing, maybe on LinkedIn, that’ll help them get found?

Patricia Karam: [00:12:09] Yeah. Oh, that’s a great question. Because that is my favorite tool to recruit people. I would say, definitely add more of your experience in your LinkedIn profile. The more the merrier. This is where the more the merrier is in LinkedIn because it’s definitely keyword searches.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:27] Now, how does a candidate know what are the appropriate keywords? Like, what are the drivers or there are certain keywords to have or certain keywords not to use? Like, is something kind of a red flag if you use too much of this one word where that’s going to send a certain signal? Because, like you said, it is AI. There’s a lot of automation when it comes to this, and you might be doing things inadvertently that are sabotaging you being found.

Patricia Karam: [00:12:52] Yeah. That’s a really good point. And I think it’s mostly not about red flags, but more about articulating experience so somebody could have experience with a specific tool that a company needs someone to have. And they don’t list it. They just list their job title only. So, that would definitely knock them out from the job search. So, the more details and consistency is the best.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:19] So, when you say a tool, that might be a certain software or kind of you went through a certain program that kind of is looking for that, “I need people that have Python” or “I know people that have certain things.” And then, if it’s not in there, they’re not going to make the cut.

Patricia Karam: [00:13:37] They’re not even going to pop up. Yeah. Exactly.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:40] So, in that case, that’s probably a more the merrier, too. So, don’t think that they know that you do excel. Put it in there.

Patricia Karam: [00:13:48] Exactly. Exactly. Don’t put spreadsheets, put Excel or Google Sheets.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:55] So, it’s important to be kind of that granular because, like you said, this is AI. They have a checklist. They’re just going, “Okay. We need somebody that does ten out of ten here. And if they don’t, it’s not going to get you to the next level of even be vetted.”

Patricia Karam: [00:14:10] Absolutely. And I’m so glad you’re making all these points, because the more we can put this information out there, the easier it will be to find people.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:20] But I think they, obviously, aren’t doing it to kind of sabotage themselves. They just don’t know what they don’t know. And when things are being vetted with automation, they’re not looking at your resume and going, “Oh, this seems like a nice person. Let’s bring them in.” They’re just kind of if it’s not ten out of ten or nine out of ten, it’s not even getting into the pile to even be looked at.

Patricia Karam: [00:14:44] You’re 100 percent right about that.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:48] So, now, do you have any advice for the women out there, the GWBC audience? There are a lot of women that, obviously, they already have a business or they’re at the point where they had to go through a pivot or some kind. But any advice for women when they’re launching their own company that you would wish you had done differently or something that was a big takeaway that helped kind of get your business to a new level?

Patricia Karam: [00:15:17] Yeah. And I can’t say enough good things about GWBC because they are the reason why I was able to get into my Fortune 500 clients. Because with the certification, you have diverse spend. And that’s one thing I recommend to any woman is to, first, get your women-owned certification, that should be the first thing besides formulating your company. That’s the most important thing to me.

Patricia Karam: [00:15:49] As well as if you are working a job and you want to start a side hustle, just start it. Go ahead and work it on the side as you’re working and whenever you are comfortable enough financially, then dive into it 110 percent.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:06] Now, your firm was recently named one of the Top Ten Asian-American Businesses in America, how did that come about? And does that help you kind of penetrate those enterprise level companies when they’re talking about diverse spend to go with somebody that’s kind of been vetted and named to one of these top awards?

Patricia Karam: [00:16:32] Yeah. Man, what an honor. That was one thing I just was not expecting at all. But I’m so full of gratitude to even be mentioned in the same category as these other amazing companies. But it definitely has helped put a mark on our name. And, obviously, clarify again that we are diverse then, so it’s just an amazing experience, and I’m so thankful for it.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:04] That’s great. I don’t know if you did that on purpose in terms of a strategy to apply to be considered.

Patricia Karam: [00:17:11] I didn’t. I didn’t apply. Someone nominated me.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:15] Wow. That’s even better. So, did you even know about the award that one of your clients or somebody you knew nominated you? It’s amazing.

Patricia Karam: [00:17:23] It was someone I knew, a friend at a client site who put my name in the basket. And I had no idea she did. And I have received an email saying I won the award and I was so thrilled.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:38] Wow. That’s a goose bump moment there.

Patricia Karam: [00:17:40] Totally. It’s like winning the Oscars in the business world.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:46] So, now, as we look ahead as this year is coming to a close, what are you most looking forward to next year?

Patricia Karam: [00:17:53] Oh, opportunity. And now is the most interesting time ever in corporate America, I feel like, because nothing is stable, nothing is the same. Everything is changing right before our eyes. So, I’m interested to see the abundance of 2022 for everyone.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:15] So, you’re optimistic about the future for Mission Recruit and your yourself?

Patricia Karam: [00:18:21] Yes, I am. It only gets better and better.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:25] Now, what is kind of the best fit client for you at this stage of your growth?

Patricia Karam: [00:18:30] So, our clients are primarily midsized to Fortune 500 companies, and we service all industries.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:38] And then, is it all across the country or is it primarily in the southeast?

Patricia Karam: [00:18:43] It’s across the country and also globally, so we have global clients too.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:48] Well, congratulations on all the success. It’s an amazing story.

Patricia Karam: [00:18:52] Thank you, Lee. I so appreciate that.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:54] Now, if somebody wants to learn more about the firm, get on your calendar, or have a conversation with you or somebody on the team, what’s the website?

Patricia Karam: [00:19:02] Yeah. It’s missionrecruit.com, and we’re on all the socials. And I’d love to hear from anyone and everyone.

Lee Kantor: [00:19:09] Wow. Thank you again for sharing your story. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Patricia Karam: [00:19:14] Thank you, Lee. I appreciate you.

Lee Kantor: [00:19:16] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on GWBC Open for Business.

