Business RadioX ®

The Best Strategies for Creating a Strong Brand Identity

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High Velocity Radio
High Velocity Radio
The Best Strategies for Creating a Strong Brand Identity
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In this episode of High Velocity Radio, Lee Kantor interviews Cynthia Maselli of The Brand Strategist. Cynthia shares her journey into branding and discusses the critical role of brand identity, business structure, and customer trust in today’s fast-changing market. She explains the difference between brand and branding, introduces her “Iconic Brand Blueprint” workbook, and offers practical advice for entrepreneurs. Cynthia emphasizes building a strong foundation, understanding customer perception, and the value of ongoing education and support for business owners seeking to create impactful, enduring brands.

Cynthia Maselli is a sought-after Brand Strategist and founder of Her Mentor®, a faith-infused platform for women building intentional lives and purpose-driven businesses.

With nearly two decades in creative design, brand development, and strategic marketing, she turns scattered ideas into stand-out brands through strategic listening and intuitive planning, and for 25 years has coached women toward self-awareness, growth, and decisive leadership.

The first in her family to earn a master’s degree and a proud granddaughter of Mexican immigrants, she is a pastor’s wife, mom, entrepreneur, and trusted mentor at the intersection of vision, faith, and family—creating transformation through strategy and soul.

Connect with Cynthia on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • What women really need when starting a business (Hint: It’s not just a website)
  • The mentor every ambitious woman needs: faith, strategy, and building a purpose-driven Life
  • Coming soon – raising a family, running a business, and leading with faith: The real behind-the-scenes of a pastor’s wife entrepreneur

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here. Another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Cynthia Maselli and she is with The Brand Strategist. Welcome.

Cynthia Maselli: Thank you so much, Lee, for having me on.

Lee Kantor: Well, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Can you share a little bit about the brand strategist? How you serving folks?

Cynthia Maselli: Absolutely. So the brand strategist is an agency, and the agency is focused on servicing clients with brand identity, website design and business and brand consulting.

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

Cynthia Maselli: Well, it all started when I was a new mom, and I was having a conversation with a friend of mine, and we were talking about some business things, and she just suddenly said, you know, Cynthia, I think you really should start an agency because you tend to give all your advice for free. And at that time, I was pretty overwhelmed with just being a new mom and figuring all of that. But I had heard of that before because my husband had actually encouraged me when we first started dating. And he said, you know, I think you should have a marketing agency one day. And I just thought, I don’t know. I mean, it sounds great in theory, but it’s a lot of work and commitment. I’m not sure if that’s the direction I want to go. And so now, all these years later, here I am. And I’m so grateful because it’s been such a fun adventure, quite honestly, being able to help business owners and then also getting to do what I love, which is a mix of business and branding.

Lee Kantor: Now, since branding brand is in your name and strategy is also in your name, can you talk about the importance of brand nowadays, where it seems like we’re in a climate with marketing that, um, it’s in flux a little bit and it’s changing so rapidly. Can you talk about the importance of brand?

Cynthia Maselli: Absolutely. Well, I think one of the most important things about brand and branding is to actually know what it even means. Words are often used interchangeably, especially in branding. And so I would say that the first thing is to understand that a brand is really the perception that your target audience has about your business or company or services, and branding is the ongoing process of how you continue to execute your brand and the perception that you want. It’s so important to know what branding is because it isn’t the foundation of a business. The business structure, the core services or products and everything behind the scenes that you don’t necessarily see. If you’re a consumer of, you know, a know, a specific company or you love a certain product, you don’t really actually know what’s going on behind the scenes. And that’s often what I have some really great conversations with my clients about. I really want to make sure that they have the structure and the foundation in place, which is, quite honestly, what inspired the brand. The iconic Brand Blueprint, which is my consulting level workbook that I created, because what I found is that through the years, my clients were missing gaps in their businesses that were quite common, and I noticed this as a pattern.

Cynthia Maselli: And I realized that, you know, quite honestly, most entrepreneurs don’t start off with a business degree, and many of them kind of end up having a business, kind of like the story that I just shared about my own. And so they’re not often equipped with the things that they need to have, and they tend to try to piece it together, which, you know, it’s very admirable. And I think all of us do when we don’t. There wasn’t a kit, I guess, essentially. Centrally, and I wanted to really come alongside of entrepreneurs in that kind of a way and be able to create at least a starting point, that blueprint. And that is essentially what my book is all about. And it’s been helping entrepreneurs, which has been such a great joy for me to hear with the feedback and to see the differences that it’s making in businesses.

Lee Kantor: And the company’s brand is something that is going to happen, whether they’re proactive about it or not. Right? Like, people are going to have opinions and thoughts and, um, and they might think the brand is one thing when the people in the company might think the brand something else, and it’s important to be proactive about it and not just let kind of, um, the world decide what your brand is, right? You should have some say in it if you want to be successful.

Cynthia Maselli: Yes. So there are a few things that I even listed out in the iconic brand blueprint, and that is building Brand trust. It’s not just the visuals which we refer to as brand identity, where you think of immediately the logos, the colors, the fonts, the visuals, the tone, and even the copy or the language that you use. But it’s the consistency as a company, internally and externally. It’s the brand personality, it’s credibility. It’s establishing that credibility with those that are working with you behind the scenes and also those that are purchasing from you. It’s transparency, um, with a company, with your products, with your services and it’s customer service. And that is something that I cannot emphasize enough, is it’s really what the people are saying about your brand, your products, your services, or who you are. If if you’re the one that’s interfacing with the public, um, it’s word of mouth that really still is to this day, the best form of marketing.

Lee Kantor: Now, um, how did you get to be so passionate about this subject matter. Did you is this something that you kind of grew up learning, or how did you kind of become the expert that you are about this? Did you have a mentor? How did you get to where you’re at?

Cynthia Maselli: I didn’t have a mentor, but I just became really passionate as I have had all these years of experience working behind the scenes. You know, before I had my own business, I was working for other businesses, from small businesses, start ups to an international corporation, and I really could see the difference that it made behind the scenes and how things would run. And, you know, at this point I can pretty much I don’t want to say I know what would happen in the future to a business, but I think there are strong indicators of the future of a business. Just by observing how an owner runs their business and how things are set up, or lack thereof, um, to even just the interactions that people are having with the business owner or with a company. Um, if you’re really looking to be in the business game for the long haul, there are so many important factors that come into play. And I think that maybe even today, culturally, there is more of a romanticism behind starting a business and having a business. Then there is an understanding of what that actually entails and what success really means.

Cynthia Maselli: And of course, success is going to be defined differently by everyone. Um, but for the most part, I think success would it would be safe to say that everyone who’s in business to some degree is interested in, of course, having a revenue and, um, increasing that year by year. Uh, you don’t go into business thinking you’re going to lose money because there would be no appeal to that. And so you really try to do your best. And I have found that with just my background, um, with business and marketing and advertising and also, uh, a degree in psychology, all of those things kind of come into play because businesses really come down to the consumer behavior and the perception. Again, it’s what a brand is actually all about. It’s how someone views or perceives a company, a business, or even an owner of a business. And that’s why we have conversations now about, um, just your own personal brand and who should have a personal brand. And what does that even mean? Or what does that entail?

Lee Kantor: Now, when you’re developing the brand or building it out and communicating it, how important is it to articulate the why, the true north behind what you’re trying to accomplish and what you do?

Cynthia Maselli: I think it’s important to really convey your mission and your vision, because it is what becomes a relatable piece for a business or a business owner to connect with the audience. As a business owner, you’re really trying to connect with your target audience, which first needs to be identified as to why are you going into business? It’s not just if you’re passionate about a product or service, but what is it that can be a game changer that maybe someone else is not doing already? And with so many products and so many services, it really it really does matter. And so, you know, for example, my business, there are many out there that are designing websites that are designing brands. Um, but a couple of the things that I focus on, of course, is customer service, the experience that my clients have with me, the process that they have while walking through what can sometimes feel very overwhelming to someone who isn’t familiar with, you know, all of this brand conversations and what do I actually need? And I think that’s, uh, figuring out what it is that your target audience really needs and then conveying or communicating to them why you’re being able to offer them something that isn’t already in existence or already out there, or how you’re doing something better than maybe a competitor of yours, um, to be able to show them why it is that they need to trust you and, you know, purchase from you and build your brand, um, trust at the end of the day.

Lee Kantor: So if you were to advise somebody right now listening, what is some low hanging fruit they can be doing to kind of make their brand a little better?

Cynthia Maselli: I think one of the most important things is really evaluating your business structure. And if you have one, um, did you kind of just, you know, throw stuff together, uh, because you had a great product or idea for a service, and your business is kind of hanging by the seams. You know, if if there was to be exposure behind the scenes, what does it look like? What does it communicate about you as the business owner? And, you know, if you have goals for the long term, uh, for the big vision, how are you going to be able to sustain where you’re at right now to that point in time? Because every business will face challenges inevitably, whether it’s internally or economically. And there are factors that we can’t control. And so, um, evaluating how is my business set up number one. And number two is what are people saying about my business today? Um, sending out a survey, finding out what are people saying about your products or your services or about your business. And I think you can if you have employees that are working for you. I think that’s a great place to start, is how healthy is the environment where they’re working? Um, what are the things that they’re saying because they’re your first brand ambassadors, really.

Cynthia Maselli: They’re the ones that are having conversations about their job and their experience working with you. And then I would say, um, maybe a third one would be have an assessment done about the brand image. And so that would come down to your website. Um, is it easy to navigate, uh, is there an appeal to your target audience, your brand identity? Did you kind of just put it together. Did you have someone do it professionally? Is it still in alignment with your mission, your vision, the long term goals and, um, being able to kind of start there? As a few of you know, the examples really does go a long way. I think that once, many times that once we’re an entrepreneur, you just kind of get caught up in the rush of just having to get things done, that sometimes the most important things seem to be so small and as though we don’t have enough time for them. But really, they can be big game changers.

Lee Kantor: Can you share a story that, uh, about maybe one of the the clients that you’ve worked with and a lot of our audience are business coaches and in and around the coaching world or, you know, um, professional services primarily. Um, is there a story you can share in that area that demonstrates maybe how you were able to help someone? Don’t name the name of the organization, but maybe share the challenge they had when they came to you and how you were able to help them get to a new level?

Cynthia Maselli: Yes, absolutely. So my favorite stories are when a client comes to me for one service, and typically, of course, it’s going to be website or brand identity, and we end up working on other things internally in their business. Because when I’m walking clients through the process, whether it is for a redesign of their website or a new website launch or even their brand identity, I will send my client a questionnaire and it’s asking specific questions because I want to get to know their business. I want to get to understand their vision. Um, it’s easy for me to do the design part. I can easily just, you know, whip something up if you will. But at the end of the day, it needs to align with their business and their goals for their business. And so quite often, um, they, they start to realize that they haven’t thought about certain things, um, until we start having conversations. And so I’ve worked with clients multiple times where they start off with thinking that they need a new brand identity, they need a rebrand, or they need a new website. They need to redesign their website. But then they discover that there were other missing gaps. Um, there was one example where I was working with this client, and they started to realize that in their partnership, um, they didn’t have the clear communication that they thought they did.

Cynthia Maselli: And so there were unspoken misunderstandings that weren’t causing any issues, but they would down the line unless they began to address them early on. And so it was a really great experience to just be a part of that and be able to watch that unfold in real time. Um, because they became stronger as business partners. Um, because at the end of the day, again, a brand is great, but there are honestly a lot of brands out there that Maybe would even come to mind for even someone who’s listening right now. And it has baffled them, thinking, how in the world are they making so much money but their website is awful, or their packaging is not even that great, and they could even be comparing their own business to that said business. Um, but at the end of the day, perhaps the word of mouth is so strong that people will overlook those things. Um, because it isn’t all about the visual perception as much as it is sometimes, let’s say a product, if you have a house cleaning product, maybe you don’t really care what the packaging looks like as much as you do.

Cynthia Maselli: Is it effective? Is it doing what it’s promising to do? That’s why I’m willing to pay X amount of dollars for it. And at the end of the day, you’re sharing it with a friend and you’re saying, hey, you know what? Have you tried this product out? It’s great. And in that conversation, there’s no mention about maybe how you would prefer a different color of the packaging, or maybe the logo could have been better or their website’s not that great, but at the end of the day, if you’re sharing those links and people are going there, clicking it, adding it to their cart and purchasing it, that’s, you know, that’s the dream. You want your clients to just be able to go and purchase without hesitation. So everything working together, including the brand, it’s the goal is to just make it something that is a no brainer for your target audience to just go, you know what, I want to go ahead and just try this out. I want to go ahead and purchase this. And then hopefully the delivery and the execution of what they’re expecting will match their initial perception of your business or your product or your service, and they’ll continue to share about it or purchase it.

Lee Kantor: So who is the ideal client for the brand strategist?

Cynthia Maselli: We love working with entrepreneurs who are ready to get their hands in the creative process with us. Um, we’ve had experiences where clients come to us and they kind of just want everything done, which could be easy, but at the same time, the whole purpose of even just launching the brand strategist is really for the intentional business owner who understands perhaps, that they don’t know everything. Um, and they know, but they know that they need something or they’re starting to see the missing gaps. They’re starting to see or hear, hey, you know what? I might need to rebrand, um, my website, or I might need to expand my website. I might need to update this or that. And they come because they know that they don’t have all the answers. They’re looking for some professional experience. Um, people in the industry might my team and I, um, we have experience and we’ve been working with hundreds of clients at this point in time. And so what we focus on is really listening to our client and taking what it is that they’re saying, but also kind of filling in those gaps of maybe things that they’re just not aware of. And so education is a big part of the process with my clients. I really like to walk them through the process of not just what their goal is, um, for that project, but also just educating along the way.

Cynthia Maselli: Because whether they come back later for something else in their business or they need someone else because maybe they’re expanding in a different, um, form or capacity that I may not be able to help them with. At least they’re empowered and they’re equipped to know a little bit more than when they started working with me. And so, um, whether they’re a new business owner, they’re launching a business for the first time. Maybe there’s someone that’s been running their business for a few years, and maybe it’s time for that rebrand. Um, or they’re in a, in a point in their business where they just maybe can’t figure out what they need to do, but they know that there’s something missing at that point. Um, it would be more consulting, but, you know, focusing on the services around brand identity, website design and the consulting. And of course, I love connecting people. So if there is a service or something that someone is looking for, and if I don’t offer it because there are a lot of other services out there, whether it’s designing for email marketing or it’s SEO, etc., I always love connecting people with the trusted professionals that I know do a really good job at what they’re an expert at, and I love being able to help out people with referrals as well.

Lee Kantor: And so you mentioned the kind of the way you deliver the services, a combination of coaching, consulting, but you also have, um, kind of a book that they can do on their own.

Cynthia Maselli: Yes. So the iconic brand blueprint is really for, I would say, business owners between 1 to 7 years, um, whether they’re launching and they have no idea where to start, this is kind of your business kit, if you will, or if maybe you are considering a rebranding your business and you’re not really sure where to start. This book will cover all of the things. Um, and again, as I’ve mentioned before, a lot of the business owners really don’t have an idea what they need when they start out. So they’re kind of figuring out along the way. And this book was really inspired from working with business owners from different stages in their business and discovering that it’s actually quite common, um, in, in terms of the questions that were being asked. And so I realized, you know, I think I haven’t found a resource out there that really covers everything that I cover in the iconic brand blueprint. And so it was something that is accessible to anyone just by going to my website, the Brand Strategist, and being able to purchase it just in case someone’s not ready to work with me yet, or someone just trying to figure out what it is that they need. My hope is that they will be able to have a really good starting point with this book, and it’s reusable. So whether you’re building one business and you’re going to be reusing it for years to come because it’s it’s kind of like your, your brand and business Bible, if you will, um, or you’re going to launch a new business, at least you have this book that will be able to help you time and time again.

Lee Kantor: And if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or the team. Is the website, is that the best starting place?

Cynthia Maselli: Yes. The brand strategist Dot would be the best place. And then you can also find us on at the Brand Strategist on Instagram.

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

Cynthia Maselli: Thank you so much, Lee.

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

Optimizing Team Dynamics: How Culture Index Can Revolutionize Your Hiring Process

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High Velocity Radio
High Velocity Radio
Optimizing Team Dynamics: How Culture Index Can Revolutionize Your Hiring Process
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In this episode of High Velocity Radio, Lee interviews Tiffany Slowinski, CEO of Team Spark Advisors. Tiffany shares how she helps businesses optimize team performance by using the Culture Index, a data-driven tool that matches people to roles based on their natural strengths. She discusses the pitfalls of traditional hiring, the benefits of objective analytics, and practical strategies for aligning talent with business needs. Tiffany also offers actionable advice for business owners and highlights the importance of leadership buy-in for lasting team success. Listeners are invited to connect for a free consultation.

Tiffany Slowinski is the owner of Team Spark Advisors and co-owner of seven successful franchises. A former VP of Sales overseeing 200 markets, she now helps businesses optimize culture and drive results by aligning talent with roles.

With a Master’s in Psychology from Columbia University and deep expertise in human behavior, she blends data with empathy to help leaders build high-performing, purpose-driven teams.

She’s also a mom of four spirited daughters and brings both insight and heart to every conversation.

Connect with Tiffany on LinkedIn and Facebook.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Discovering Culture Index—and turning it into a business
  • The most common mistake in hiring leaders

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here. Another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Tiffany Slowinski and she is the CEO of Team Spark Advisors. Welcome.

Tiffany Slowinski: Hi, Lee, thanks for having me.

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

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. So with Team Spark Advisors, I help business owners put the right people in the right seats. So I use data and analytics to look at who somebody is naturally. And are they aligned in the right role. And then once we have them in the right role, how do we best work with that person? How do we communicate with them? How do we motivate them in a way that’s going to serve them to maximize their productivity and keep them happy, and serving your company longer and longer.

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

Tiffany Slowinski: So I was actually a client first. Um, so culture index is the tool I use, and I was a VP of sales at a national magazine franchise. And we started using Culture Index to bring in the right franchisees, um, who are going to be these great salespeople who were hunters, who could go out and and close business and, and sign on new partners easily, who was made to do that? And so this made my job so much easier when I realized that there was a tool we could use to help align people into these roles, and then also then how do we build out the staff around them? These people who are often great at sales, were not the most detail oriented, weren’t the best at follow up and documenting and and taking care of clients. So who else did we need in that equation to make sure that once we got a new client in that they were going to be happy and and stay with us. And so I have a background in psychology, and I became so enamored with how well this was working that I eventually left that position to start team Spark Advisors and help companies use the culture Index to do what it had done for me.

Lee Kantor: So what were you doing before Culture Index? Was it kind of like gut feeling? Like how were you assessing people prior to working with Culture Index?

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. A lot of gut feeling. Uh, um, we used to call it the beer test. Is this somebody I would want to have a beer with? Right? I mean, it’s so rudimentary, but, yeah, I mean, the same things that a lot of companies are doing, right? You’re looking at resumes or do they have the experience you want and then they come in and do you like them? Um, how do they present themselves? Are they professional? Are they showing up on time? And those aren’t things you should ignore. It’s absolutely something you want to pay attention to. But what I learned through my experience with Culture Index is that social people are four times more likely to get hired for a position, regardless of whether or not they’re more qualified. And so for certain positions, yeah, it makes sense. You want social people, but there’s a lot of roles out there that, you know, you don’t need your accountant to be social. You don’t need your engineer to be social. And yet being social was getting people hired into positions that didn’t make the most sense for them. They’re kind of an obvious reason, right? Social people interview better. And so I love adding this data piece because this is what takes over when you can’t just get a hunch, right. I’m not 100% perfect with my hunches. Nobody really is. And now there’s a data point that can help you.

Lee Kantor: Now, there’s a lot of assessments out there that deal with, you know, personality and character and things like that. How is this different than some of those other ones?

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah, there are a lot out there. And I had taken many of them throughout my career. And what I found different with the Culture Index was it was a couple of things. One, simplicity of the survey that we use of the tool. It only takes 5 to 7 minutes. So it wasn’t a big lift or ask for people to complete. Two. Um, it’s a free range response. So a lot of surveys out there will ask a question and then say, are you A, B, C or D? And there’s times you’re like, I don’t think I’m any of those things, or I’m more than one of those things, but I can only select one answer. So it’s sort of forcing you. It’s called forced choice response. With culture Index, the way the survey works, you could pick as many words or answers as you want. And so you could be a lot of something, a little of something, or somewhere in between. And so the way that the the surveys are measured is very different. It leaves all that gray area in there to not just stick people into these little boxes, but look at degrees of things, how people present you can be a little social or very social. Those are two very, very different humans who are going to present in different ways. So the way that the data is aggregated is completely different. And then the reliability rate is extraordinarily high at a 0.92, meaning, you know, if you take the survey 100 times, 92 times out of 100, it’s going to come back the same. So that was extraordinarily impactful to me.

Lee Kantor: So when you started using it, how quickly did you have that aha of, oh, this thing works pretty well.

Tiffany Slowinski: Day two. Um, I mean, my initial reaction to it was, okay, this really describes me really well. That’s that’s sort of fascinating, but I already know myself. So it wasn’t telling me anything about me. I didn’t know, but it was giving data to it. It was like, this is why I am the way I am. I’ve always felt this way, but I’ve never had another survey capture it quite the same. But then when I started looking at at the people who worked on my team and my colleagues, and starting to understand them through a different lens that I didn’t necessarily know everything there was to know about them. And then, even on the next level, I started surveying, you know, my family and close friends, and I was amazed at how many times I literally would get the results and think, this must be wrong. This is not my brother. This is not how he operates. And I would go through the results with him and he’d be like, that’s exactly me. And I’m like, how have I known you for 43 years and not known this was you? Even people close to me in my life. So that was really my aha moment, literally within a day or two.

Lee Kantor: Now, um, when you’re kind of getting these results, how does that kind of fit into the culture of the given organization? Because like, do you have to now modify the role based on the results? Or do you get rid of the person based on the result? Like how? How do you make this actionable?

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah, it could be all of the above or none of the above. Totally depends. Situation dependent. So my goal is to come in and work with who you have. It’s not to give out a survey and say, well, we clearly have all the wrong people. Let’s fire every person who works here, right? That’s not real life. So some of it is in some ways. Do we have the right person in the right role? Is there a modification to the role that would make more sense? Or do I need to instruct them or mentor them differently, knowing that somebody is very low detail? Are there things I need to put into place to help them tackle some of that, of that detail work? Or there are certain things I should take off their plate because it’s not working for a reason, right? And so we learn how to work with who we have, but then we also hire better. So now as new people come in, who’s going to fit into this role. And it’s in two different ways. One who’s going to fit into the job description of the role. What does the person need to be able to do. But then also who’s going to fit in based on the personalities of the other people on the team. Who are you reporting to? Who’s going to work best with me is different than who’s going to work best with you, Lee. And so knowing the dynamics of who else is there will also help me guide my advice on who to hire.

Lee Kantor: Now, does the advice, um, kind of trickle down to this is how we write this ad to attract the right person. Uh, like, do you help in that area as well, or do you just say, okay, you need a more a less social person here and a more detail oriented person here, and then good luck.

Tiffany Slowinski: Exactly. No. You want to attract the right people, right. So even in the ad process, there’s words we can use. Right? So I help with that. If we’re hiring a salesperson and we want a sales hunter who’s aggressive and outgoing and is going to turn over every stone and be relentless, but then also social and connect with people. The wording we’re going to use in that ad description, or that job posting is very different than if I’m hiring an administrative assistant, right? So yes, absolutely. You want to attract the people you need. And, you know, I had one client who was hiring. It was a small business, right? And so he was hiring. He called the position business development administrative assistant. And I was like, okay, I need some clarification here. What exactly is that? And he’s like, well, I need an administrative assistant, but we go to trade shows, so I need someone to go to the trade shows with me. And I said, okay, well, how often do you go to trade shows? He said, 2 or 3 times a year. I said, you need to hire an administrative assistant. The second you throw the word business development on there, you’re attracting a bunch of salespeople. And truth be told, your administrative assistant can show up 2 or 3 times a year to a trade show and help you hand out tchotchkes, collect contact information, and make some follow up calls. But if you hire a true business development person, they’re going to make a lousy administrative assistant for you. So there is a lot of that sometimes really figuring out these roles, because particularly in smaller businesses, there’s times you wear a lot of hats, but what’s the hat that’s going to make the biggest impact for his world? It was having a better administrative assistant was by far going to be more important to his success than getting someone who’s super good at standing at a trade show.

Lee Kantor: Now, um, when you work with your clients, are they primarily you mentioned earlier that your background was in franchising. Are your clients mainly in franchising, or are there, uh, business people or entrepreneurs of all shapes and sizes?

Tiffany Slowinski: I work with all different industries. It’s this is not franchise exclusive whatsoever. I love working with with sales teams as well. But I mean, this is something that can apply to all businesses. All businesses need the right people. I’ve yet to meet a business who said 100% of my staff is perfect? Couldn’t ask for anything more from anybody.

Lee Kantor: And then. So what’s the kind of that pain that a person’s having right before they contact you? Or are they just having trouble hiring people or are they having a lot of turnover? Like what is the symptom that they may need help in this area?

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. So sometimes it’s turnover. I’ll have people call me when they’ll say, I’ve hired two office managers in the last six months. I’m so frustrated with this. Or I’ll have people who are in a growth mode and they know they’ve got to bring on a lot of people. Um, or there’s company culture issues. People aren’t getting along, there’s growth issues. They can’t get the right people in leadership. And so they’re battling with them because they don’t have visionary people. So it really depends on the business and what they’re trying to achieve of of where where do they need this?

Lee Kantor: Now, I know in business a lot of times people, um, you know, ah, as soon as there’s a fire, they look to solve the problem. But I would imagine that in this regard, in the work that you’re doing, just taking the temperature of your team would be a good idea. And just getting some sort of a baseline of what everybody is, no matter how well your team’s doing, because these are the things that if there could be some quiet quitting, there could be some some people in the wrong roles that are frustrated, that have a foot out the door you may not even be aware of because they’re not, you know, well matched to whatever the work, they’re they’re being done. So I would think this is something that everybody would benefit from using, but they probably don’t proactively use your service until something you know bad is going on or they need to.

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. Lee, you you get it 100%. So that is part of what I do too. I have measures where I can look for disengagement, probability of quiet, quitting. Right. Stress. Are people getting burnt out? That is all part of this as well. And so you can have the right person. But if they’re under the wrong. The wrong leader, if they’re not being treated the right way, those are also things to look for and get ahead of. You don’t want somebody just. And a lot of times, like when you do an exit interview, they’ll just kind of give you the simple answer, oh, I found a position for more money. Well, what made them start looking for that position to begin with? There was already a problem. The number one reason people quit their jobs is their direct report, boss. The number two reason people quit their jobs are their colleagues. So people really quit people? Sure, people want more money and all those things as well. I’m not not recommending you underpay your team, but the biggest motivators that lead for someone leaving their position and going somewhere else is they don’t like who they work for or who they work with. And so getting an early read on that absolutely can help change the game. And it doesn’t mean, oh, this is not the right boss. Okay, well, we got to fire them. No, but are we communicating the right way? Just sometimes even just understanding this is a person who doesn’t want to be micromanaged. They want more autonomy. Give them a little freedom. And having that in your head or knowing, okay, I got I’ve got to compliment this person more. They really are going to thrive off of that. There’s little tweaks you can do that can help improve the environment without making a major modification on your side either.

Lee Kantor: Now everybody is always kind of searching for these a-players and surrounding themselves with eight players. Um, obviously there can’t be everyone can’t be an A player in everything. And I would imagine the Bell Curve tells you how many players there are, um, just in general. So how do you kind of identify the A players in your organizations, or at least put the right people in the right seat until you can find the, the the A players.

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. So there’s there’s other tools we use within Culture Index to help us identify what does an A player look like here? For this role, I could be an A player in one role and a D or an F in another role, because that’s not meant for me. So there’s not a finite number of a players. Anybody could be an A player in the right position for them doing what they are meant to do. So you’re looking for a players within different positions, which leads to a lot of different types of people that depending on the size of your organization, you’re going to need. I like to say there’s no wrong people, just right people for right seats. Everybody has something they’re good at. Everybody in this world has a place that they belong. And I also view this in a humanitarian way. When you set somebody free, sometimes they’re free to go do something where they’re going to be happy, where they’re going to excel. Nobody wants to come to work and lose every day and be stressed out every day, and not be able to hit their mark every day. And so you need eight players for your company, which might be different eight players than another company needs. It’s not limited thinking. There’s enough eight players to go around when we align them correctly.

Lee Kantor: So um, so how does the process work? Somebody raises their hand and says, Tiffany, I’m struggling, or we have turnover or we have some issue. Um, let’s get started. So how do you begin?

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. So this is a top down program that starts with leadership. This is not I come in and just fix your company for you. Although plenty of people have kind of offered that because that seems like the simpler solution to them. They would love to hire me to just come in and do everything. But what I’m doing is I’m training leadership in surveying what to look for. You need to know what you need because a lot of times we’re hiring for the wrong things. We have a bias towards ourselves. And so a lot of times we’re looking for people just like us. And I’ll tell you right now, I’d be my own worst assistant. So it’s teaching them how to use the tool, what to look for now understanding their people. Who are they working with? And so it works its way down through the culture of the company. But if you don’t have buy in at the leadership level, it’s going to fall flat. And then the other piece is then also through that through training is they get better and better at doing this themselves. But I’m also there to be that accountability buddy, that little birdie on your shoulder who delivers the good and the bad news. I’ll tell you. One thing is that I’m not going to lie to you.

Tiffany Slowinski: I’m going to tell you what the data says, and you could try your best to talk me out of it. And people do all the time. But this, oh, this person is so experienced. And I will sit there and be that accountability buddy and say, this is what the data says. You are free to make your own choice about that. But I’m not going to fudge what I’m seeing here on paper. That’s what you’re paying me to do because it’s really hard to get out of our own way. I can struggle with this myself sometimes. When you really like somebody and you want to see the best in them, or there’s some reason there’s somehow connected to you in some way, and you want to give them the job. And when the data says otherwise, it’s having that self discipline to walk away and say, you know what, I’m going to gamble on data. Does it make it 100%? No. There’s other outside factors I can’t measure. You know what’s going on in somebody’s personal life or their ethics, right? There’s other factors out there. But when I’m looking at the data that that is a gambling point that I’m going to bet on every time.

Lee Kantor: So then the first step is kind of assessing the organization and seeing what the the roles are currently and what they could be. And then you plug the people into that to make sure the fits are correct.

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. So we start off by getting a baseline on who we already have there.

Lee Kantor: So you start with the people, not the role. Like I’m just trying to get the chicken and the egg here because, um, you know, like, they could have a person that is in a role just because, you know, when they were smaller, they were in the role and now they’re bigger and they’re still in the role, and they may not be the right fit for them. Like, I would think that you would have to get kind of an idea of what the roles are and then match the people to it. But you’re saying you start with the people before the role.

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah, I’m looking at your people first. And or maybe I should phrase it this way, it’s being done concurrently. I’m looking at both people and roles at the same time. What’s the who’s the person and what’s their role? I’m not coming in and saying, let’s just okay, based off of let’s all just switch all your jobs tomorrow, right? We are looking at this by team. That’s why I want leadership in there with me. We’re looking at it by team. And so you might have a profile of someone who would make an excellent salesperson, but they’re killing it over in another department. I’m not going to say oh let’s just like put them over here because they’re fitting the criteria for another for another job you have. Right? Um, so it’s being done at the same at the same time. And there’s times, frankly, somebody’s going to come back and maybe they’re not 100% in alignment for a role, but they’ve been there a long time. They’ve learned they’ve they’ve adapted their their strengths to them. Okay. Are there things we could do to supplement it to get them up to an A player? Are there is there more training we need for this particular person, or is this a complete misfit where they’re totally, you know, in the wrong spot. And and depending on the position, there’s ones that this is a huge, huge issue to have. You know, when you’re talking about some of these higher level positions, having the wrong person align there could could be costing a company millions of dollars a year. So this is not one size fits all that I’m going to do the same thing depending on the position. Right. Um, it really is individualized and looking at what’s going on right now in that company, what’s what’s the most important pieces we have to get to first, and where does it make sense to make changes? And where does it make sense to focus on optimizing who we have at the moment?

Lee Kantor: Now, in kind of today’s working environment, everybody has to be kind of a salesperson to some degree. Um, how do you kind of maybe coach up a person that maybe that’s not their superpower, but it’s necessary in today’s business climate, especially in the smaller, leaner companies.