About GWBC

The Greater Women’s Business Council (GWBC®) is at the forefront of redefining women business enterprises (WBEs). An increasing focus on supplier diversity means major corporations are viewing our WBEs as innovative, flexible and competitive solutions. The number of women-owned businesses is rising to reflect an increasingly diverse consumer base of women making a majority of buying decision for herself, her family and her business. GWBC-Logo

GWBC® has partnered with dozens of major companies who are committed to providing a sustainable foundation through our guiding principles to bring education, training and the standardization of national certification to women businesses in Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina.

Paulette Harper With Elevate Your Story

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Leah-Davis-Ambassador-logo1

ElevateYourStory

PauletteHarperPaulette Harper is a twelve-time best-selling, two-time award-winning author, certified creative story coach. She has been featured in CBS, ABC, The Sacramento Observer, CBN, and NBC.

Paulette uses her gifts to equip ambitious Christian women speakers & entrepreneurs to write, publish books, and be the catalyst for transformation in their spheres of influence. She is committed to empowering women and equipping them with tools to unapologetically share their voices and stories, as well as helping them push past barriers and discover their purpose, so they may become the best version of themselves.

As a creative story coach, she teaches emerging authors how to tap into their creativity and turn words into stories so they can accomplish their dreams of becoming published authors.

She enables her clients to build their confident, grow and see new possibilities while creating the results they desire. Paulette challenges them to unlock and expand their creative thinking and creativity.

She is the visionary author of four #1 bestselling book collaborations- “Arise From The Ashes, Women Who Soar,” “Resilience in Hard Times,” and “For Such A Time As This.”

As a minister of the Gospel, she has devoted her life to sharing the message of hope on as many platforms as possible. Paulette preaches, “Live with purpose. Don’t limit God. Stay focused and allow God to take you places you have only imagined.”

Her motto is “I’ve unlocked my voice, so I can help others do the same.”

Connect with Paulette on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • How to build a business around writing book
  • How can someone get started writing their story

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:06] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in the Bay Area. It’s time for Bay Area Business Radio. Now here’s your host

Lee Kantor: [00:00:17] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Bay Area Business Radio and this is going to be a fun one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Leah Davis, coaching inspiring women of color to claim their wealth legacy today in the Bay Area Business Radio. We have Paulette Harper with Elevate your story. Welcome, Paulette.

Paulette Harper: [00:00:39] Hello, Lee. Thank you so much. I’m glad to be here.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:42] Well, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about Elevate your story. How are you serving, folks?

Paulette Harper: [00:00:48] Yeah. So as a published author of 12 books and a certified creative coach for aspiring nonfiction authors, my business model really is reaching and serving those who want to write books. Those who are coaches, thought leaders, faith based leaders and entrepreneurs who want to tap into their creativity and turn words into stories so they can accomplish those dreams of becoming published authors, but then also taking it a little bit further and showing them how to create a thriving business from that one book so they can become a better coaches or more entrepreneurs, or even create businesses that they haven’t yet tapped into.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:38] Now, can we talk a little bit about your back story? How did you get involved as an author and as a coach?

Paulette Harper: [00:01:46] Yeah. So my back story is I wrote my first book years ago, and when I wrote my book, I wrote it just because of being nudged by the Lord. And then I had gone through emotional trauma and from the emotional trauma and coming through that I realized that my story was powerful. I realized that there were other women who had gone through emotional trauma and losses and setbacks in life and divorce, and I wanted to be able to offer them a platform to be able to share their story without fear, share their stories without being intimidated to just really own their truth. And so for me, being able to write my story. It really opened up the opportunity for other women to say, You know what, I want to write my story, but I just don’t know how. And that’s where, you know, my business is. My business became an opportunity for me to just really showcase other authors or aspiring authors to be able to share their stories as well. So through my own pain, I began to write my story, and from that, it just opened up up opportunities for other women to say, You know what? I have something to share. I have a story, but I want to share with the world. But I just don’t know how and how can I get it out? And that’s where my back story started from. Just being able to share my own story with with other people as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:16] Now did something happen where you were able to connect dots to the power of storytelling? Did where story’s important to you growing up that you were able to kind of see the power in them and you were able to say, You know what? I have a story too. That’s worth telling.

Paulette Harper: [00:03:32] Actually, I when I first started sharing my story, I didn’t know any other writer, any other author. So for me, it was just really me learning that, you know, my words had power. And then for me, taking that journey and walking through the steps to become a published author, I began to be connected with other writers who helped me along the journey, and I was able to gleam off of them. But realizing that there is so, so much power in storytelling and that the connection really does come when we can be real, authentic, when we can tell the truth, when our truth really can resonate with other people who are going through similar experiences with us and that our stories matter and that our stories are really meant to be that creative force that really does propel other people to have the freedom to say, You know what, I don’t have to be ashamed about my scars, my bruises, what I’ve gone through in life, and that I can use what I’ve gone through to really propel me into destiny into purpose, and that there is a better place or a better purpose for me in life. And that really is sharing my story and letting other people hear the truth and the genuineness of what I’ve gone through.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:50] Do you find that folks who maybe tell you their story, they don’t see the value or the worth in it as much as you like, you’ll hear and you’re like, Oh, that’s fantastic. This is a powerful story. And for them, it’s just they almost take it for granted that they don’t see kind of all it could be.

Paulette Harper: [00:05:11] Yeah, in fact, I get it a lot. A lot of people are afraid to share because they don’t feel that there is anyone out there who will listen. There are people who won’t, you know, they feel that there’s other people who, you know, they feel like there is no value in what they’ve gone through or they don’t think anybody is going to read it. Or it sounds like somebody else’s story. And that’s, you know, that’s contrary to the truth. Because even though there are other people, for instance, that have gone through emotional trauma and divorce, no one has gone through the same experiences that I’ve gone through. No one has are going to be able to, you know, pull the lessons that I’ve learned out of my experiences. And so people, a lot of people stop at sharing their stories because they don’t feel that their story has value. But it does. You are the you don’t have to be certified to be able to share your story. You are an expert in the things you’ve gone through. You are an expert in the trauma because you learn to get out of it. You’re expert in the circumstances that life brought you because you were able to overcome those difficult situations, you were able to overcome and build a better life for yourself. And so whatever that looks like. So people feel that. But on the contrary, I tell people, you know, know your story matters, your voice matters, your experience matters. And let let let us share that with the world so that you can be able to connect with other people who are just like you.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:44] Can you share a story, maybe where either yourself or one of your clients was able to share their story and then the impact in the ripples that that caused where people were coming up to them and saying, Hey, you know, your story made a difference? And now because of this, I do that or now because of hearing you, I know I can do this as well.

Paulette Harper: [00:07:06] Yeah, you know. You know, for for me and then I’ll share a couple of my clients, but for me, it’s really being able to connect with other women. And once they read my story, my first book that was then this is now was written years ago, but I have people still, you know, reading it and coming to me and saying, You know what? I resonate with that. And it helped me just really identify where I am, and I’ve taken the the lessons you’ve learned. I’ve taken the tools that you’ve given. I’ve taken the suggestions and the steps to, you know, have a better life and get clarity on, you know, what my purpose is and then for my clients to be able to write their own transformational stories and self-help books. They’re people that read their stories, seeing the authentic see that they’re being so genuine and authentic in those stories because those are stories of triumph. But to get to that place, you had to go through very, you know, different struggles in life. And so their readers or, you know, really resonating with them and finding that there is hope that there is a place of, you know, a genuineness that they can be open to to be able to share their story. So it’s transformational. The readers are being transformed by the stories, but I’ve written stories that my clients have written and that’s really what it’s about, offering the transformational process to get you from where you are to where you need to go.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:49] Now, now that you’ve kind of created a business that’s around writing a book, is there any kind of tactical things that you would recommend someone who aspires to kind of follow that same path? There are things that they can be doing today that would help them build a business around writing themselves.

Paulette Harper: [00:09:12] Yeah, you know, if if somebody is aspiring to write a book, you know, the first thing I say, you know, make sure you get the clarity on which story that you want to write because there’s so many experiences that we have in life and you don’t want to take the reader on a journey where they’re confused when they get done reading your book, so you get clarity on that one story. And then once you get the clarity on that one story, then you’re able then to outline how it is that you want the story to flow, what it is that you want readers to know about you and then taking the readers on a journey. And that journey as the chapters unfold should be, you know, not only resonating with the reader but transforming the reader as they walk the journey with you. And then, you know, building the business side of it. For me, it was people coming to me and asking me, How do I do this? How do I write a book? How can you help me publish my book? And so the the demand for me was people asking for help. And so, you know, people will tell you what they need and you’re able to fill fill those needs because of your gifts, because of the creativity that you’ve been able to to show in your writing your story.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:35] Now, do you think that everyone has kind of do you think everyone could be a writer or is this something that you know you either have it or you don’t? Is this something that can be learned?

Paulette Harper: [00:10:49] Yeah, everybody has a story and everybody can be a writer and you develop the craft as you write more stories. And so, you know, for a lot of people, they think, you know, what stops a lot of people is they say, you know, well, I’m not a writer. And so the thing about it is, you have a story and you write it. And then there’s, you know, editors that help make your story polish and make it look really good. So you know, everybody, you know, as I mentioned, they have a story. It just depends on if they want people, you know, to publish it, if they want to publish their story, or maybe they just want a journal about it and let you know just family members read it or just, you know, have it in a in a diary. But everybody, you know, has the ability to write a story and you just have people that help craft it for you and make it better.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:46] Is there something that how do you know kind of your story is? A business as well. Is there some clues that when you’re writing a story that you know, you know what? This is something that can evolve into a business if I take certain steps.

Paulette Harper: [00:12:04] Yeah, I think anyone that is a storyteller can really create a business around it. For me, it’s coaching other people how to write books. It’s it’s helping other people pull out their creativity. And so depending on what the story is about, the book is about can really you can really tailor it for coaching. And so me, I have my other business is also my life coach and my empowerment coaching services that I also offer. And that helps the, you know, that deals with the internal struggles that women may have and how to help them get out of that. So, you know, there’s a niche for every story. You just have to find out what niche your story fits and then definitely as an audience to to service them

Lee Kantor: [00:13:05] Now, is that how you help your clients as you help them kind of hone in on what is the the story that that maybe is the most productive for them to be sharing?

Paulette Harper: [00:13:16] Yeah, I do. Just because there’s so many stories that we have so many experiences that we’ve gone through and you know, as a, you know, first time author or, you know, they want to write about everything. And so I help them get clarity on that one story. And from that one story, for instance, one of my clients wrote a book on on on forgiveness. And so it was centered around her, you know, her struggle with unforgiveness and how she walked, you know, her way through that process to live in an area of forgiveness. And so now from that, she could spring off to be a coach that helps other people in those same predicaments because she’s lived it. She she she know the process, she knows what it’s worked for her and she can apply those same tools and gifts, things and abilities to help her create a coaching business surrounding forgiveness. And then she can reach other people in that in that space as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:20] So now how do you kind of describe your ideal client who is the perfect fit for you in your practice?

Paulette Harper: [00:14:28] Yeah, my ideal client is a is thought leaders, faith based, faith based leaders as well. And then those who are really aspiring to write a story. It’s those who are ready to take action, ready to move, ready to say, You know what? I want to write a story and I want to. I need a coach. I need somebody who’s been there that’s going to help me. You know, along this, you know, along the journey that’s going to show me how to do it and do it correctly, that’s going to be there for me to be accountable. And so I’m looking for people who are ready to say yes, and they’re confident in the story that they want to write and they need a coach to help them along the journey to become a published author. And the thing about me is that I empower my clients to become the publisher themselves, so I empower them with the with the tools and the resources and even my literary professionals that will help them achieve those goals of becoming published authors

Lee Kantor: [00:15:40] And about how long does it take from when they begin working with you to when they have a book in their hand?