Tiffany Slowinski: How necessary is it to the role? Because I will tell you, having the wrong salespeople is really the number one factor that limits growth. These are the people who have to bring in your revenue, right? Um, so coaching up, it’s far easier to coach up somebody who innately has some of the traits of someone who makes a good salesperson than to try to take somebody who is absolutely not wired that way and tell them, okay, you got to go start selling to.

Lee Kantor: So that’s that’s.

Tiffany Slowinski: So much.

Lee Kantor: So that if you’re in any and every organization, the selling organization is that’s kind of the first thing you have to triage is to make sure you have the right kind of hunters on the team.

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. Well, depending on what there’s different types of sales. Right. Is this is this inbound sales? Inbound sales? Um, outbound sales, I mean, is like the word sales is thrown around pretty loosely. Um, but depending. I mean, do you need someone who’s cold calling and knocking on doors, or is this more of a relationship sale, people who are networking, or is this more of an order taker? People call in. Those are different people that could perform well in those roles.

Lee Kantor: And then, um, when you do the, uh, culture index, then you’re able to kind of, uh, discern between those. Maybe they’re subtle differences.

Tiffany Slowinski: So here would be an example. I work with a company that has a person who really great profile of someone who’s good at networking, absolutely relationship driven, lights up the room, knows everybody will call somebody they knew from kindergarten without feeling weird, but not a sales hunter in that they don’t like to ask for money. They’re not big on contracts. They’ll let people pay late. And when looking at I mean, this person brings tremendous value to the organization but is really struggling in some pieces of the role. And it’s like, okay, put him where he’s good, throw him in more networking groups, let him do that. But they’ve been trying for years and years to make this person good at collections. And he hates calling and collecting money. I’m like, grab one of your admin and throw them on that piece of it and let him just go out and meet people. He’s great at bringing in the leads. That’s where he’s going to better serve your company than him trying, you know, putting off all day that he’s got to call all these people and collect money. And now all of a sudden they’re literally hundreds of thousands behind because he just never seems to get around to doing that piece of the job.

Lee Kantor: And that goes back to what you were saying is aligning. Aligning the talent with their superpower, and then just filling in the gaps where they might struggle with somebody else’s. Whose superpower is closer to whatever that weakness is and that individual.

Tiffany Slowinski: Exactly. And in this instance, he’s strong enough in networking that this makes sense to, to to put somebody else in and take a little piece of this off his plate. If he was somebody who just innately was terrible at all of this, then the decision becomes easier to say, this is not an individual that belongs in this company, but he does have great strengths and is brought in a ton of business for them. So are we. Like, how many years can we sit there and pound on, like you’ve got to do money collection thing before realizing it’d be far easier to just slot somebody else in to do that, that small piece of his job.

Lee Kantor: So what’s something that a business owner right now could take today to get more out of their team?

Tiffany Slowinski: It can you repeat that? I don’t really understand your question.

Lee Kantor: Um, is there something that our listener. A listener right now could do, uh, to improve their team, to get more out of their team based on, you know, kind of the culture index and your, uh, expertise when it comes to just, um, kind of wringing out the most value from the people you already have.

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. I mean, anybody listening out there, I’m happy to do a free phone call with you to go over your team, give you some data points on them. I believe in the data because this will show you who people are, and it gives you a way to see it. Very clear. So happy to do that for any of your listeners. Because once you have that data, whether or not you choose to engage with me or not, I will give you information on your people that you’re going to be able to walk away from and immediately have insights to ways that you can improve their productivity.

Lee Kantor: Now, you mentioned that, um, any business can benefit, obviously, from this type of information. Is there a size company that is in your sweet spot? Is there kind of an ideal client profile for you?

Tiffany Slowinski: I like to say a minimum of ten employees. Um, but truthfully, I once had a client that only had it was a solopreneur who just wanted to build his team correctly from the very beginning. Um, so there’s not a specific size. If you value having the right people on your team, and sometimes with small businesses, it can be hard because if you only have a handful of people working there, one wrong person makes up a very large percentage of your workforce. There’s not a whole lot of room to absorb those missed hires, right? So there’s there’s really no no minimum. I’m happy to talk to anybody.

Lee Kantor: Now, do you work with kind of startups that are, you know, just at the idea stage and like you said, that they’re, you know, they have maybe they just got funding and there is a path, but they’re just not there yet.

Tiffany Slowinski: Typically, I’m not working with them as much. I certainly am open to a conversation, but usually the companies I’m working with, like I said, have a minimum of about ten employees.

Lee Kantor: And so they’ve been around for a minute.

Tiffany Slowinski: Mhm.

Lee Kantor: And then if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, what’s the website. What’s the best way to connect.

Tiffany Slowinski: Yeah. You can look me up at Team Spark Advisors. Com or I’m happy to connect on LinkedIn as well. Tiffany Slowinski.

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

Tiffany Slowinski: Thank you. Lee, I really appreciate you having me on.

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

The Human Element: Why Leadership Development Needs a Personal Touch

by

Atlanta Business Radio
Atlanta Business Radio
The Human Element: Why Leadership Development Needs a Personal Touch
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In this episode of Atlanta Business Radio, Lee Kantor interviews Amber Cabral, founder of Human Well, about the evolving challenges of leadership and communication in today’s workplaces. Amber discusses the impact of technology, generational differences, and remote work on interpersonal skills, emphasizing the need for psychological safety and resilience. She shares insights on bridging gaps between corporate and frontline employees, highlights the importance of empathy and intentional development, and offers practical strategies for fostering healthier, more connected work environments. Amber also introduces her podcast, Human(ing) Well, and invites organizations to engage with her leadership development services.

As a culture and communication strategist, TED speaker, and twice-published author, Amber Cabral teaches people how to be good humans at work and in life. She helps us learn how to respectfully speak our minds, purposefully define our goals, and strengthen our relationships while avoiding burnout.

She’s known for her authentic approach, practical solutions, and powerful communication techniques, all of which are showcased in her weekly podcast, Human(ing) Well, on the SiriusXM radio network.

Connect with Amber on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • What it means to “human well” in business today
  • How leaders build resilience in their teams during change
  • Why high-stakes conversations trip up even seasoned leaders
  • How people speak up without damaging relationships
  • The ROI of better humans at work

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio. And this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, CSU’s executive MBA program. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on the show, we have Amber Cabral, who is a leadership strategist, a TED speaker, an author, and a podcast host with Human(ing) well, welcome.

Amber Cabral: Hey, there. Glad to be here today.

Lee Kantor: Well, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about Humaning. Well, how you serving, folks?

Amber Cabral: Yeah. So Humaning well is a leadership development company, so we mostly do training, consulting, coaching and executive development for pretty well known brands. And I’ve been doing that work in general for the last 20 plus years. But the humaning element really took off this year when I realized that there was a lot of things that we were trying to do in the workplace without considering what we as people need to be able to do that. So that’s the work that I do, and it has just grown to add the human element more recently.

Lee Kantor: So how are you defining Humaning? Well.

Amber Cabral: So with Humaning, well, as a framework, there are four pillars. That’s health, wealth, relationships and growth. Generally, thinking about what makes humans well, we usually have to have a little something good going on in each of those. But in a grand sense, what Humaning well is really asking us to do is to make sure that we are considering our needs as we’re making decisions. So whether those are workplace decisions, whether they’re decisions in our personal lives, whether they’re decisions about how we’re going to spend our time. We have to think about how we are taking good care of ourselves in the process so that we have the capability, and, more importantly, the resilience to navigate whatever we may encounter on that journey.

Lee Kantor: Now, in today’s world, it seems like there’s an endless amount of conversation around artificial intelligence, around automation, around robots, all this kind of stuff that aren’t really human. Can you talk about how all of this technology is impacting the ability to human well in business?

Amber Cabral: Absolutely. So we are seeing this in a generational window as well. So we are finding at least my company, we’re finding that organizations are reaching out to us for more basic leadership skills. You know, how to effectively communicate, how to give and receive feedback, how to navigate challenges at work when you’re on a team, because a lot of that isn’t necessarily being learned the same way that it used to be, which was when we would do things together, like going to school or, you know, navigate being out in the world or hanging out at the mall. A lot of that has been replaced with engagement with social media. And so what’s also happening on top of just those transitions is exactly what you said. Now we also have workplace AI. Now we have AI in the way that we are navigating spaces in our personal lives too. And so it’s further impacting what it looks like for us to engage with one another. So those fundamental skills that are important to how we get things done as teams, how we are productive and build together when we are, you know, having to aim toward the same goal, those skills are not as common. And when they are present, they need building. And so I would say that AI, while helpful, has to be applied strategically, and we have to be more intentional about making sure that we keep some of the human stuff that makes it easier for us to be able to connect together also gives us the clarity about where we as people should be showing up, and where we should leave the work to the machines.

Lee Kantor: Now, are you finding you mentioned generational? Um, are you finding that the digital natives are are less inclined to believe that this type of human interaction face to face, you know, look someone in the eye shake their hand, you know, have a conversation, uh, verbally, um, is is as important to them as it is to maybe the older generations that that that isn’t maybe table stakes in a way that it used to be for older folks.

Amber Cabral: So I think it’s a little bit of I’m not sure that this is as important, but more I don’t actually know how. So what we’re finding is that organizations are hiring talent that have achieved really well from an education standpoint. Um, getting them through the interview process, but then finding when they’re on teams, they don’t necessarily know how to engage with their teammates, they don’t know how to effectively engage with their leaders. And many don’t realize that they’re not doing it well. So not even necessarily the, you know, hey, I don’t value this as much. I’m not necessarily interested in the in-person engagement more the lack of awareness that you’re not engaging well. And so the skill set is a little bit tricky because the first thing that has to happen is folks have to get a little bit of self-awareness. And that isn’t always present when we go into an organization. There are a number of leaders who will say, yeah, I have a couple team members who just don’t really seem self-aware. They don’t feel as connected, and I’m not even sure if they really know that they’re not doing that. And so being a digital native does make connection mean something different, because folks are connecting across the digital divide where if something is funny, you type lol, you don’t necessarily have to have a smile on your face, But when you’re having a conversation with someone, when you think something’s funny, we usually are intentional as humans about how we express that. But when you haven’t had that habit, it may not occur to you that people don’t understand that you’re having the LOL moment in your brain. And so that’s a little bit about how we’re hearing it show up in some of the workplaces that I work with.

Lee Kantor: Now, in some of the workplaces that you work with or have they, um, or are they considering or have they done kind of the transition back from remote work to more in the office work?

Amber Cabral: So I have a mix, um, I work across a lot of industries. So retail, for example, retail is still very much in the, you know, the stores. And so there’s not a way to necessarily take all of that away, though we do definitely do a lot more online shopping. Um, but there are organizations that have a mix of hybrid and in-person. That’s the most common format that I see. But then in addition, you know, you do have folks that are saying, hey, I want folks that are working for us back in the office, you know, 4 to 5 days a week. And so that’s showing up. It just really depends organization to organization. Larger organizations that are very visible, I think have done a bit more mandating people to come back to the office, largely because they have so much property. So if you’ve got all this, you know, shared space, you know, people want to use that space and actually have an opportunity to enhance the in-person connection. And so we’re getting more contact from organizations that are in person on how to better connect in the workplace across generations. But some of the conversations that are happening are connecting to the hybrid space or the remote workspace, because even as people go back to the office, we do business globally now. And so we’re no longer, you know, businesses are not just in the United States or even just in, you know, New York City businesses are operationalizing around the globe. And so you may have to have a conversation with your team in Dublin or in India or wherever. And so being able to know how to use your connection skills to be able to work with colleagues in different parts of the world is also critically important to how we human well together as well.

Lee Kantor: So what is the typical pain that your clients having right before they reach out and contact you? How is this showing up in their world? What are the symptoms of a problem or an issue that you can you might be able to help them with?

Amber Cabral: Probably a couple of things that come to mind more recently. Number one would be, uh, psychological safety in the workplace. As the world becomes more polarized, people tend to bring a bit of that polarization into the workplace, or at least worry about what it will look like when it shows up in the workplace. So regardless of if we’re talking about an organization that is remote and hybrid or in person, we live in a world right now where there are just a lot of beliefs and a lot of perspectives and a lot of change, and a lot of that has a bit of a political angle to it. And so people are just very hesitant to Connect across what they perceive to be differences and don’t know how to talk about what to do. Should there be a concern that arises? So I typically will get contacted for something like that. I’m not sure that my teams are connecting. I’m not sure that we’re seeing the psychological safety necessary for us to be able to produce and be effective and communicate well. How can we create, you know, a better, more meaningfully connected set of leaders and teams? The other thing that I get very often is that people are just, um, trying to figure out how do I just communicate better. And that communicate better can be across generation. It can be across from, you know, client to consumer. It can be navigating the evolving landscape kind of to your point about, you know, we’ve got social media all of a sudden, how are we navigating that? Well and how that’s showing up in the workplace. So communication is a constant element that I feel like I get tapped a lot for as well.

Lee Kantor: So how do you kind of deliver those services? Is it through training? Is it through coaching?

Amber Cabral: It’s a bit of both. So depending on what kind of organization it is, if, you know, I work with a lot of executive leadership teams, if the executive leadership team isn’t communicating well guess what? The organization probably isn’t either. So I work with a lot of executive teams about how they can develop effective communication with one another. And effective communication doesn’t mean we are always nice to each other. It means that we know how to have the hard conversations and walk away from that without feeling offended or, you know, personalizing things and still knowing how to engage going forward. So people don’t necessarily have that skill set natively. I think that’s kind of been the case over time, and I think the digital element is just maybe made it a bit worse. So I work with executive teams from a coaching standpoint, group coaching or individual. But then I also do training with leadership teams or specific parts of the organization. So for example, a marketing team may be having some challenges with an idea that’s been put forth that people may have perceived as being, you know, maybe rub some, you know, certain groups the wrong way. How do we have the conversations to make sure that we’re putting out the kind of imagery and messaging that resonates with what we want to say and how we want our consumers to feel, and making sure that we’re also being sensitive to the possibility that someone could be rubbed the wrong way and how we manage that. So sometimes it’s a team specific circumstance. It really just depends on the organization that I’m working with. But yes, training is an option. Coaching is an option. Sometimes it’s consulting, sometimes it’s how, you know, how do we work to build an organization that uplifts its values across the entire enterprise. And so that would be more of a consulting opportunity. It just really depends on what the organization’s needs are now.

Lee Kantor: How do you find, um, the teaching of communications throughout for young people? Are you finding because like, these digitally native young people, um, are brought up in a world of texting and emojis and shortcuts. Um, like you mentioned that they don’t have kind of the experience on how to how to communicate in person. Uh, you know, the softer skills around that. Is it becoming a lost art, or is it something that that, you know, maybe parents can do or, uh, schools can do to help, uh, educate younger people on how to be more effective when it comes to in-person communication.

Amber Cabral: I think in-person communication works best when people hold folks accountable for doing it well. So whether that’s parents, whether that’s schools. I think it will become a lost art if people are not intentional about holding folks accountable for communicating. So if you are a parent, you know, maybe we don’t sit down and all have dinner together because, you know, life works a little bit different than that for a lot of folks these days. You know. But what does it look like for you to have some intentional dialog with the young people that you are bringing into the, you know, bringing up so that you are developing humans that are able to communicate in school? I remember when I was in school, you know, we had to get up in front of the class and, you know, maybe read a passage or we had to talk about, you know, a topic of some kind and give a small presentation. So on something that we’ve researched, what does that look like today? You know, yes, we have computers and we can type essays and do all of that. I mean, I guess even that’s debatable because a lot of folks are using ChatGPT to do their homework now. But, you know, what does it look like for you to really intentionally put people in a position to have to communicate? Because I do think it can be a lost art, and I think that there’s a lot more that’s lost than just the message in the moment. It’s also the ability to connect. We hear a lot of information these days about, you know, the loneliness epidemic and folks are having a difficult time with making friends. And there’s all this content around. Well, here is what you can do to make friends.

Amber Cabral: And it’s like, yeah, some of this is just communication. I’ve got to be willing to take a chance and say hello and be willing to try to carry a conversation, be willing to practice being interested and also knowing the ways that I am interesting. And those are things that we did very naturally when we didn’t necessarily have a phone in our hand. And we all went outside to play. So what does it look like to manufacture those opportunities? Whether you are a parent or you are a teacher, um, or you happen to be in the workplace? You know, I ran an intern program when I worked at Walmart. And one of the things that was really important for that program was to make sure that that intern got connected to a myriad of relationships, their mentor, their manager, myself, you know, the team that I supported. And we were intentional about making sure that they understood that for this business, you know, we’re talking about at that time, 2.2 million people globally. If you want to be able to work here, communication is key. So how are we making sure that we’re helping you to have the tools necessary to be able to do that? You know, when you’re locally right on site in Bentonville, but then also when you’re at your desk and you’re connecting across zoom or sending an email. And so I think it’s making sure that we understand that even with the advanced technology that machines is providing, are providing us, you know, the opportunity to grow in that way. We still, as people have a need to connect. We still have to have that to be able to grow forward and to do the jobs that we want to do every day.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. I think an unintended consequence of all of this digital connection and the reliance on digital communications has really hurt a generation when it comes to, like you were saying, even just playing and the ability to have a conflict and resolve it without things escalating or being super sensitive about issues and being able to be resilient and not and feel and not feel like you have to be on eggshells like those kind of communication skills that we learned, you know, in a chaotic way as children, I think are being lost in a lot of places. And then you get into a more of a high stakes world where it’s your job at stake and things like that, and they don’t know how to cope with just some of this stuff. And, and it’s really a gift you’re giving them to be able to teach them how to kind of navigate this world. And it’s a shame that they’re having to learn it, you know, you know, ten, 15, 20 years after, they probably could have learned it.

Amber Cabral: Absolutely. I do think, too, like some of it is just the the language that we use and the overabundance of information around certain things. It’s like everything is therapy, language now, you know, and I when I open up a conversation about resilience, you know, people think I mean, knowing how to be tough and take it on the chin. And it’s like, that’s not exactly what resilience is asking you to do. What resilience is asking you to do is make sure that you’re getting what you need so that when you encounter a tough circumstance, you have the ability and the skill to navigate it. So I’ve gotten what I needed in terms of making sure I have the skill set to communicate. So when I encounter a tough conversation, I’m not saying it won’t be hard or it won’t be uncomfortable, but I have the tools that I need to get through it. People, I think, frame resilience now as like, you know, having to take it or, you know, just muscling through and it’s like, no, there’s there’s another layer to that. It’s making sure that you know why your body needs rest, you know, so you aren’t exhausted, you know, so you have the ability to have the strength that you need to do some of the tough stuff that comes along.

Amber Cabral: It’s making sure that you’re moving your body so that you have the physical ability to navigate some of the tough stuff that comes along. And so it’s I think that there’s also, in addition to the challenges we have with just communicating in general, it is the volume of information that is available and the way some of that is weaponized. You know, it’s almost like we have people that are like, oh, that’s uncomfortable. And so now you’re crossing my boundaries and it’s like, no, like, this is uncomfortable is a part of the way that we get through life. And if we are unwilling to do the basics of discomfort, there are a lot of things that we’re going to be behind on, including how we connect and build friendships and, you know, avoid being lonely and find partners and all of those things outside of, you know, the workplace.

Lee Kantor: Is there a story you can share about don’t name the name of the company or the organization, but maybe they the challenge they came to you with and how you were able to help them get to a new level?

Amber Cabral: Yes. Um, well, let me think about that one that I feel like that I can share in a relatively short frame. So I’ll just say, say it this way. I think a lot of, uh, retail organizations are challenged by some of the same things. When you think about a retail organization, most folks consider just the store experience because a lot of us are consumers. But with a retailer, you also have, you know, the Home office, you or the in-office side of the business. You know, the folks that are the buyers for the business, the folks that are, you know, doing all the HR stuff and, you know, the things that are not necessarily happening right there on the ground in a store. And what happens very often with retailers is that that home office in office population has one experience, and that on the ground, navigating customers every day group has a different experience. And so one of the things I am often asked to do is help our in-office employees and staff know how to better connect to what the experience is in the stores. And so what I do is kind of build a bit of a program depending on what the organization is, where they’re located, what they sell.

Amber Cabral: You know, all of those things play a part, but the objective is to intentionally make sure that we’re giving that home office population the tools to be able to connect to a group of folks who essentially have a completely different skill set, and also encounter a completely different set of things. They’re dealing with angry customers. They’re seeing the politicization of whatever’s happening in, you know, our, uh, social atmosphere in a much more personal one on one way, they’re knowing what it looks like when folks come into the store frustrated or angry. And so there are some skills and some tactics that have to be built by that population that are very different than the skills that are built by the Home Office population and vice versa. And so what I will usually do is come in and build a series of learning experiences. And I if I if, if allowed, also actual in-person immersion experiences that help both sides of the business be able to better understand each other, communicate about what’s happening and have the resilience to support whatever changes need to be made so that the business can function more effectively.

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

Amber Cabral: Um, I’m always open to more clients and customers and business. Um, I would like more of that at any point. Um, I also have a podcast. My podcast is called Human Inkwell. And what Human Inkwell is aiming to do is make sure that folks have some of the skills that we’ve talked about in this conversation so that we can show up in our workplaces and play spaces and life spaces with more resilience. We have a lot less, you know, honking and middle fingers when we’re driving down the road and a bit more grace and patience as we do that. Um, so Humaning well is aiming to help us be able to live better in that way. Um, so yeah, the two of those, that’s probably all I’m ever looking for is more folks to lean in. And, you know, if you’re struggling with how your organization is experiencing psychological safety or resilience or inclusion or equity or any of those kinds of things, communication, definitely tap in. Um, happy to help support on that side if you’re looking for coaching that’s available. But also if you’re just looking to learn, you can always go and tune in to the podcast.

Lee Kantor: And then that ideal client you mentioned, retail. Is there a niche that you serve or a size company that is ideal for you.

Amber Cabral: I work with I have worked from fortune one on down so there is not a specific size organization. Most of the organizations that I work with are actually fortune ranked. So um, probably the fortune 200 are most of my clients, but we work with itty bitty tiny nonprofits as well. So if you are an organization that we can serve, we’re happy to chime in and lean in where we can.

Lee Kantor: And if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team or find the podcast, what is the website? What’s the best way to connect?

Amber Cabral: The best way to connect is to go to Amber comm. That’s a m b e r c a b l.com.

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

Amber Cabral: Thank you so much for having me. This was a great conversation.

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

Building Trust, Shaping Perception: A PR Masterclass

by

High Velocity Radio
High Velocity Radio
Building Trust, Shaping Perception: A PR Masterclass
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On this episode of High Velocity, host Lee Kantor sits down with Jill Lublin, a world-renowned publicity expert, international speaker, and 4x best-selling author. With 25+ years of experience and over 100,000 clients served, Jill shares her proven formulas for media attention, visibility, and sales growth that have put her on stages with icons like Tony Robbins and Barbara Corcoran.

Jill Lublin is a 25+ year Media Magnet. She is a world-renowned publicity expert, international speaker and 4x Best Selling author. She has made thousands of stage appearances alongside celebrities such as Tony Robbins, Barbara Corcoran and Jack Canfield, to name a few.

She has worked with over 100,000 clients implementing her signature formula for getting media attention, creating next-level visibility in the marketplace that results in boosted sales.

These lead and profit generating formulas are included in her signature program, the Media Mastery Intensive and her monthly Kindness Circles.

Connect with Jill on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Public relations
  • Secret sauce formula for creating a great media script
  • ROI on publicity – visibility, credibility, and lasting influence

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. So excited to introduce our guest today. 25 plus year Veteran of Public Relations Jill Lublin. Welcome.

Jill Lublin: Thank you so much, Lee. Glad to be here.

Lee Kantor: Well, I am so excited to learn about what you’re up to. Before we get too far into things for folks who aren’t maybe crystal clear about PR and public relations, can you kind of define some terms? Because there has been a blurring of the lines between advertising, marketing, digital public relations. Can you, you know, maybe define some terms for us?

Jill Lublin: You got it. So the real definition I have of public relations is that it happens from the minute you walk out your door. What do I mean by that? Listen, it’s all public relations now. What I’m talking about specifically is getting in radio, on TV, in blogs, on podcasts, on magazines, newspapers, like traditional media, but also you controlling your media, like doing your own LinkedIn lives and Facebook lives and Instagram lives, etc.. Tiktok. When you control your publicity. But what I am going to also tell you is it’s not social media and it’s not advertising because you don’t pay for it. It’s free and that’s super great about media.

Lee Kantor: So are you finding what have you seen kind of trend wise as you’ve gone throughout your 25 plus year career? 25 years ago, it was pretty clear there were kind of lines of delineation. And now there to me, there is kind of a more of a ambiguous ambiguity around what’s going on.

Jill Lublin: So in terms of, you know, what I tell you is the clarity about public relations. Is it earned media? It elevates your expertise. It creates that visibility factor and credibility and frankly, builds trust in the marketplace because you’re the expert that they are interviewing. That’s powerful.

Lee Kantor: And then when people are working with you, what does that kind of relationship look like? What are the some of the things you’re helping them do more and do better?

Jill Lublin: So one of the things that I’m big on is get a great message, because what the media cares about is your message and how it applies to their listeners, readers and viewers. So you have to be clear with the message and make it stand out. You know, make it interesting and important.

Lee Kantor: So getting clarity around kind of the message and the why behind what you do.

Jill Lublin: Exactly, exactly that kind of stuff. Exactly.

Lee Kantor: Now what types of clients do you typically work with? Are you kind of industry agnostic or do you have specialty?

Jill Lublin: I love industry agnostic. That’s fun. But I will tell you, my general specialty is what I call small business owners. And that could be people, you know, in multiple fields. They could be in real estate or chiropractors. But I’ve also been brought into bigger firms to help manage the message and create one that works. Mostly, though, I work with entrepreneurs and small business owners.

Lee Kantor: Now, in part of your work, you’re trying to give them some authority and position them as an expert.

Jill Lublin: Exactly what I’m trying to do, not only trying to do, but we do it. So the question is, you know, what are you an expert in? And then creating a zoomed in focus, so to speak, like, okay, that’s what works. And then giving them an opportunity to pitch the media in a way that, you know, the media says yes to you. That’s important. And that’s the type of things that I’m doing now.

Lee Kantor: When you’re working with somebody, maybe in a business that maybe they themselves don’t feel like kind of as sexy, maybe you’re working with a CPA or, um, a consultant or somebody in professional services. How do you kind of help them, uh, create a level of expertise or specialty around what they’re doing?

Jill Lublin: So part of it is I want to look at what is it, um, frankly, that you get paid for, right. How do you earn your revenue? And then we want to focus the message on, uh, creating a campaign that focuses on what’s the problem today? I always like to zoom in on that first. Like, what’s the problem out there that this expert solves? So I was just on the line with a psychologist, and we were talking about stress in today’s chaotic world. And she is a solution for that. And that’s what I’m talking about. Um, made a big difference for how she’s going out there, even though she has a very specific specialty. We broaden in her case, broaden the expertise. And again, it just made a big difference.

Lee Kantor: Should you be an expert in kind of one targeted thing, or can you be an expert and then bring in kind of, uh, an explanation on how your expertise helps in that case of, say, stress or, or whatever the issue of the day is?

Jill Lublin: Well, I think it is good to start out with one main focus, I’ll call it what’s the main focus? And, and then, uh, your specialty, we can dive deeper. And then if that doesn’t work, I have, I have one other, uh, shall we say go to and that that’s to use everything you’ve got. So, for instance, I have a business consultant, and, uh, she does a lot around communication and how to speak better and communicate better in business. Of course. And guess what? Um, we’re getting great PR, and because she’s a black woman, we shifted for Black History Month. Her her actual approach, which is how to be a powerful black woman and communicate well in today’s times. Now, that still has to do with what she does, right? But it’s a little bit different. And so I just want people to hear that sometimes we do a I’d like to call it use everything you’ve got story and um, all parts of who you are. And sometimes we use expertise and, and we want to see what, what’s working and of course do what works and do more of it.

Lee Kantor: Now do you sometimes after talking with your client for a period of time, you uncover maybe a secret sauce that they didn’t realize that they had?

Jill Lublin: Yes, I’m really good at that. And I love kind of digging in there and and finding out about people’s stories like the story is really what the media loves. You know what’s in it for them? Why should they care? Um, and how does it help their listeners, readers and viewers? Does that make sense?

Lee Kantor: Right. So it sounds like you’re really trying to be empathetic around what are the needs of the media, because that’s the person you’re kind of courting.

Jill Lublin: Exactly. You got it.

Lee Kantor: Now, when you’re working with your clients, do you help them kind of develop this dream list of ideal media outlets or, um, is there kind of a list and you just kind of blast them with. This is the press release I developed, like like how how much of this is kind of mass marketing and how much is it? Is it as really targeted?

Jill Lublin: Well, I like to target generally like my question is based on what you do, what what are your clients reading, watching and listening to. And that’s where we’ll focus, you know. So if they’re reading USA today, if they’re reading and they’re listening to particular podcasts, if they have special interests, if they’re reading, you know, Forbes and Inc., I mean, an entrepreneur magazine, we want to know what are they reading or watching and listening to.

Lee Kantor: And then how do you figure that out?

Jill Lublin: Well, part of it is let’s see if you’re serving, uh, like this psychologist I just told you about. She does actually serve mostly women, mostly in a certain age range. So. Okay, great. We’re going to go after women’s magazines. We’re going to focus on International Women’s Day, you see. So now we can start drilling down based on what. And you know what I like to say. Why should people care now?

Lee Kantor: How do you kind of, um, leverage all of these kind of, uh, the, the owned media that you kind of alluded to earlier where anybody can be the media nowadays. How do you kind of, uh, get your people involved in the conversation in all of the kind of influencers out there doing all this great stuff in a variety of places like Instagram, TikTok and YouTube and things like that?

Jill Lublin: Well, again, I want to just repeat social media is not publicity. I mean, it’s kind of sometimes a one hit wonder. I’m not opposed to it. I think it’s important as an overall part of your brand. I just don’t want people to rely on social media. Publicity is free. It’s it’s the things you pick up. It has a probability factor that lasts forever, frankly, versus sort of, uh, did somebody see your post today? That’s why I don’t love social media. I think integrated is important. You integrate it. Great. Um, but don’t rely on it. So what I love about the power of publicity is that is it’s going to last you a long, much longer time. And, you know, that’s good news. Uh, and that’s therein lies some of the difference.

Lee Kantor: So then your focus is in more of the traditional media outlets, like you mentioned, magazines, uh, you know, newspapers and radio, TV, things like that.

Jill Lublin: Um, so, yes, radio, TV podcasts are really good.

Lee Kantor: So, okay, so you’ve added podcasts to the list of more traditional, even though that’s relatively new in that.

Jill Lublin: Exactly.

Lee Kantor: And then, um, the strategy when you’re working in that area, so you’re targeting the ones that are appropriate for your clients, and then you’re helping them craft a message that resonates with, uh, those platforms in order to help them be included in whatever the those platforms are working on.

Jill Lublin: Exactly. That’s it. It’s focusing in on what’s going to best serve? What’s going to drive people to you now?

Lee Kantor: Um, so but it isn’t you’re not eliminating social media altogether, but you’re just not emphasizing it as much as some people are.

Jill Lublin: Exactly, exactly. And the truth is, everything we do, you can actually use in social media around the message, right? And I think that that makes a big difference.

Lee Kantor: Now because the the media platforms you’re working on are earned. Um, how do you kind of manage the expectations of the client? Because obviously all you could do is present the, um, client to these platforms, but there’s no guarantee that they’ll appear there. So how do you kind of manage what is possible and what’s realistic and what is actually happening?

Jill Lublin: So, you know, part of it is absolutely managing expectations. You know, again, it’s a little bit I call why should people care and making it so that people are connected, um, to your message and appreciate your message. And so that that makes a big difference. Um, and so what we want to do is, is zoom in on the most should I maybe call it easiest message that we can quickly get to people and that people will say yes to.

Lee Kantor: And but a deliverable back to your client could be like, uh, an article somewhere. And then there’s a quote from your client.

Jill Lublin: Yes. Not only a quote, but really hopefully more of an interview.

Lee Kantor: So the the ideal is an interview, but I mean, there’s quotes from experts in articles regularly that seems like a more likely scenario.

Jill Lublin: Yes. It tends to be a good scenario with, um, the quotes. But also, you know, depends if the, the piece is all about them. I mean, obviously if they’re in a podcast or a radio show, the segment is all about them and they’re not usually long segments. It’s short segments. And, you know, most media interviews, you’re talking 4 to 6 minute interviews, um, you know, in terms of just how that tends to work.

Lee Kantor: And then when, uh, okay, let’s talk about podcasting a little. So do you help kind of prepare them for the podcast? You do role play. You kind of get them prepped.