Paulette Harper: [00:15:46] Yeah. So there’s two types of people that I that I work with, depending on the stages that they’re in their writing journey. And so some people come to me and they have a manuscript already. And so for me, it could be a three month journey from that period on. I take their manuscript, I read it through. I make sure that it’s outlined correctly. It’s, you know, it’s it’s sharing what they’re what the author wants it to share. And then I moved them on the journey of edit. So that’s about a three month process. Now, those who have never written before, they don’t have a manuscript, they don’t not they’re not clear on their story, and they need help from the conception of it. Then that’s a three. That’s a six month process because it’s three months to really write the story, get the clarity right, the story and outline it. And then I have to allow the the author to be able to write the story in the designated amount of time and then the other three months, the other 90 days. It’s for the. Development of the of the product itself to produce the book.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:56] And if somebody wants to learn more and get on your calendar, maybe have a more substantive conversation with you. What is the best way to do that? You have a website.

Paulette Harper: [00:17:05] Yeah, I do. They can reach me. I call it Harper as Paulette Harper, and they go to my website. They can get a free gift from me, which is the Storytellers Story workbook, which is going to help them outline their story and pick the exact story that they want to write first. So they’re welcome to grab that copy of the Free My Free PDF that I offer as long as they join my mailing list.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:33] And then can people learn more about all the books that you publish on your website as well?

Paulette Harper: [00:17:38] Yeah, I have a section on my website that list all of my books. They’re more than welcome to go and read a little bit about more about me and the books that I’ve written, and then they can also purchase my books on Amazon as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:54] Well, Paulette, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work, and we appreciate you.

Paulette Harper: [00:18:00] Well, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate the opportunity.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:03] All right, this is Lee Kantor Lusail. Next time I’m Bay Area Business Radio.

 

Larry Galler With Larry Galler & Associates

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LarryGallerLarry Galler works with owners and executives of small and mid-size businesses, non-profits, and institutions to transform them from “what it is today” into “what they want it to become tomorrow” by creating breakthroughs in management and marketing.

For sixteen years, Larry was the owner of a chain of six retail stores in regional malls in Indiana and Illinois, then owner of a company that manufactured and sold items of his own design to many of the largest retailers in the country including Walgreens, K-Mart, Sears, J.C. Penney, Target, and many other mass merchants.

For over 20 years, he has specialized in advising executives, professionals, and businesses to extraordinary achievement with an extensive list of clients throughout the United States and Canada.

Larry has written over 750 weekly columns that have been published in the Northwest Indiana Times every Sunday between 2001 and 2017 and is frequently published in many business publications.

He is an active member of and guest lecturer to a number of business related organizations (Chambers of Commerce, Trade Associations, etc.), a Member of the Board of Governors of The Society of Innovators, the Citizens Advisory Board of Lakeshore Public Media (TV and Radio), and hosts a weekly radio show where he interviews people in the business community on WVLP Radio in Valparaiso.

Connect with Larry on LinkedIn.

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:02] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Coach the Coach radio brought to you by the Business RadioX Ambassador Program, the no cost business development strategy for coaches who want to spend more time serving local business clients and less time selling them. Go to brxambassador.com To learn more. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:32] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Coach the Coach Radio, and this is going to be a fun one today on the show, we have Larry Gawler with Larry Geller and Associates. Welcome, Larry.

Larry Galler: [00:00:44] Thanks, Lee. Nice to be here with you.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:47] Well, I’m excited to learn about your practice. Tell us a little bit about who you serve.

Larry Galler: [00:00:52] For the last 25 years or so, I have been working with owners CEOs of small to midsize businesses. I suppose that means that requires a definition. And to me, a small business is. Well, the bulk of my clients are anywhere from one to 12 employees. A substantial number of them are larger, going up to 50 to 100 employees, and a few are. Over the years, a few of them have been much larger companies.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:27] Now what’s your back story? How did you get involved in coaching?

Larry Galler: [00:01:30] You got two hours. I have a I come from a small business background. My parents owned a retail flower shop. I went into business with them after college and after a few years. We had a major disagreement into the future of the company, so I went off on my own. I opened a retail store in what was then a brand new retail shopping mall, which was a very hot destination in those days. The store is sold primarily gift wares and housewares, a broad assortment of things that you would have in your house. The store did very well, and over the next 10 years I opened up five more stores, so we had a total of six stores and. Of then shortly thereafter, in the next four or five years, the economy changed substantially. It became known as the Rust Belt depression or recession. Interest rates went up into the low twenties, the high teens and we were highly leveraged and had a very rough time paying the rent and paying the interest and paying the vendors and ultimately at the end of about a five year struggle. We had to close the business and had to look for something else to make a living, and I did some marketing work for a number of small businesses, people that I knew.

Larry Galler: [00:03:04] One of them introduced me as his business coach. I had never heard that term before. And so I looked it up. And sure enough, there are people out there that call themselves coaches and they’re making a living at it and looked at what they did. And I said, That’s what I do, and I’m very qualified to do it. So I became a business coach and I joined the chambers of Commerce. A couple of them, three of them actually worked very hard to get clients, and the first year was really a struggle. But. I’ve been doing it for 25 years now and slowing down the practice, but still very involved in my practice and in the people I serve. If you want to know something about industries, just about everything, I have worked with one person carpet cleaning company to a statewide community college program where I coached the campus. Chancellors on communications and delegation did that for quite a while. And so and just about everything in between manufacturers, retailers, restaurants, professionals. I think everybody but a veterinarian. I’ve never done a worked with a veterinarian. Not that I’m adverse to it. It just hasn’t happened.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:35] Now is there a typical pain point that your clients all have or it could be anything? It could be a marketing problem. It could be a leadership problem. It could be a communications problem. Or do you solve or do you find you have a sweet spot where you’re really good at a certain aspect of business?