Jill Lublin: Uh, we role play, we focus on practicing the message. I, you know, watch everything from voice tone to how do they look on camera. So yes, it’s all around helping them get, you know, well, um, well qualified and feel confident because confidence makes a big difference.

Lee Kantor: And a great way to feel confident is kind of practicing it and not just showing up and hoping you’ll figure it out on the fly.

Jill Lublin: Yes, exactly.

Lee Kantor: Now, how important, um, is it for your client to be able to share kind of anecdotes or stories of success?

Jill Lublin: Um, I think it’s important. I think you want to tell people some great stories about what has happened with your clients and, you know, really, um, brag in a nice way. I’m not talking ego. I’m talking about sharing your success. And that’s a good thing.

Lee Kantor: And especially if you can share your success in a way that either you’re giving advice or you’re sharing how you solved a problem.

Jill Lublin: Exactly.

Lee Kantor: And and those are kind of subtle distinctions. But, I mean, I interview people all the time, and some people are, you know, there’s different levels of how well they can handle that.

Jill Lublin: Exactly. You got it.

Lee Kantor: And so but that’s, that’s why I see the value of working with some expert like you, where you can help prepare these people for the moments so that they are well prepared and well practiced at having kind of these conversations and discussions that elevate and illuminate what they do in an elegant manner, rather than a kind of pitchy or clumsy manner.

Jill Lublin: Exactly what we’re doing. You got it.

Lee Kantor: So now, is there a story you can share about how you were able to work with somebody and kind of, um, solve their problem, give them the exposure they needed to get to a new level.

Jill Lublin: Yes. I actually had a wonderful client. Ryan and Ryan had seen me speak, and I’m like, he’s like, I want to work with you. I’m like, great, Ryan, what do you do? He told me that he, uh, is an instructional designer. And I have to tell you, I didn’t know what that was. I said, no offense. Once he told me, uh, it’s not going to work from a PR perspective. Tell me something interesting about you. Then he told me his story about, uh, his pregnant wife with their third child on the way. He told me he just bought a big house in Northern California. Oh my gosh. You know, can you imagine? Now he’s got a big mortgage, he’s got a pregnant wife, and he’d just been fired from his job. I’m like Ryan, oh my gosh, what did you do? He said, well, I started my own business and literally online. He had eight employees at once, you know, doing instructional design. I thought, well, now that’s interesting. That’s interesting. Uh, and with that, he ended up, well, getting an entrepreneur magazine using everything he’s got, like I told you about before because he’s Asian American. We got we translated an article, put him into the Chinese Times. He got $7,000 worth of business from one article in the Chinese Times, his web. His business actually grew by 45%. Using the power of publicity. And he got featured in Entrepreneur magazine, in Mac Home Journal, in lots of media publications that were huge, that really supported him to grow his business, to fill his pipeline, and frankly, to have a very successful consulting business now. And I’m going to tell you, when he came to me, he had no clients. He had just been, like I said, fired from his job. Well, actually downsized now, you know, that’s scary stuff. Using the power of publicity literally grew his business from zero to a very thriving consulting business.

Lee Kantor: Now, you mentioned the everything you’ve got strategy. Can you share a little bit about, um, some of the places to look for everything you got?

Jill Lublin: Yeah. Um, well, first of all, start with your ethnicity, your religion. Start with being a man or a woman because there’s International Women’s Day, for example. There’s Father’s Day if you’re a father or Mother’s Day if you’re a mother. Um, I have a business consultant who has a son who’s autistic. And we use National Autism Day, for example, to focus in and use everything she’s got.

Lee Kantor: Now, what about around, uh, um, kind of their specialty. Can you describe some of the, uh, questions you asked them in order to kind of, uh, dig layers deep to find all that they offer that maybe they’re taking for granted.

Jill Lublin: Uh, well, a couple things. Um, I think, you know, sometimes it’s so interesting that we forget the obvious things about who we are. You know, could be religion. I have a woman who’s a Christian woman. Now we have three opportunities to go into press, which is Christian Women’s press, women’s press. Right. And Christian press. That’s three media opportunities. She had never thought about using her religion before. My Jewish clients may go into Jewish publications that exist all around the the world, basically. What more can you be using that perhaps you’ve never thought of before? Could be your personal story. And again, you know, sometimes the obvious, um, like I remember in my media mastering intensive, I was looking across the screen at a woman. I said, May I ask you your ethnicity? And she said, I’m Filipino. I said, great, would you be willing to use that? She goes, absolutely, absolutely. I’ll use everything I’ve got. And, uh, by using her Filipino heritage, we were able to get her into the Filipino, uh, Business Journal for top 30 under 30 digital marketing agencies, which is what she was growing, which is why she wanted publicity. Guess what? That publicity grew. Her digital marketing agency got her leads, prospects and clients and actually got her a major speaking engagement with Les Brown. That was one of her dreams. She wanted to do that because she sent him the publicity and he was like, whoa, you must be good, right?

Lee Kantor: And when it comes to kind of, um, media attention, it’s not a bad idea to start small, right? And kind of work your way up the ladder and just start accumulating a portfolio of media appearances that then you can send to the Les Browns of the world so they can see a pile of, of, uh, media rather than one single thing.

Jill Lublin: Um, yes. And you just start wherever you start, whatever you get first. It’s a good thing. Put it out there, let people know about it and start publicizing your publicity is what I call it. Everything. Everything is important.

Lee Kantor: But you want it to build, right? Like it’s a compounding effect?

Jill Lublin: Yes, it is, but I’m just saying you start wherever you start, and it’s a great thing.

Lee Kantor: And, um, how do you kind of deliver some of the services? Is it just people hire you to get media attention, or do you coach people? Do you have, um, workshops? Like, I know you have books. Uh, how do people kind of receive your different services?

Jill Lublin: Yeah. Well, what you can do is start with, I’ve created a free gift for all of your listeners, and it’s a publicity action guide with great more publicity tips. Plus, guess what? A live, interactive class on zoom with me, where you get to ask all of your publicity questions and check it out. It’s Jill.

Lee Kantor: Uh, and then they can go there, they can get the information and, and, uh, participate in that, uh, live event.

Jill Lublin: Yeah, exactly. You got it.

Lee Kantor: Well, Jill, that’s very generous. Thank you for doing that.

Jill Lublin: You’re so welcome.

Lee Kantor: And is that the best way to, um, just kind of learn more about you if even if they don’t want. The guide is Jill Lublin the place to go? Just to learn more about what you got going on.

Jill Lublin: You got it. Jill Lublin. Com.

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

Jill Lublin: Thank you for having me, Lee.

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

Scaling Smarter: The Power of EOS

by

High Velocity Radio
High Velocity Radio
Scaling Smarter: The Power of EOS
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On this episode of High Velocity, host Lee Kantor talks with Adam, a Certified EOS Implementer® who helps entrepreneurial teams gain clarity, traction, and results. From surviving the crash of 2001 to scaling and selling a company, to doubling businesses with EOS, Adam shares how this proven system transforms entrepreneurs’ biggest challenges into sustainable growth

Honest Coaching with a Caring Heart.

Adam Kaplan helps entrepreneurial leadership teams gain clarity, traction, and results by combining strategic vision with operational rigor and deep emotional intelligence. As a Certified EOS Implementer®, he guides teams to cut through complexity, focus on what truly matters, and build sustainable systems that drive growth.

He has seen the highs and lows of entrepreneurship. The low – 2001. The economy turns, and the fast growing company he’s working for closes virtually overnight.

The high – 2011. He helped run and sell a fast growing dental services business to a Private Equity firm for a great price.

Next, he started his own recruiting company and was struggling to gain Traction in it – until in 2014 a client introduced him to EOS. He doubled his business in three years under EOS. He then brought EOS into another company, which doubled its customers in one year.

In 2021, after seeing the power of EOS, a complete and proven system, with simple and practical tools, he decided to become an EOS implementer to share that system with other entrepreneurs.

Connect with Adam on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Aligning teams so everyone rows in the same direction
  • Gaining control over business growth and daily operations
  • Building healthier teams with stronger accountability
  • Applying simple, practical tools to strengthen the business right away

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show, we have Adam Kaplan, who is an EOS implementer and a Business Coach. Welcome.

Adam Kaplan: Thanks. Great to be here.

Lee Kantor: I am so excited to be talking to you, because I’m a big fan of EOS, and I would love for you to explain to the folks listening, just kind of EOS and the macro view, you know, talk about the process and how you help people through it.

Adam Kaplan: Okay, sure. Yeah. So EOS is a business operating system basically designed to help the entrepreneur reduce stress, control chaos, and put out fires. Business run a better business. Build a better life. Live a better life. Go on vacation. Have fun again.

Lee Kantor: So what’s your backstory? How’d you get involved with them?

Adam Kaplan: Well, um, I’ve been an entrepreneur since, uh, the early 2000. I’ve seen the highs and lows, uh, being an entrepreneur. The low happened, um, 2001 internet bubble burst. I’m building a company. Poof. It’s gone overnight. And then, uh, ten years later, I hit the high. I sold the business to Morgan Stanley. Private equity. And really, nothing much had changed because I was running my business on grit and hustle, making things up. And then in 2014, I was running my recruiting firm, and the client introduced me to EOS. Finally had a system to run my business better. Doubled it in three years did that in another business. So I knew that iOS wasn’t a one trick pony. And, uh, for the last four years, I’ve been coaching entrepreneurs on the system so that they don’t have to suffer through what I suffered through.

Lee Kantor: So was that a difficult decision? Uh, I know you got two CEOs in action as a customer of iOS, but was it hard for you to say, okay, I’m going to kind of go all in now and basically pay for iOS, uh, to be part of that team and then to kind of get into iOS business.

Adam Kaplan: You want to know how that happened?

Lee Kantor: Yeah, I mean, I from what you’re telling me, I’m hearing that you were, uh, you know, you were kind of being coached by us and was learning how to utilize it, but then to get into iOS business and then, you know, do that for other people, that’s a different thing.

Adam Kaplan: That’s true. Yeah. I had a I have a friend in the community named Eric Perkins. And basically, I was talking to him on the phone and, uh, early November 2021, and he’s like, dude, you should become an EOS implementer. And, uh, kind of, uh, you know, the light bulb went off and, uh, three weeks later, I was getting training.

Lee Kantor: So so it was one of those things where, since you were using it and having such success, you were like, look, I’m going to be able to sell this to other people. I’m already. I’m living it.

Adam Kaplan: That’s true. I mean, honestly, EOS sells itself. If you’re the person who needs it. I’m no master salesperson. It’s the system that does the heavy lifting.

Lee Kantor: So kind of. What’s the pain for someone that’s out there, uh, where, uh, hiring you would be the the right move.

Adam Kaplan: Um. Well.

Adam Kaplan: You know, they’re struggling with people problems. They don’t feel like they’re in control of their business. They’re working more hours for less pay. Um, I mentioned the vacation thing earlier. That’s a telltale sign. Um, it’s typically not a startup. Anything kind of second stage and beyond. Um, sometimes it’s, uh, uh, divisions within larger companies that are stuck, um, whenever the business is really stuck and it’s hit a ceiling and needs to break through that ceiling, uh, we can often help. Eos can help.

Lee Kantor: So what’s it like? Okay, I raise my hand. My business is kind of plateauing. I’m frustrated. I’m not taking vacations, I contact Adam. What happens next?

Adam Kaplan: Well, um, we need to talk. Right. Because, um, even though you’re struggling in the business, doesn’t mean that you’re a good fit for iOS. Um, you would be someone who, um, has kind of tried all the tools and the tricks and have been running the Lee Kantor business system, and that’s just not working anymore. So you have to be open to implementing something new. Um, also, you have to be coachable. One health want to do it with a team and not by yourself. And be willing to delegate and elevate to your unique ability, and let other people do what they’re good at.

Lee Kantor: And then how do you kind of vet me and discern if I’m a good fit?

Adam Kaplan: Um.

Adam Kaplan: Well, you know, I’m kind of picking you, and you’re kind of picking me, right? So you’re picking me to see if. Hey, is Adam going to be the right coach for me? To help me get what I want for my business? And I’m kind of vetting you? Are you going to do the work? Are you going to be committed to the system and follow through with it? Commit to the two plus year journey on implementing it. So it’s it’s it’s, um, you know, and it’ll be based on a conversation that we’ll have. And then I’ll, I’ll meet with, um, you and your leadership team as well to see if it’s a fit.

Lee Kantor: Now, you mentioned a two year journey. Is there how long does it take before I see some kind of clues that this is going to work, or I’m on the right track?

Adam Kaplan: It’s a good question. I mean, it kind of depends. Each company is different. Um, there are three foundational days that we do in the first 90 days. Um, I would expect that every that pretty much every company is going to see some change for the better within 90 days. Some see a more dramatic change depending on, uh, some of the people decisions maybe they’ve made in the first 90 days. Um, for some it might be more dramatic, some might be less dramatic. On average, about after 90 days, you’re going to see some improvement. And then, um, depending on where your business is, how strong it was going in, um, the more dramatic improvement after that.

Lee Kantor: Now what is is there a story you can share maybe that illustrates a challenge the the company came to you with and how you were able to help them get to a new level? Obviously don’t name the name of the company, but the challenge that they were going through and how you were able to help them.

Adam Kaplan: Um, I am going to name the company.

Lee Kantor: All right. Your call.

Adam Kaplan: So, um, there’s a company here in Michigan called Endo Corp, and, um, CEOs Najib Haddad taking, uh, family business to a whole other level. He’s very happy to share some of the ways that iOS has benefited him. He posted about it and his team. He posted about it on LinkedIn. Um, basically he was running the Jeep system, and, uh, iOS has allowed the business to scale in a much more purposeful and much more profitable way. So feel free to look up, um, Najib and a hadad h a d a d at Endo Corp, um, on LinkedIn. And you’ll, uh, you’ll see what he says.

Lee Kantor: But what was so what was his initial struggle, though, like when he came to you? What was he? He was just. It wasn’t working.

Adam Kaplan: He was?

Adam Kaplan: Yeah. He was running.

Adam Kaplan: The Jeep system. Um, he didn’t have all the right people in the right seats. Um, meetings were really chaotic. Didn’t have a clear plan for where to take the business. Um, didn’t really prioritize. Uh, had good people in some areas. Um, wasn’t really clear on who should be doing what. A lot of chaos, a lot of stress. Um, and now there’s, um, great clarity, systemized processes, gaining traction, solving issues. Great scorecard, clear vision.

Lee Kantor: Now, you mentioned kind of right people, right seats. And I know that, um, uh, your one of your kind of superpowers is recruiting. Can you talk about is there any advice you can share about kind of identifying who the right person is and making sure that, you know, that everybody’s aligned?

Adam Kaplan: Sure. So I ran and sold a recruiting company from 2011 to 2019. I’ve just gotten back into it, and the reason I’ve gotten back into it is because my clients are asking me for help. So it’s crazy out there, um, for many entrepreneurs to recruit top talent. Um, it’s very easy for people to apply for jobs. So companies are getting flooded with applications. Um, it’s hard for companies to assess the talent and the representation and what’s true and what’s not true. Um, so I would really suggest, if you’re an entrepreneur out there listening to this and you’re stuck with, you know, finding a leadership team member, or maybe you’ve made some bad hires, you know, really try and simplify the process and, uh, dig into what, what you need to do. So I believe there’s really only two things you need to put in the job description. It’s really simple your company’s core values and who you are basically like a one paragraph summary and the five major roles of the position. What do you truly need this person to do in this job and to perform to get 80% of the work done? That’s it. Don’t put other stuff in there. Don’t complicate it. People are just too busy. And also, um, try and, um, implement a system that helps you weed out, um, poor fit. So, um, the system values use AI, and they, they help you, they help tell you if the person, based on what you put in for the job description is a proper, um, talent, fit or not a talent fit. So that should help you weed out half or maybe more of the applicants, and then just get really clear with the entire leadership team about what you’re looking for. And then you need to have a good applicant tracking system. I have one that I think is great, and if anyone’s interested, you can reach out to me and I can kind of share what I use and how I use it.

Lee Kantor: And is, is recruiting something that entrepreneurs should be doing kind of all the time. So you, you have kind of a bench ready or is it something that you only need to break out when you need somebody?

Adam Kaplan: I mean, that’s a good question. You know, ideally you’re recruiting all the time, but because entrepreneurs are sitting in so many seats and they often don’t have a dedicated HR person, I don’t think it’s very realistic for fast growing, scaling entrepreneurial businesses, if you can. Yeah. You should always have your tentacles out for good people 100%, but you’re not going to hire someone unless you have a seat open for them in your company. So, um, yeah, keep your eyes out, but I don’t know how realistic it is in today’s world.