Larry Galler: [00:04:52] Well, I like to think that I’m very good at strategy and no matter what the problem is, and it’s all of those things, it’s, you know, it’s leadership, it’s human beings. It’s it’s having a vision or articulating the vision, having a mission or understanding what that mission is. Training your training the staff to deliver on the mission and vision and values marketing. And I mean, they all want more. All of my clients want more. They want more business, they want more profits, they want more ease of administering the business. And I work in just about all of those areas. I don’t do accounting. I don’t do taxation. I don’t work with insurance. Those are areas that are much better left to professionals who are expert at those things. I will and have negotiated with banks on behalf of my clients, you know, as part of part of the team that negotiates with the banks. But I I think the sweet spot and I don’t I don’t think that most of my clients, when we initially get started, know what that sweet spot is going to be for them because they want more business.

Larry Galler: [00:06:24] But that means that they are lacking something or it would be coming. So what are they lacking? They could very well be lacking a long term marketing advertising strategy. They could be lacking a training program to get their staff to be part of their marketing, be part of their advertising example, HVAC company heating, air conditioning, ventilating. They have people out in the fields. Some of them go in and fix whatever. It’s fixed the furnace and leave and hardly mumble anything to the to the customer. Now, what we’ve worked with is to get those people to be quiet salespeople or marketing people for the company so that that client, that customer knows which H-back company actually service them last time, ways of getting those people back as customers rather than thinking that all HBC companies are commodities. So help we help differentiate our our clients companies from their competitors. So no matter what it is, it’s really a complex. It’s not a magic bullet that you say, do this in your business is going to explode. It’s do a lot of things and implement them properly.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:51] Now, do you see entrepreneurs kind of making similar mistakes or is every client you work with kind of on its own adventure? So everything is kind of totally different.

Larry Galler: [00:08:05] Well, it’s different because we’re all different people. And each each of my clients has strong points and weak points, just as you and I do. Some people are very articulate, able to communicate thoughts. Others have to do have to work in different ways. And I have to know as a coach, I have to know what what will or have to learn and then know what will what will work for my clients and what will help them get to where they want to go. And that’s part of the problem is very often they just want more. They want bigger and they don’t strategize their way to figuring out how they are going to get bigger and more profitable, how they’re going to. I always think of. The eye make up little stories for myself, and one of them is going into the first Starbucks coffee shop in Seattle. Twenty five years ago and going into the back room, sitting at their conference table, which is a bunch of beanbag chairs, coffee beans and everybody sitting around and talking and saying, Hey, we’re doing great. The store is growing. We’re profitable. Yet it added somebody. Somebody says, Hey, we can have a second store. Wow, what a concept. And somebody else says, if we can learn how to run to stores, we can run 10 and somebody else says we could even have 100.

Larry Galler: [00:09:40] Well, today they have twenty five thousand stores across all over the world and it came from. I’m guessing, a grand strategy that they developed and from that they had to do, they had to grow it. There was no model for what they did. So they had to develop leadership managers training, how to how to pour the coffee and how to talk to the customers and how to display the product they had. They had to figure out how to distribute their products, so they had to have a logistics and transportation issues to deal with. Of course, they have internal growth issues like human resources. How do you hire enough people for thirty thousand stores? How do you train them? Well, it starts with when you train your second employee and you build on it and build on it so that you can. You can eventually attain your your goal, your dream. And. Oh, very often the things that just imagine the issues with with inventory management for thirty thousand stores, I don’t care what you’re what you’re selling. But in this case, it’s coffee cups, right? And the little lids that go on the coffee cups and the raw product, the coffee. And how do you maintain the machines that they have on a regular basis? How do you replace them? When do you do it? What are the strategies behind all of those things? Growth is not just one thing, it’s not, except in extremely rare cases.

Larry Galler: [00:11:20] I mean, we probably anybody of a certain age remembers the ad for Wendy’s Where’s the beef? But every company has got a little saying, and very few of them attain that kind of viral viral importance. So. You know, yeah, there is no magic bullet to what they want. Every company is different, every owner is different. Every board of directors is different. Every staff is different and you have to figure out what will work for your company. And that part of that is is going to have a mention this, but part of it is creating a culture. This is the way in a culture is a fancy word for translates into the way we do things around here. And if you have that culture, if you’re able to create a culture and maintain it and teach. To the people who are disseminated to your public, you’re going to go a long way towards getting that business of your dreams, and I think that’s what my role is, is to help them articulate it, to help them figure out how to attain it.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:36] Now do you find that your clients, most of them, are they dreaming too big or dreaming not big enough?

Larry Galler: [00:12:44] Both. And again, you know, it’s, you know, they’re individuals, and I’ve had clients that want to take over the world. And I’ve actually got a couple that have released their world. And others that want to just get a little bit bigger, I think both of those things are valid because it’s their vision and. You know, it’s it’s their it’s their dream, we all have different dreams.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:21] Now, what’s the most rewarding part of the job for you?

Larry Galler: [00:13:24] The most rewarding part of the job is when we develop something and it works and they’re able to replicate it and they’re able to put it throughout whatever their system is. If you’ve got a moment, I’ll give you a short scenario. A client of mine some years ago, landscaping commercial landscaping company, they mow lawns of industrial areas and schools, hospitals, things like that. Nature. They won’t come and do your home. They had no growth for quite a while. They have a very nice business, by the way. It’s been running at about the same level for a number of years. Family owned operation Why can’t you get any growth? I ask. And they say, Well, property managers aren’t interested in talking to us when the snow is on the ground. They only want us to be there when the grass starts growing and I can’t get appointments. I rarely can get appointments with them to sell anymore. So when the grass starts growing, they all sign contracts very, very quickly. There’s no I’m busy getting my contract signed, so I don’t have time to go out and work on getting new business. Ok, I heard that a couple of times and then I said, Well, maybe we change the model for how you sell and market the company. I asked if they were could get appointments at towards the end of the season. September. October, when the grass is hardly growing and they’re kind of ramping up their operations here in the north and. Yeah, I can get those appointments so great. So let’s make an appointment for a end of the season, end of the season assessment of how we did and what we look forward to next year.