Lee Kantor: Now, if somebody, um, you mentioned AI a second ago, how how is AI impacting businesses today? Is it more of a distraction or are people using it more strategically?

Adam Kaplan: Um, I see a lot of people using it.

Adam Kaplan: Well, I’m not an AI expert, by the way. I mean, I can share some for recruiting. Let’s just finish that thought. Um, AI is just really good at matching data up, right? So if you put data in the job description and the candidate is put data in their application, AI is very good at kind of matching those and saying, is it a fit or not? Um, AI is also really good at summarizing a transcript. So zoom for example, you know, has AI built in that you can use the AI companion, and it could sum up your, uh, your call so you can get a good summary of that. If you enable it again, these things are really inexpensive. Um, the um, other some other benefits are really for brainstorming. Um, if you need to send important email, uh, I use ChatGPT Pro a lot. Like if I have an important email I need to send out, I will say, hey, ChatGPT, I you know, you know me, I’m Adam Kaplan. I’m trying to send an email to a client or a prospect. Uh, here’s what I want to communicate. Um, here are some points I want to get across. Here’s the tone I want to read or I want to achieve for this individual. Um, grab me a couple of emails I can look at and they’re going to come in draft 2 or 3 that are going to be pretty good, and then I’ll take it. I never send it as is. I always tweak it. I always put my voice on it, but it saves me time.

Lee Kantor: Are there any other tools that you use that can help business people?

Adam Kaplan: It depends. For for. What? Do you have a particular area in mind?

Lee Kantor: Well, I mean we’re talking about businesses that are struggling here. So. In what area do you find that most business people are struggling.

Adam Kaplan: So I mentioned kind of what I do with recruiting. That’s a big area with people. Um. You know, if you’re if you’re struggling in a business and, um, managing cash, like I had an entrepreneur in my office earlier this week. Um, didn’t really know what was coming in, didn’t really know what’s coming out. Um, there are definitely good cash flow forecasting tools, but you’ve got to have some of that expertise. You cannot be running blind. Um, in your business, you need to have a budget. Um, doesn’t have to be too complicated, honestly. Um, revenue, gross margin, you know, revenue, cost of sales, gross profit, um, expenses. Net profit. Like those five things that you need to know that every month, um, doesn’t have to be. Much more complicated than that. There’s a ton of, uh, books out there for that. Um. Systems out there for that. The profit first system, the one that’s good. And I like, um, also. You want to know yourself and know your team and hire. I like the.

Adam Kaplan: Colby.

Adam Kaplan: System. Colby. I use that a lot. My clients use that a lot. Um. Strength finders. Another one for, um, knowing people’s work style and, uh, also their strengths.

Lee Kantor: Now, is there, uh, you mentioned that, you know, you came from recruiting a little bit. Is that your niche? Um. Or do you work are you kind of industry agnostic in the people that you coach?

Adam Kaplan: I’m industry agnostic. It’s more about the people and what do they want? I really like ambitious visionaries that have a heart. They care about their people and want to grow. And usually there’s a mission behind it that’s more than just about, you know, making money. It might be to improve a community or serving God or, um. Doing something important in the world. Um, I’m more of a natural integrator. So I can even though as an entrepreneur. Um, so I connect really well with the visionaries that need someone like that to, um, hold them accountable and keep them on track.

Lee Kantor: And that’s an important distinction within EOS, the, um, the integrator and the visionary.

Adam Kaplan: Oh, yeah.

Adam Kaplan: Super important. Yeah. So the visionaries, often the founding entrepreneurs, a lot of great ideas. Um, they’re, uh, creative problem solver, very passionate, very focused on the culture, selling the integrators much more bottom line oriented PNL, typically much better at holding people accountable, managing the team, leading in the team based on, um. Uh, logic versus on emotion, which is what drives the visionary typically.

Lee Kantor: And then, uh, the distinction between what you’re doing, you’re not coming in to actually, you know, roll up your sleeves and do the work. You’re the coach that’s helping the entrepreneur and their team do the work, right. And that’s an important distinction between coaching and consulting.

Adam Kaplan: Very important distinction. Right. So if you want someone to come in there and tell you what to do, uh, that’s a consultant. That’s not me. If you want someone to make you and your team better empower you to lead your business than, um, I might be the guy for that.

Lee Kantor: And if somebody wants to learn more and connect with you and somebody on your team, what’s the best way to do that?

Adam Kaplan: Sure you can go on, go on the internet and look up Adam Caplan, EOS implementer. Um, and also, uh, reach out, email me, uh, Adam Caplan, it’s Adam k a n e s worldwide.

Lee Kantor: And then they can go to the EOS worldwide comm website and search for you there as well. And your name will pop up.

Adam Kaplan: Sure.

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

Adam Kaplan: I appreciate the opportunity. Thanks.

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

FrontHouz: Solving Hospitality’s Staffing Shortage with Tech & the Gig Economy

by

Atlanta Business Radio
Atlanta Business Radio
FrontHouz: Solving Hospitality’s Staffing Shortage with Tech & the Gig Economy
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In this episode of Atlanta Business Radio, host Lee Kantor sits down with Starr Douglas, Founder & CEO of an AI-powered staffing platform transforming the hospitality industry. Starr shares why the hourly labor market is broken, why hospitality was the right place to start, and how flexibility—not just pay—is key to solving staffing shortages. She also opens up about bold risks, customer insights, and what she’s optimizing for as a founder.

Starr Douglas is the founder and CEO of FrontHouz, an AI-powered on-demand staffing platform that connects hospitality venues with vetted front-of-house professionals, like bartenders and servers.

A Georgia Tech graduate based in Atlanta, she is passionate about using technology to innovate the future of work in hospitality.

FrontHouz addresses the hospitality industry’s persistent staffing shortages by tapping into the gig economy, helping restaurants, stadiums, and event venues find qualified staff quickly.

Connect with Starr on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • The hourly labor market is broken — and flexibility is the missing piece
  • Hospitality was the right first move, and it’s proving to work
  • Customers can’t live without quick, reliable staffing
  • Staffing shortages aren’t just about pay — flexibility matters too

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

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

Starr Douglas: Thanks, Lee. Happy to be here.

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

Starr Douglas: Yeah. So Fronthouz is the future of hospitality staffing. Our platform sources vets and uses AI to train hospitality professionals so that restaurants, restaurant managers can push a button and receive a fully trained, fully vetted staff member on demand.

Lee Kantor: And then what types of skills do you specialize in?

Starr Douglas: So we’re in the front of house in restaurants and event venues. So when I say the front of house, think guest facing roles like bartenders, servers, hosts, skilled positions of that nature.

Lee Kantor: So since they’re customer facing, how do you help train them so that they understand kind of the nuances of each of the specific places they’re going to go to work at?

Starr Douglas: Yeah. So every single restaurant or venue that we onboard our step one is to take a professional 360 degree virtual tour of their space, and we build this tour. Think of like one of those virtual tours you see when you’re Your online touring, some sort of real estate property, but we put that together. We label all those table numbers, and then we bring this to the top of the basically to do list for workers to study before they get there, so they can walk around, view all the table numbers, learn the access points. You know, this is table one. That’s table 19. This is the cabinet where the coghlan’s glasses live. So that’s step one. And then we collect training documents, think menus cocktail build sheets like ingredient lists, steps of service, any other information that’s used to train in-house staff that goes into our portal. And we use AI to analyze these documents and generate quizzes, assessments, any sort of knowledge check to make sure that the staff they’re studying and they’re comprehending this material.

Lee Kantor: So then the staff enters there for the first time. They kind of have the lay of the land a little bit.

Starr Douglas: Yeah, yeah. For the most part, it’s not a completely perfect process, but what we see happen most of the time is these workers will show up day one. They’ll have a very general understanding of the table numbers and the layout and the menu, how to upsell, how to make the drinks. But then through repetition and continuously picking up shifts at the same location, they’re able to really become just like an extension of the staff.

Lee Kantor: So it’s not or is it meant for the person who, okay, I got I need, you know, I’m triaging this bad situation and I got to put two bodies here for just a shift and that’s it. Is it for that or is it for somebody that. Okay, maybe I can get somebody in here and then they can eventually be more of a solution that will last a while, not just for this one problem I’m having today.

Starr Douglas: Yeah. So there are many different business cases on the the venue side. And we refer to all of our businesses as venues. So venues can have many different reasons to, to using us. Maybe it’s somebody calls out, maybe somebody no shows. Maybe they just they can’t find anybody who’s qualified to work at their specific location. Um, so in the amount that they use us, it could be every day. It could be a few times a week, a few times a month. It really depends on the business. But we’ve built this platform for the workforce because the hourly labor market is very different. It’s a very different landscape now post Covid, especially in hospitality. All these restaurant workers in 2020, they lost their jobs. And you know, they they now have a lack of job security, uh, knowing what could happen at any point in time. So Covid happened, they lost their jobs. And all of a sudden, where are they going to turn to because they still need to pay their bills. So we found that the vast majority of these, the workforce they entered, the freelance economy, the gig economy, and they started driving for DoorDash and delivering for Instacart companies like that. And the workers really enjoyed the freedom and the flexibility that those platforms offered. But at the same time, they knew that restaurants paid 2 to 3 times more on average. So we really took all the benefits of the freelance economy, applied it back to restaurants, and gave workers that freedom, the flexibility that they desire. And we pay them within, on average, 10s of clocking out. So we’ve built a solution for the workforce first, knowing that if we can optimize for them and build a solution that attracts the best workers, the best venues have no choice but to follow.

Lee Kantor: So. But it is a two sided marketplace.

Starr Douglas: Yes.

Lee Kantor: And then you just started first by optimizing for the worker.

Starr Douglas: Yes. We believe that by obsessing over the workers experience, we can create a very sustainable, long term solution that just delivers what the workforce wants. And then in turn, once. Once you’ve made the workforce happy, it becomes much easier to serve the business as well.

Lee Kantor: So now is your relationship with the worker just primarily they’re an app user, or are you kind of a temp agency? Um, that are helping them get gigs?

Starr Douglas: So we we actually have banned the word temp from our vocabulary at our platform. We are very far removed from the concept of temp labor, especially because of all the vetting that goes into, um, being an approved user on the platform. Um, I would say that the experience for the workers more on the the former, uh, of the two that you mentioned. So they’re a user of the app. There’s somebody who regularly logs in, sees what shifts, what gigs are available, and then they have 100% freedom and control to select any shift that they want to work.

Lee Kantor: But what if the person wants to hire them? The venue? And what if they want to hire them? Is that cool?

Starr Douglas: Yeah, we don’t charge any fees for that. The business is more than welcome, but we’ve what we’ve found by surveying our workers is that 92% of them say no amount of money, no full time job offer, whatever convinced them to return to full time W2 work because it’s just not how they want to work or live their lives anymore.

Lee Kantor: Now, what percent of the workforce wants that level of freedom compared to the percent that wants kind of more security in a full time or quote unquote, security in a full time job?

Starr Douglas: So looking at the general hourly workforce, it’s estimated that by 2027, 50% of the US workforce will in at least some capacity, be freelance. 91% of freelancers across the board say that no amount of money would convince them to return to a full time job. So it’s not just hospitality, Even though this is really a perfect use case for it. So our workers, we’ve surveyed them in 92% say they don’t want a full time W2 job anymore.

Lee Kantor: And the driver behind that is the freedom element.

Starr Douglas: The freedom, the fact that they don’t have any overbearing manager. Nobody’s setting their schedule. They get to to choose when they work, what shifts they want, and they are fully their own boss and they get to clock out, um, and get paid within seconds in full.

Lee Kantor: Now, um, so tell us about kind of the early days, the genesis of the idea. Like, how did this come to you?

Starr Douglas: Well, I lived the the problem from both sides. I was a bartender, but I eventually was also a bar manager and beverage director. And I experienced the pain as the worker, you know, wanting to have more flexibility, wanting the particular schedule that I wanted. And I, I was always very independent. I wanted to do my own thing and not be micromanaged. And I also loved the concept of going and bartending at a dozens of different places across the city. And that’s what I had done in college. So that was very appealing to me and my other coworkers around me at the time. But then when I was a manager and director. Wow. It was such a crazy period, especially during and post Covid. I couldn’t keep staff behind my bar to save my life. I kept losing them to DoorDash and Uber and I figured, well, why couldn’t I do something about this? You know, every day I was told by the the owners or the operators that this is just the way it’s always been. Turnover is just something that you have to live with and figure out a way around and just suffer those costs. And I figured with all the new technology out these days, why not make something that could change that? So I was actually finishing up my last year at Georgia Tech at the time, and I was sitting in class and I was in between, uh, going to two different jobs.

Starr Douglas: I had just come from my day job. I was about to leave for my night job. I was pretty busy at the time, and I was just sitting there dreading what I was about to walk into because I was supposed to be managing the bar, but I knew that I was going to have to bartend because I wouldn’t have staff. And there was a guy sitting in front of me, and he had his laptop open and I could see what he was doing. I was actually pretty tuned in to what he was typing, and he was searching on Google how to find and book a bartender for some sort of party. And I was just thinking in my head like, man, if only it was that simple. And then I thought, well, why couldn’t it be? Why couldn’t I create a platform as intuitive and as easy to use as a DoorDash or an Uber and instead bring all those benefits to restaurant workers? So that was the genesis.

Lee Kantor: So then did you were you went to Georgia Tech? Did you know how to code and build the platform?

Starr Douglas: Uh, yes. I studied computer science and Business Administration at Georgia Tech, but the platform was built by my CTO.

Lee Kantor: So you found a kind of a partner early on?

Starr Douglas: Yeah. A wonderful technical partner. I’ve always been more focused on the business side, you know, being there in the weeds.

Lee Kantor: The front of the house.

Starr Douglas: Yeah, exactly. I love being in there and and making sure that the customer experience, when I say customer, I mean the venues and the workers making sure that it is smooth, it’s flawless. And, you know, there’s so many things that you have to account for when you’re dealing with humans and automating, uh, human scenarios and things that can happen in life. So being out there in the field and just spending time with our different stakeholders and optimizing our operations, that’s really been, uh, one of my areas strategy, growth, business development and product strategy, helping guide, you know, take that feedback and then guide where we’re going to go on our technological roadmap.

Lee Kantor: So, uh, I would imagine you build some, um, minimum viable product first and then, uh, kind of tested it with a venue.

Starr Douglas: Yes. And in the very early days, it was me I was going around and I was seeing what it took for me to learn those training documents up front. And then I’d go and I’d work the shift. I’d go bartend, I’d go serve, I’d host. And it was a ton of learning and a ton of great relationships built along the way.

Lee Kantor: So did you, um, what was it like when you, you know, left it out into the wild? Um, like, did you I’m sure you had some venues that agreed to pilot, and then you were looking for people to be kind of the guinea pigs to go through the training and start working.

Starr Douglas: Yeah, yeah. And we always thought that it would be more difficult to bring on the worker side, but it ended up being the easiest part because the workforce is so ready for this. So what we did was we put out some some ads and we were able to bring workers into our application funnel. And from there, you know, they’re they’re jumping through a lot of hoops to be a part of the platform. Work experience verification, professional reference checks, identity verification, skills based tests, personality assessments, virtual interviews, the whole nine yards. So we can really get a good sense of who they are, their experience, their personality, which are both so equally important in the front of house. So we get these workers onto the platform and then just let them loose and see what breaks, see what we need to do to fix it. And what was really interesting was that we didn’t spend a ton of time nor money on marketing or these ads, but we ended up pretty soon, or pretty early on, having a wait list of over 20,000 workers who wanted to work through us.

Lee Kantor: Now are they? Does each one of them have to go through all of those checks and take all those assessments? Because that cost has to be, um, kind of substantial? I would imagine.

Starr Douglas: Every single one of them has to take the same testing, all the application requirements. Um, we’re we pride ourselves on adding more friction intentionally to our registration because we, we really want the best, the best workers who are willing to stick it out, knowing that there are rewards if they do and they do a great job. Um, as far as cost, all of that is actually automated. Thanks to our incredible CTO. We have a very robust technology stack, and our software automates the entire registration process from start to finish.

Lee Kantor: So there’s no fee for the worker.

Starr Douglas: For the worker, no, there is no fee to them.

Lee Kantor: So when 20,000 people on board, all of those costs are just absorbed by the platform.

Starr Douglas: So the only cost that we incur at this moment is for identity verification. It’s about a dollar and that’s per person. But the workers don’t pay any pay anything to apply. And the only fees come out of subscription fees for the venue side. And then actual shifts worked. But again, that’s all being charged to the to the venue. Workers keep 100% of what they earn, and there’s no fee for them to join front House or apply.

Lee Kantor: Right. So the venue is the one that’s paying the bill, as they should for the worker they need.

Starr Douglas: Yes, correct.

Lee Kantor: And then, um, so you didn’t have a problem getting workers. The so was it more talk about kind of educating the um, the venues in order to try this? The, the need sounds kind of desperate. So I don’t know how much education it would take. I just I guess they would have to believe you know, your promise. But, um, was once you started getting some success there, then I would imagine it probably quickly. Word of mouth spread.

Starr Douglas: Yeah. Word of mouth has been a huge driver for us in referrals. The venue side to get them to trust us. We it was an interesting scenario. We had to do a lot manually at first to have confidence in our numbers. So what I mean by that we have a we’ve averaged a 99% shift fulfillment rate. We filled 99% shifts successfully to date. And across all those shifts, our average star rating for our workforce is 4.95 out of five. So we needed to build that up and, you know, reach, scale and optimize our operations. And we made some really great early partners who were trusting of us. But now it’s at a point where our numbers are very strong and we know them very well. We track our data in the most intense way you can possibly imagine. And, um, just leveraging those numbers and our past success, it’s pretty easy to at least get a company to to try us out, to see it for themselves. And once they do, you know, it’s it’s pretty much a no brainer. It works. It works really well.

Lee Kantor: Now, now those numbers sound like they’d be better than what they were getting with kind of their traditional hiring.

Starr Douglas: Yeah, the traditional hiring process, especially for hospitality, which is really the only industry that I can speak to, um, specifically to this, but the average cost to, uh, well, to turn over an employee is roughly about $6,000 in hospitality and especially the post Covid world. So many restaurant owners and managers, they’re getting stood up on interviews. And I was reading something the other day. There were 25 interviews scheduled. Only two of them showed up and only one of them was even a possible candidate to be hired. So it’s it’s weeks, if not months of spinning wheels and spending money and, uh, you know, churning out dollars through, indeed, ads and just kind of seeing what you get. And at that point, when you finally find somebody who’s decent enough to to take the job, then they’re turning around and quitting in in days, if not weeks.

Lee Kantor: So, Ken, venues just kind of, um, outsource all their employees to you. Has that happened?

Starr Douglas: It’s possible. Uh, Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United, they’re one of the examples of companies that do that. They’re more events driven. They do have full service dining facilities on site at their training camps. Um, so we do 100% of their staffing in the front of house at the Atlanta Falcons training camp in Flowery Branch, for instance.

Lee Kantor: But could a restaurant or a bar do that?

Starr Douglas: They don’t have a bar, they don’t really encourage the football, right?

Lee Kantor: I know they don’t, but could just a random, you know, in the city, just some restaurant or bar, could they just say, you know what, let’s let front of the house be our kind of. They’re the ones hiring now.

Starr Douglas: Absolutely.

Lee Kantor: But that hasn’t happened yet.

Starr Douglas: It has, it has, but I will. I’ll keep those stories for another time. We we could really get into the weeds on that one.

Lee Kantor: Um, because of it’s such a problem. And you have a solution. Like, why wouldn’t people just want to solve the problem?

Starr Douglas: Yeah, I get it. Well, something that we that is a really great scenario. We run into a lot of our, our companies we work with have good culture. You know, we have the best workers. So we really try to partner with the best venues, the ones that, um, are very inclusive and welcoming. And, you know, most of the time when you factor in that great culture and high volume means you’re making really great money in the front of house. And the the great problem we run into when it comes to why wouldn’t they just use us for 100% of their staff? Is a lot of these companies will have at least a small base team of core people who sometimes have been there for years, and that is, well, number one, it’s great for them, but it’s helpful for our staff as well because they have a big support network around them. So even if somebody’s coming in for their first shift, they haven’t been there before. And you know, they’ve studied online, they can still go up to somebody who’s been there for years and just, you know, tag team with them, stand side by side with them and, you know, learn the ropes together.

Lee Kantor: Right. So that’s kind of optimal on both sides. So you have somebody who’s there been there done that has some history. Um, so the new people can go to them to understand maybe some of the subtleties.

Starr Douglas: Exactly.

Lee Kantor: Now is there is the growth map include kind of back of the house. Are you like going to start expanding into like chefs and sous chefs and, and folks behind, uh, you know, in the back.

Starr Douglas: Potentially once we’ve proven ourselves in the front of house, you know, we have a long way to go. It’s a massive market and a lot of growth in our future in front of us. So right now we’re staying very specialized, very focused on the front of house, because by staying this level of specialized, we’re able to maintain quality control, unparalleled quality control on both the venue and the worker side.

Lee Kantor: Now, is this bootstrapped or did you get funding?

Starr Douglas: We’ve raised, uh, one round that is closed and we’re closing our second funding round right now.

Lee Kantor: And your work is primarily in the metro Atlanta area?

Starr Douglas: Yes. Atlanta was our home market. It’s our first market ever. But we recently have done soft launches in Buffalo, New York and Orlando, Endo, and we have worked with events companies in major cities nationwide. So we’ve piloted this, especially on the worker side in over 16 markets east to west coast.

Lee Kantor: So when you got the 20,000 they were coming from, it wasn’t all Atlanta based or.

Starr Douglas: That was actually all Atlanta based.

Lee Kantor: There’s that many folks out there.

Starr Douglas: Yeah, plenty, plenty of people wanting to work this way. And the Atlanta hospitality ecosystem is absolutely massive. The population density of workers out here, it’s one of the the biggest metros in the country for hospitality workers.

Lee Kantor: So about how much is that universe.

Starr Douglas: In the.

Lee Kantor: Metro Atlanta of in. Yeah. The I’m just trying to get a handle on 20 is 20,000 out of a million. 20,000 out of what.

Starr Douglas: Oh in the seven figures, I believe. Last time I checked, in the past couple of months, Atlanta was the number six largest metro hub for Hospitality workers.

Lee Kantor: Wow. That’s amazing. So that I mean, that could be part time. That’s not like full. That’s not how they’re making necessarily their full livelihood. But they might be doing it like you were doing it like in the evenings or something like that.

Starr Douglas: Yeah, exactly. And I mean, when you think about it, hospitality is is 10% of our GDP. They’re the massive or the market for this is just absolutely massive. Um, where we can go across the country, there are virtually no limits, especially when you go back to what you asked a moment ago about expanding into the back of house or other sectors or verticals within hospitality, because we’re still very focused on our lane right now of the front of house. But, you know, there’s a very large door open for the other areas.

Lee Kantor: So what do you need more of? How can we help you? You need more venues. You need more workers. It doesn’t sound like you need more workers, but what do you need more of money?

Starr Douglas: Uh, so the number one thing that we are building out right now is, is the the venue side? You know, there are so many restaurants and event venues in Atlanta really well across the country that are struggling with staffing. And it’s because they’re looking for their workers in an outdated way. And the more that we can bring awareness to this new style of working, you know, the better these businesses will be, the more money they’ll save. I’ll give you an example. Uh, those companies who use us for 100% of their staffing, they’re saving 10% on their labor costs by doing so. And and their managers aren’t turning over as much because they’re not having to deal with that massive, major stressor of finding staff and filling last minute needs. And just it’s incredibly stressful. It’s, um, to date, it’s been the number one biggest pain point of managers finding staff and retaining them. So if we can take that off their plate, not only are we saving the money, but we’re saving them stress and all these other ancillary benefits that just make everybody’s lives easier. So all that to say, we’re hoping to help as many businesses in the Atlanta area and beyond.

Lee Kantor: And if somebody wants to learn more, what is the website? What’s the best way to connect?

Starr Douglas: Yeah, absolutely. So our website is WW House. House is spelled h o u z. So f r o n t h o u z.com. And you can also feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn as well. Star Douglas Starr is with two R’s. Or if you’d like to email us, you can also find us at info at House comm.

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

Starr Douglas: Thank you so much, Lee. It was a pleasure.

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

Fast, Reliable, Impactful: The Flagship LMS Approach

by

High Velocity Radio
High Velocity Radio
Fast, Reliable, Impactful: The Flagship LMS Approach
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On this episode of High Velocity, Lee Kantor talks with Christopher Dundy, CEO of Flagship LMS, about building fast, scalable eLearning systems that deliver measurable impact. From military precision to global eLearning expertise, Chris shares how to turn concepts into fully branded platforms without wasted time.

Christopher Dundy is the CEO of Flagship LMS, a company specializing in full-service Moodle hosting and administration. He has worked in the eLearning industry since 2007 and has lived and worked around the world in Korea, Japan, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon.

Under his leadership, Flagship LMS has partnered with associations, unions, and nonprofits to deliver training systems that are fast, reliable, and tailored to organizational goals. A former Marine infantry officer, he brings a systems-driven mindset to business, ensuring that training infrastructure scales smoothly and supports measurable impact.

His team is known for launching fully branded LMS platforms in just one week, helping clients move from concept to execution without wasted time.

Connect with Christopher on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Why Training Fails Without Governance
  • The Business Case for Done-for-You Learning Systems
  • Speed of Implementation as a Competitive Advantage
  • The Hidden Costs of a Messy LMS
  • Scaling Without Breaking Your Systems
  • From Knowledge to Impact
  • What Business Leaders Can Learn from the Military Mindset

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Christopher Dundy, who is the CEO of Flagship LMS. Welcome.

Christopher Dundy: Thank you, Lee. It’s nice to be here.

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

Christopher Dundy: So we are a learning management system vendor, and we provide not only hosting for learning management systems, specifically the Moodle learning management system, but we also provide administration as well for those organizations that don’t have or are not interested in hiring somebody to manage their learning management system full time.

Lee Kantor: Now, before we get too far into things, do you mind just kind of educating the listener in general terms about what we’re talking about here. Lms and Moodle.

Christopher Dundy: Sure. So a learning management system. A lot of organizations, in fact, the majority of organizations that have remote workers or workers that are in disparate locations have a learning management system, and it’s a piece of software. Most people have been familiar with this. When you come into HR on your first day, they sit you down in front of a computer. Maybe you watch some workplace compliance training, or you watch some sexual harassment training or something along those lines. The learning management system is not the training, it’s the software that the training sits on. It’s the platform that we manage. And so Moodle is an open source platform. It is one of the largest and most used platforms in the world. Everybody from Buckingham Palace to the US federal government to state education associations, large organizations use this platform and it is one that we specialize in.

Lee Kantor: And a lot of times those open source Very popular software systems. Uh, it’s a double edged sword, right? In one side, it’s super flexible, but on the other side, it can. It can make it very complex and tricky for organizations to kind of wring out the most value and use it in the most efficient manner. And that’s why having an expert like you can really simplify things and make things work better.

Christopher Dundy: Absolutely. And Moodle is the most flexible learning management system out there. But as you mentioned, Lee, it can be it can be a beast if you haven’t configured it before or worked with it before to make sure that your particular organization’s needs are being met because it’s so feature rich. So absolutely, having somebody who’s been there before, who’s walked that path, who can guide you through all of the things that are necessary. It’s really important to get the most value out of it.

Lee Kantor: Now, a lot of times when people start using Moodle, do they just try to go at it on their own and they’re kind of cobbling things together and then, you know, they’ll learn something new and then they’ll tack it on and they’re just not efficiently kind of getting the most out of it and is creating kind of headaches down the road as their needs change.

Christopher Dundy: Absolutely. We see that all the time. People think because it’s a free piece of software, that it is an easy thing for them to quickly download and implement without taking into account all the ancillary tasks that are necessary. You’ve got to set up the servers for it. You’ve got to make sure your servers are secured. You’ve got to make sure that the site itself is secured. You have to make sure that it gets updated on a regular basis. There are, you know, 50 or 60 different types of activities that you can use within a course. So which of those are going to be most appropriate to the material that I’m presenting? There is a lot of things that that go into the the thought process behind what you’re going to use that and how you’re going to use that learning management system. And so, um, we take all of that stress and that headache away from the client. You don’t have to to reinvent the wheel. We’re here to walk you through everything step by step, ask you the questions that you need to be asked so that we can understand fully what you’re trying to accomplish, and then we can make it really simple for you.

Lee Kantor: Now, I would imagine ideally, in hindsight, they would have started talking to you before they began. But I would imagine in most cases they’ve already gone down a path.

Christopher Dundy: Yeah, we get a lot of frustrated first time clients, people who’ve tried to implement it before or who have implemented it with, um, consultants or, uh, you know, kind of part time people that they caught off of Upwork and, um, that just doesn’t cut it. You really need to have a dedicated team behind you to, to backstop your training team. Otherwise, um, you’re going to get, you know, kind of a hodgepodge of, of, of answers and information and, and that’s just going to lead to everybody’s, uh, needle moving to the right.

Lee Kantor: So how does, um so how does it work? They come to you. Maybe they’ve gone down that path and they’re frustrated. Like, what are some first, what are some symptoms that maybe they should bring in an expert? Uh, let’s start there.

Christopher Dundy: Yeah. So, um, essentially in my litmus test for, for any client as to whether or not they need a professional to help them with their learning management system is, um, do you feel any stress associated with the management or the implementation of your platform? And if you do, the answer is you need some help because most organizations, um, their core, uh, their, their core tasks, their core, um, um, uh, I spaced out the word that I’m looking for here. Their, their core, um, goals, the things that they do. Well, uh, are not, are not around training or learning management. And they should focus on those core competencies, which is the word I was looking for. Um, they should be focusing on those because those are the things that are going to be driving revenue for their company, uh, in the, in the immediate future. And, um, if you don’t focus on those things, if you start spending your time and energy on learning a new piece of software, where and on trying to figure out if you have no education background, you know what kind of courses are going to be the best for your particular, uh, set of users. Then you’re going to be spending a lot of time from the ground up on tasks that are not, you know, really, really important to what it is that your company, uh, what service or product you’re delivering.

Lee Kantor: And it’s funny because in other areas of the business, they, they, um, delegate this responsibility to others, like when it comes to their accounting, you know, they don’t expect their people to be the accounting software experts.

Christopher Dundy: Yeah, exactly.

Lee Kantor: Like, so why would this be any different? Any type of kind of large scale, uh, utilization of a tool like this? Why wouldn’t you just hire experts to do this right the first time and then stop thinking about it?

Christopher Dundy: No. You’re right. Absolutely. And we get that. Um, we we we see that a lot, and I, I don’t actually have a really good answer for you other than, um, people. In my professional opinion, people look at learning at training and the training, uh, the training team and the training department. They look at that not as a, um, a revenue generating department, but rather they look at it as a cost center. They look at it as, um, some sort of infrastructure that they can, um, just kind of muddle through on their own. Uh, it’s not it is absolutely one of the core levers that your organization needs to be able to move in order to achieve your goals and objectives. If you don’t have a trained workforce, everything else you’re trying to do is just going to go by the wayside. Um, and so but what we don’t see that a lot, a lot of people feel like, ah, the money’s a little tight this quarter. Training is going to be the first thing that we cut. Um, it’s a nice to have. It’s not a need to have. And we’re trying to make sure that the word gets out that it’s exactly the opposite.

Lee Kantor: So then when you’re having these conversations, you’re probably brought on by the HR people, right? Like they’re the ones who need this, uh, to be done. Right.

Christopher Dundy: And I’m really glad that you brought this up, because this is also one of the things that we see quite frequently. And it’s one of the biggest weaknesses that most companies experience. We are typically brought on either by HR or by training, but it’s always by middle management. It’s never by the C-suite. And, um, that is a really difficult concept for organizations to. I think when it comes to training to kind of wrap their heads around organizations, look at, uh, and I get this in a lot of different, um, different. They state it different ways. But it comes down to this training is for them. Training is something that we push to our employees. It’s for our employees to do. But what I never get and what I very seldom, uh, even have a discussion with is training for middle management or C-suite to improve their particular skill sets, or to groom people to move into those particular positions. It’s always compliance related. Um, something to do with, uh, maybe OSHA safety training. It’s always for the grunt level employees. And, um, and that’s, that’s the first implementation. That’s typically where it stops. And it should absolutely be for every single person in the organization. But it has to start with the top providing that leadership by example. You know, the CEO has to be seen to be taking his training. Um, you know, all of the C-suite needs to have courses that are available to them, and they need to be visible, uh, and they need to be seen taking that so that the culture of training can percolate down through the ranks to that lowest level. If you’re pushing it from the ground up, it’s just not going to work. Even from the middle management point. It just doesn’t work very well.