Larry Galler: [00:15:20] He could do that and he went out and he called on 10 of his accounts and he got appointments with seven of them. And when a when they had the assessment of how they did, he would then talk about next year and he would have next year’s contract in his portfolio and would get out of the top of the first 10. He called on and he got seven appointments. He sold four of them. And then before the season started in next spring, he sold three or four of the rest of them. And so now we had all, and he did it for much, much larger number of people. So we did it at the start of the spring when other property managers are thinking about lawn mowing. He was able to go out and get get appointments with them, and he was able to expand his business the first year, over 30 percent. He’s been doing this now for a number of years in the business is substantially larger than it was when we first did it. And is this something that he could have done by himself? Yeah, but he never thought of it. He doesn’t think in those terms. He thinks about mowing the lawn and sharpening the blades and having the right people at the right places, at the right time. And and he’s very good at it. So we change the paradigm of how he markets and sells his business, and the business got a lot bigger. I do that for lots of companies, not only in that mellow in that way of doing getting business, but in many other aspects, most other aspects of running a business.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:59] And if somebody wants to learn more and have a more substantive conversation with you, is there a website there is.

Larry Galler: [00:17:05] It’s Larry Geller, Larry Y, JLL and somebody can send me an email. Larry at Larry Gallacher. Well, they are why JLL?

Lee Kantor: [00:17:23] Well, Larry, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you.

Larry Galler: [00:17:29] Thank you much. It was a pleasure being with you, Ali.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:31] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We will sail next time on Coach the Coach radio.

Jimmy St. Louis With Franchise123

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Brought To You By SeoSamba . . . Comprehensive, High Performing Marketing Solutions For Mature And Emerging Franchise Brands . . . To Supercharge Your Franchise Marketing, Go To seosamba.com.

JimmySt.LouisJimmy St. Louis is an entrepreneur, competitive athlete, and businessman focused on innovating and changing the health and technology industries.

He is currently an operating partner of Ayon Capital, Franchise Accelerators, and the founder of Franchise123.

Jimmy is currently focused on innovating and advancing the industry of franchising through a combination of technological advancements, as well as new operational and team efficiencies. As the founder of Franchise123, his focus is on creating simple and open market connections between franchise buyers and sellers, to advance and improve the success of franchisees and franchisors.

Follow Franchise123 on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • About Franchise123
  • The trends in franchising these days
  • The best/most popular industry for franchising now
  • The biggest challenges in the industry
  • Advice to someone looking to open a franchise
  • The future of franchising

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:07] Welcome to Franchise Marketing Radio, brought to you by SeoSamba Comprehensive, high performing marketing solutions for mature and emerging franchise brands to supercharge your franchise marketing. Go to SeoSamba.com that’s SeoSamba.com.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:32] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Franchise Marketing Radio, and this is going to be a fun one today on the show, we have Jimmy St. Louis with franchise123. Welcome, Jimmy.

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:00:42] Hi. Great. Thanks for having me. I’m excited to be here.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:44] Well, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about franchise one two three. How are you serving, folks?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:00:50] Sure. Yeah. We created franchise one two three, really as a Zillow for franchising. We realized a couple of years ago that on the web, there wasn’t really this single source of truth for individuals looking to invest in the franchise. And it just wasn’t the ability for individuals looking to invest to connect directly to brands. But we did it with the credit franchise one two three. By aggregating as much data as we could from the web, and we created over 4000 company profiles of individual companies who are selling franchises both in the states and globally. And we built out those profiles and then we started marketing direct to consumer to bring individuals interested in investing in franchises on there. They create accounts to answer a couple of questions. We start to pair them up with not all 4000 brands, but brands that our algorithm thinks is best for them, based upon some questions that they answer. Then they have the ability to connect directly online with franchise owners and begin the process of considering an investment with them and quite a bit of success and looking forward to talking more about it.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:00] Well, if there was no franchise one two three, how were these folks kind of finding each other?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:02:07] Sure. When you look at some other ways in which franchisees or prospective franchisees were engaging, they may go online and say, Hey, what are the best franchises to invest in? And that would either direct them specifically towards a brand that would direct them towards a franchise portal or may direct them towards franchise brokers or franchise consultants. So what took place then was you immediately went from the top of the funnel down to the middle of that buying funnel without having done enough research to really understand which brands are truly a good fit for you. If you click on top franchises and go directly towards a brand, now that brand is trying to sell you on their concept. Or if you go towards a portal, you’re clicking on it, whatever you think, looks nice without really understanding much about the brand. So those initial conversations, in our opinion, were far too early. Prior to Franchise one two three. And now that there’s a single one stop shop for people to go to, to gather information, to review franchise disclosure documents, to look at videos and sales presentations of each brand that’s on our platform now they have the ability to do a lot of their own research prior to having that initial discussion with the brand, that truly would be a good fit for them.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:34] Now, as part of a lot of people’s processes, going to a franchise broker, and I don’t think that everyone understands that a franchise broker isn’t showing you kind of the universe in terms of choices, they’re kind of curating that list. Does franchise one to three curate or is this kind of you’re trying to be the universe of franchise opportunities

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:03:56] Franchise ones or three is the universe of franchise opportunities. The way that it works is when you go onto our platform, you answer some questions. It starts with the roughly 40 100 brands that are on there. We ask you about location industries. You’re interested in minimum maximum investments. A couple of different questions that helps to narrow the universe, down from roughly 4000 to roughly five hundred or so. Then you can go out there and answer a couple more questions. And now we’re starting to direct you towards brands that were based upon your specific criteria. We are not directing them towards brands that have signed contracts with us or directing them towards brands that really are truly a good fit for you. And then you have the ability to engage directly with those brands directly through our platform. So different than when you mention a franchise broker who may not have the whole ecosystem of franchise or within their portfolio, they may have 10, 15, maybe 50, but they don’t have access to all of them. So what they’re doing is I discuss the forward. They’re starting with you in the middle to bottom part of that buying process or what they may call a funnel, and they’re leaving out thousands and thousands of other brand opportunities that could be a good fit for you. So what they’re doing is they’re controlling the universe that you operate within as opposed to you as a potential franchisee having complete control. That’s what we call it, the Zillow of franchising. So before Zillow, you were at the mercy of your agent to show you what was in the market. But now, when you go see your agent, you’re armed with all the information about all the comps, all the homes, what the market looks like, and now you’re much more educated buyer, which it gives you a lot more confidence that your overall decision.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:57] Now, are you finding that in the economy today that there’s a lot of folks out there looking for a franchise opportunity?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:06:04] So the short answer is yes. There’s a lot more people now looking for franchise opportunities than we saw even a couple of years ago. However, franchising as a full franchise environment, you know, it really encompasses dozens and dozens of different industries. So we have seen that, of course, based upon the the way the world is today, there’s certain brands and industries that people are more attracted to than others. So some areas that struggled a little bit fitness franchising struggled a little bit there for a year. Restaurants and lots of bricks and mortar struggled there for a year, year and a half. We’re starting to see some traffic pick up where we are really seeing the fastest. Most movement is in franchises geared towards home services, whether that means working from home or actually improving your home. There’s brands that are out there like a garage, gangs or other home services groups where people who are at home want to make sure their house looks nice. And because of that, they’re engaging with companies to help their home look nice. And a lot of those are franchises. So we see that potential franchise investors have seen those as opportunities. Also, they were a little bit of a lower cost of entry. So that’s an example of a sector of the industry that we saw moving faster than some of the other ones were.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:31] So now are you? It sounds like you’re creating a marketplace where you have the franchise laws that can show their wares and show the opportunities, and then you have the potential franchisees that can kind of get a really broad picture of what opportunities are out there that might be the best fit for them. Is that a challenge to kind of maintain both of those and provide value to both of those people? Or do you kind of feel that you’re more useful to the potential franchisee?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:08:03] But the you know, the experience really is managed as a multi-sided platform by the buyer and by the seller. And although we are there to provide the customer service to answer questions, we have onboarding specialists and programmers who will work directly with franchise owners to help make their accounts look and feel as powerful as possible and as accurate as possible. We also have customer service individuals who work directly with prospective franchisees to educate them on how to utilize the system. And of course, we’ll be there to consult with them and to answer questions and have give them a certain brands that may be a good fit for them to think about. But it is somewhat of a self-managed tool. However, we are starting to see that who’s really liking it are the franchisor wars, because not only do they have access to. A lot more leads. They also have access to brands or individuals who are ready to buy. So they’re more highly qualified, and they also have access to a dashboard, a series of other tools they can plug into to help make their buying selling experience more efficient. The prospective franchisees are telling us they’re really happy with it because they’re buying experiences better. They can navigate at their own leisure. They’re not getting bombarded with dozens of phone calls from dozens of brands that may have been generated from, say, a franchise portal. So their experience is a lot more pleasant as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:39] Now, if someone is looking for a franchise right now and they come on, this is it. Does this shrink the timeline from them saying them raising their hand and saying, You know what? This is something I’d like to pursue. And then you have you mentioned those questions that are helping me kind of narrow down my choices? And then ultimately at some point, I’m sure have a conversation with the appropriate franchisor that I feel is the best fit. Or together we self discover it’s the best fit if I do it through you. Is that kind of shortening my timeline to actually, you know, be in business? Is it just the same, but different? What how is it from a time standpoint?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:10:21] They’re the number one factor that is speeding up the the transaction time is trust. We now have individuals who are on who can trust the system because they have all the information available at their fingertips and they feel much more confident because they have been in control of their decision the entire time because they’re in control of their decision. Now they’re able to go through and control that conversation, and that feeling of control has led the trust, which leads to a faster experience in terms of them making a decision to buy. We did not anticipate that, but that is often what we are seeing. We’re seeing when you give people more options, they’re actually more likely to narrow down their their decisions much more quickly.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:14] And then if you are a person who maybe is in corporate and hadn’t maybe considered franchising yet, but maybe you’re kicking the tires. Is there some kind of do’s and don’ts that you would recommend that potential franchisee? Like, what are red flags, kind of yellow flags and green flags when you’re kind of betting?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:11:34] There so we did publish a book called Your Comprehensive Guide to Owning the franchise and available on our website and online, and you have a publisher who’s picking up as well. So we do take them through a series of exercises. The book is really it’s a workbook explains the ins and outs of do’s and don’ts of franchising. And then ultimately the objective is to help them go through the exercises to narrow them down from the four thousand down to one. The workbook is also available on our platform so you can go through the whole workbook. It’s pretty extensive, but you can do it efficiently. It’s a pretty intuitive tool. It helps you to ask all the questions. It gives you the guided tools to ask the franchise or the right questions gives you the guided tools to ask other franchisees who are going to eventually be your peers if you were to invest in that franchise. The the where they’ve been aligned and what has worked well for them and what has not met their expectations helps them go through the legal structure, even helps them get their budgeting and planning and preparation and pre-opening. So the goal of our book that we wrote was to arm potential franchisees with the tools to be successful and to make sure that they have the right tools in place to or the right have asked the right questions to arm them with the information so they can really make the best decisions for themselves.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:11] Now, from the franchiser standpoint, is there, if I’m a franchisor and I see that this is a great platform for folks. And I want to be kind of found first, are you? Is it? Do I have the ability to have like an enhanced listing or featured listing so that I am kind of at the top of the search when people are searching? Or is this something that you’re trying to be kind of neutral and Switzerland when it comes to this and people, it just bubbles up what the franchise prospective franchisee kind of would would find if it’s perfectly vetted.

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:13:48] Yeah, that’s a great question, the franchise or the first thing they should do is go on just grain accounts when they create an account. Now, instead of them having an incomplete profile with information about investing their franchise being not listed as not applicable or incomplete, now they have a complete profile when you have a complete profile. It’s going to work better. Take again our example with Zillow. If you click on a profile of a home and there’s no pictures of the home or there’s one picture of the home, very unlikely you’re going to continue your your research of that home. Same thing with this franchise. If they are signed up, they’re on there. They have their logo uploaded. They’ve completed the build of their microsite that lives on Franchise one two three. Their profile is done. They’ve uploaded information. It’s going to just be easier for that individual to engage with them. So that’s part number one. And that’s what we think is just the free, open market that franchise owners go on there and create an account. Great. If they don’t, unfortunately, those leads are likely going to go to a competitor now as it relates to enhanced listing after we have thousands of franchise owners on this system who are signed up and everyone’s site looks great, everyone’s profile looks great. We then will release some enhanced marketing where we will create banner ads and will allow franchise owners to advertise directly on their for premium placement, but it’s still up to them to manage their accounts. So we do anticipate finding ways for certain brands who are more engaged to continue to stay more engaged and to have pole position on leads by end of the day. It still is the consumers or the buyers decision on which brands are they clicking on?

Lee Kantor: [00:15:46] Now, in your estimation, haven’t been in the franchise business for a minute. Do you see franchising as just kind of growing at the rate it’s growing? Or is this something that you think is going to taper out? Or is this just kind of the future of businesses franchising in one form or another?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:16:06] I think individual entrepreneurs are always going to be interested in expand their brand to a nationwide footprint, and that nationwide footprint becomes possible with franchising. It doesn’t mean other business models won’t work, but the business model of franchising is sound. It’s a way to deliver on the American dream for entrepreneurs who may not have been able to scale their brands before. So, you know, we really aren’t seeing any slowdown in the growth of franchises. But even if there was the great thing about franchising is there’s there’s retail opportunities and we’re working directly with large fitness franchises or called exponential fitness. And they have brands like Pure Bar and Row House and Club Plots and Rumble and 8K. And these are brands that are well known with a nationwide footprint, and a lot of their franchisees have had success, and now they’re selling their units. And so we have individuals who are interested in maybe buying an existing operation that’s already successful. The doors have been open for a number of years. So even within the franchise space, if there was to be stagnant growth on location numbers increasing, there’s going to be essentially facility trading that would be taking place. That’s something our platform offers as well. It gives people the chance to really understand the financials before they go in and take the keys over.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:42] Now is the marketplace. Is it franchise only or their businesses, like if I can buy and sell a franchise, can I buy and sell, you know, Joe’s Jiffy Lube type company.

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:17:58] Now, our platform is just four franchises. We know there’s other business brokers out there that work with a variety of other groups, and they help to do resells. Our platform is intended to give people a free, open look at everything franchising. But we’ve we’ve not gone into the world of business resales in general. It’s probably not something we would do. We think that we have an interesting niche here and we’re trying to position ourselves as the experts in this. And I think we’ve done a good job so far. So we’ll we’ll probably keep our focus pretty narrow.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:31] And so what do you need more of right now? Do you need more potentially prospective franchisees coming to you to sign up and go through the process? Do you need more kind of franchise orders filling out their listing in a more profound way? What what do you need more of? How can we help you?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:18:51] I think all three, of course, for a platform like this that’s going to allow us to understand what’s important to the potential buyers and the sellers. So until we have all four thousand plus franchisors on there, until we have a million users, we don’t think our job will quite be done. We think that’s that’s the magic number on both sides. For us, when people are on there, it’s a great tool. We’ve, you know, it’s kind of like we look at it like it’s a Ferrari that to get the keys and be comfortable getting into the end of the system and creating your account. And when you do, you’ll be very happy that you’ve been in there. So that’s that’s the way we’re looking at it. And yeah, what we need more of is just more eyes on the site and more individuals going on there. And when they’re on there, we know that they will be happy.

Lee Kantor: [00:19:42] And then what’s the fee to go on there for a prospective franchisee?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:19:47] So for the franchisees, for the individuals, it’s free. So franchise one, two three, go on and you click, you create a free account. What most people don’t know when you’re buying a franchise is there’s an initial franchise fee that gets paid to the franchise or and groups like ourselves will. That’s how we get compensated. So we’re on a success based structure, which is really one of the line interest. We’ve seen that the market has been somewhat full of misaligned interest where salespeople get paid, whether a facility opens or not, and they may, they may sell three or five units and only one open. They still get paid for all three or five. We’re not doing that. We’re setting up the both sides for success. So the franchisee doesn’t pay the franchise or the company who’s listing their company. They pay nine point ninety nine per year, so nine hundred ninety nine dollars per year to be on there. And then they pay us a small percentage of the franchise fee as our commission, and that’s how we get paid.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:51] Good stuff. Well, congratulations on all the success. One more time, the website.

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:20:58] The website is W W-w-what franchise one, two three,

Lee Kantor: [00:21:02] And that’s the numbers one, two and three, right?

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:21:05] Yes, it is. Yep, so that’s the number is one, the number two, the number three.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:09] Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you.

Jimmy St. Louis: [00:21:14] Yeah, thank you. Thanks for all the great questions, and thanks for the chance to share a story with you. We appreciate it.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:20] All right, this is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you next time on Franchise Marketing Radio.

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