Lee Kantor: Well, it’s interesting you bring this up because I interview a lot of business coaches and they’re they’re feeling that more and more organizations are understanding the importance of coaching when it comes to, uh, the whole team, not just, you know, certain groups of people. And typically coaching has started at the top and hasn’t gone down to, you know, kind of the frontline workers. Uh, is there a place where both the kind of these learning management systems and coaching can kind of come together in some manner to maybe have more online coaching and, um, you know, is there a place where they’re going to intersect?

Christopher Dundy: That’s a great question. So my my philosophy on training is if you, as a member of the organization, have to say something more than once, it belongs on a learning management system. And so as an example of this, as the, um, the common example that a lot of people see, um, if you go to work for a, for an organization, um, I worked for one many years ago where, uh, every Monday morning, all the new people who were hired that week or who started that week would join an HR member in the conference room, and they would go over policies and documents and these kinds of things. And that same HR person, that was their job, and that’s what they did every single week, was prepare the training for the next week and then deliver that training. And you know what a ridiculous waste of time and money and personal effort. You know, all of that could have been recorded in a, you know, a nice easy format put online. And then, you know, you can put your new employees through that, uh, time permitting. And I think coaching to bring this back to your question is, uh, something very similar to that. If you’re hiring a coach, a lot of it is going to be sort of one on one meeting the needs of that particular executive wherever they happen to be in their development. But I think a lot of the messaging that the coaching is going to be getting across is pretty standard. Uh, a lot of the skill sets are going to be pretty standard at the C-suite. And so those types of things should be arguably captured and put onto a learning management system so that you can quickly and easily put large groups of people through those. Uh, and then you give that the benefit of that coaching to a large number of people rather than to just a select few, and it’ll cut down ultimately on the amount of money you have to spend on coaches as well.

Lee Kantor: Now, are you saying that actually happening, or is that kind of in your head the way it could be?

Christopher Dundy: Uh, it’s the way it should be, definitely. Um, I don’t see as much training dedicated to the C-suites. We’ve got a lot of clients, and, um, we have clients who are putting training out there for the, uh, the salespeople. They’re putting training out there for those people who are acting as, uh, call center representatives and walking people through, um, you know, different types of products and which product might be best for them, um, or how to implement a particular product. But I don’t see a ton of training related to, um, the leadership of an organization and how to sustain that leadership, you know, over a five, six, seven, ten year period.

Lee Kantor: Now, when you go in and start working with the organization, is the scope of your work, like, okay, we’re just kind of putting the nuts and bolts of this together, or are you kind of delving into the possibilities of this type of training, you know, for the executive suite?

Christopher Dundy: No, that’s a great question. So we do two types of we have two types of packages. One package is just our pure hosting package. And that is we’ll set up the platform and maintain it for you. We’ll ensure that it’s secure. Um, and those are for organizations that already have a solid training team in place. They’ve got administrators in place that are familiar with the software or are willing to learn the software. And, uh, they can pretty much handle things on their own. But more and more, what I’m seeing is clients who are taking us up on our second package as well. And the second package is our administration package. And with that, we do all of the things that we’ve just discussed. So we are actually a working member of your training team. We will join your training calls every week. We will listen to what initiatives are being rolled out, what your goals and objectives are, and then based on the experience that we’ve gleaned over the last eight years as a company and, you know, 17 years for me personally working in the in the industry, we will go through and make suggestions and recommendations about ways that you can better utilize your system, uh, in order to be able to, you know, perhaps achieve goals that you haven’t thought about yet. Um, and to try and, you know, get those other groups that are underrepresented in the learning management system on board with, you know, courses that will will help them develop.

Lee Kantor: So if you do, you typically start with kind of I’m just going to build the bones of this. And then they learn more about how you can help them on the other side, or vice versa.

Christopher Dundy: Well, there’s always a, uh, an exploratory call where we sit down and talk with, uh, typically, again, HR members, uh, HR managers or managers on the training team and get a feel for where they are at as an organization. And then based on that, we can make recommendations. Um, there is always a scaffolding process that that occurs. Um, typically, you know, we will want to start with the basic training that is going to be that they’ve already got and all organizations have this, whether that training is on some other learning management system that we’re doing a data migration from, or whether it happens to be just, you know, documentation that somebody has in a PowerPoint or a PDF. Um, but whatever it is, we take whatever is existing and we try and get that up as rapidly as we can. Uh, and once we get that, uh, Um, in a, in a position where it can be consumed by the, you know, the majority of the people who need it. Then and only then would we start to extend the capabilities to these other groups.

Lee Kantor: So how quickly can that situation be triaged and say.

Christopher Dundy: We can typically, depending on how well organized the the company is, we can turn a learning management system on and get the first course or two up and usually about a week. Uh, and we’re, we’re very, very good at that. Now, we’ve had organizations that have taken an implementation time of a year, and they’ve done that at their own behest. They’ve they’ve wanted to, you know, go through with a fine tooth comb, and they’ve wanted to have 150 courses online before they rolled anything out to the individual user in the company. But most organizations that we see want to do this faster rather than slower, so that they can get a quick return on the dollar.

Lee Kantor: Now, what are some of the kind of maybe, Um, from a customer standpoint, they don’t know what they don’t know. What are some of the costs of a clunky LMS?

Christopher Dundy: Oh yeah. There’s well, so there the, the cost that most people don’t see, um, are associated with friction and frustration. So if an employee cannot get into their training or for whatever reason, that training is not being completed, we see this a lot with a Scorm package. Um, and we can talk more about Scorm because that’s my the bane of my existence. But uh, if they’re not being able to complete that training quickly, you’re paying the employees to sit in front of that computer. And if they can’t get it done, if they can’t get it done in a timely manner, that’s costing you the organization money. We don’t typically account for that. Um, but the knock on effects of that, uh, in addition to the, to the, uh, to the financial cost, are the inability that employee to finish their regular job because they’ve got other tasks, you know, that that everybody’s got other tasks they’ve got to do, but they have to knock out this training, whatever it happens to be. So, um, the friction of that and then the frustration of the individual when they can’t get their training done or they can’t get it done quickly or they don’t feel like it’s giving them a good return, uh, will keep them from, number one, recommending that learning management system, that training to anybody else in the organization. But number two, it will keep them from seeking out additional training which could benefit them in their job or could potentially provide them an avenue for a lateral move into a different job or into a promotion.

Christopher Dundy: Um, we see this a lot in organizations. About the three year mark is a really important time period in an employee’s life cycle, because at that three year mark, the employee is comfortable enough with their own job that it’s not as challenging anymore, and they start to look for other things. But if you don’t have a good pathway marked out for that employee inside your organization, whether it’s a pathway again, laterally into another department or another type of job, or whether it’s, you know, moving up into a position with more responsibility or maybe a management position if you don’t have that clearly articulated. And the easiest way to do that is in a learning management system, that employee is going to start to look for other opportunities at other companies, and they’re going to take that, uh, corporate knowledge that they’ve worked so hard to, to achieve. And they’re going to, you know, sell that to the highest bidder. And unfortunately, we see that a lot. And it’s totally preventable because most employees would rather stay in the same organization, um, than move. It’s just a pain in the neck to move and start over again somewhere else. So you can avoid all of that. If you have a good training program in place that shows an employee a career path or a trajectory that they can, um, that they can progress upon.

Lee Kantor: Now, is this a case where kind of senior leadership is just seeing, uh, training and, and these kind of activities as just checking boxes. I got to do this and they’re not seeing kind of the value and the upside and all of these ancillary benefits that can happen if you put in place an elegant, robust learning system.

Christopher Dundy: Well, yes, I agree with that statement. It is viewed as a check in the box for most employers. And I think part of that problem comes from the fact that they have not established, um, their metrics for evaluating the ROI. I’ll give you an example. Um, in California, all so we work with the California Grocers Association, uh, their educational foundation, and they are the umbrella group for all grocers, um, and grocery organizations in California. So they’re responsible for ensuring that organizations have up to date information on all the legislation that’s affecting them. And one of the things that they are mandated, every worker is mandated to go through an hour plus worth of sexual harassment training. And so this organization provides that. And most companies do it because it’s a check in the box. You have to do it. The state says you have to do it. But what you should be doing is you should be looking at, uh, the metrics associated with that training to determine what effect it’s actually having for your organization. So how many instances of sexual harassment did you have last year? How much did that cost you in terms of legal, um, issues or settlements or, you know, what were. And then after the employees have completed that training, what was your follow up? Did you did you see any kind of cost savings because of that training? And this is just one example, but you should be doing these kinds of metrics for every single course that you’ve got. So whether it’s a safety course, whether it’s some any kind of compliance training, but you can also measure metrics for soft skills. You know, there are lots of ways to do that as well. But you should be getting the ROI for each individual course so you can see which ones are effective and moving the needle for your company and which ones, quite frankly, are just kind of a waste of time for people. And we don’t see a lot of people organizations focused on the ROI for individual courses.

Lee Kantor: But when you have them for the compliance related learning that they have to go through, isn’t that an opportunity to at least make them aware, make the the employee aware of these other things, like you’ll know if if John Smith is taking this check the box, um, training they have to take. But you can see they’re in, you know, junior sales person. Isn’t there an opportunity then to go, hey John Smith, do you want to learn more about, you know, learn these skills that might get you promoted to the, you know, a senior sales associate? Like, isn’t there opportunities to take when you’re doing the kind of check the box, learning to at least, um, tickle them with the opportunity to learn more in other areas that might benefit them directly where there’s, you know, that can put money in their pocket if they learn more and grow more. And that’ll help the organization, like we said earlier, be more sticky and help them, um, you know, keep and retain these people instead of them kind of having one foot out the door.

Christopher Dundy: That is a huge benefit. Uh, the the thing that prevents that from occurring in most organizations is that it takes sustained consecutive thought. Most organizations are quick to put up a course because they have to put up the course, but it takes a, it takes a, a very conscientious effort to sit down and say, okay, what’s next after they take this course, where could they go? And to step by step create that potential pathway. And a lot of times the training is being put onto the learning management system by middle management who doesn’t really have, um, the the bird’s eye view that they would need to necessarily plan out a career progression through the organization. So a lot of that gets missed. And you’re absolutely right. It should be. It’s a perfect opportunity to say to somebody, look, you’ve done this first course and now, you know, based on this, you could do these other three things which will bring you to that senior level or to that, um, you know, to that next step in your, in your career. But I’ll be honest with you, I don’t see a lot of it. And, and here’s, here’s where I think we come in because we are not involved in the day to day activities of your organization, and therefore we are not overwhelmed by all the other stuff that you’ve got going on.

Christopher Dundy: We can ask those questions. We can say, okay, what is the next thing that this employee can do? We did this actually, um, at the Peace Corps in Washington, D.C. we put out a and this is actually, uh, prior to my launching this company, this was something that I did when I was the learning management system administrator at the Peace Corps. Um, we put out a huge block of butcher paper in the entryway of the Peace Corps building. It was probably 25ft long, and for a week every morning, we were there with coffee and donuts. Every time an employee came in, we said, you know, want a cup of coffee? You want a donut? Now, this butcher block piece of paper represents the life cycle of the average volunteer and the life cycle of the average administration person. Tell us in your department what training you have and where it occurs on this life cycle. And over the course of a week, we were able to map out all of the courses that existed within the Peace Corps and where and when they occurred, and how many then were not on the learning management system, but were just being administered within a particular department. And using that information, we could then consolidate that and make it a much more transparent training organization. So I was kind of proud of that.

Lee Kantor: Well, I think it’s critical. I mean, if you if you take your thesis that this is a critically important work that you’re doing and that the organization should be doing, then you have to give your employees the same experience they have when they go on Amazon to say, if you like this, you might like this. Like. Like that’s just kind of table stakes nowadays when you’re dealing with software, I think that you have to help the user take the next step. And if you if you believe which I believe, you believe that this learning is critical. This is not nice to have. This is must have. So if you take control of the learning and have some more holistic view of what you’re doing here, if you’re going through all of the trouble of building this out, don’t make it kind of this, uh, this kind of minimum requirement thing, make it as robust and as, um, and get wring out as much value from this activity as you possibly can.

Christopher Dundy: You’re, you’re you’re right. That is what needs to happen. And that is what should happen. And I love the comparison of training to Amazon because it should be just that simple. The employees should quickly be able to go and find a list of all the things that apply to them. They should be able to one click enroll in those particular courses. The courses themselves should be interesting, and we can come back to talk a little bit about that, because I have seen so much incredibly bad, uh, online learning, just mind deadening, spirit crushing, uh, compliance training that. Um, and there’s lots of better ways to do that. But, yes, it should be quick. It should be easy. It should follow the consumer model that we have grown accustomed to with online shopping. It does not in most cases. And that is simply because we’re not viewing the activity of training in the same way that we view, um, the shopping experience. We’re we’re getting a dopamine hit from shopping, and we are definitely not getting a dopamine hit from our online training.

Lee Kantor: It’s almost the opposite. You’re getting a dopamine effect.

Christopher Dundy: Yeah, I don’t know if there is a negative dopamine, but yes, we get that from a lot of people. Um, and I have been through, you know, the worst training you can possibly imagine. And I it just boggles my mind that people would put this on their learning management system and expect somebody else to take it, because there’s no way they would themselves sit through it if they didn’t have to.

Lee Kantor: Right. And I think it goes back to your original kind of the original topic of this, why it’s critically important to have an expert like you and your team come in and do this, or at least assist in doing this because you need fresh eyes on this, this, this, this can’t be your grandfather’s training. Like, you know, in the world of Netflix and Amazon, people have a different expectation when it comes to content consumption and and dealing with software. This can’t be what it was. There’s a it’s a new world now, and especially with the attention span that people have nowadays, it’s you got to work a little harder to engage people and keep them coming back and wanting to do more.

Christopher Dundy: That’s totally true. In the history of e-learning, there has never been a person who has come home on a Friday night and cracked open a beer and said, wow, this is great. Now I get to sit down and relax with my compliance training. Um, it just it’s never happened and it could happen. Realistically, it might not be as enthusiastic as I’ve portrayed it, but but it certainly can be something that is both enjoyable and instructional, and it just requires a it requires an organization who has seen the same mistakes a thousand times over. And we absolutely have. Um, it’s every organization starts from the exact same place, whether regardless of the industry, you could be a manufacturing industry, you could be, um, you could be, uh, in the education sector, it doesn’t matter. Every organization starts from the same point, and they all progress through the same, uh, trials and tribulations until they get to a point, which I think is and we’ve got some organizations that I think have achieved sort of the, the upper level of, of of training. It’s it’s organized, it’s efficient, it’s good. Um, it’s it requires thought on the part of the user rather than just sitting and staring mindlessly at a video and clicking the next button. Um, it’s so I think there are organizations out there who have done it, but they’re few and far between. So an organization like us who can help you walk through that and speed up that process to to get you to that end result is really important. It’s a good investment, I think.

Lee Kantor: And it just takes a mindset shift. You have to look at this differently, like it can’t be seen as just a check the box thing that we just have to do. It has to be something like, we’re going to lean into this, we’re already doing it. Let’s just get the most value out of it, and let’s hire an expert to help us do that instead of just do the same old, same old. I think the especially younger employees are just need that nowadays. They don’t have the patience or tolerance of of just a lousy experience. They don’t have to do that anywhere else. Why would they want to do it at their workplace?

Christopher Dundy: Well, you’re right, Lee and the but the initial mindset, the initial change has to happen from the C-suite and it has to be training is and from middle management as well. But it has to be training is for us. Right now it’s training is for them. And I’m not so concerned about what their feelings are or their experience is. If I have to take it myself now, there’s going to be a bit of a bit more interest in how we’re presenting that. And, and, um, when and all those other things. But if the and most middle managers are not going to be taking e-learning. Most middle managers are going to be pushing that down to their employees, their sales departments, their accounting departments, all of those people, and let them deal with it. And I see this again and again and again. But that’s the mindset. If it’s for them, we’ll make it okay if it’s for us, meaning I’ve got to do this as well. Hey, now let’s put some time and thought into this.

Lee Kantor: Well, if there’s an organization out there that wants to uplevel their learning and wants to have a conversation with you or somebody on the team, what’s the website? What’s the best way to connect?

Christopher Dundy: I’d absolutely love to talk with you. There is absolutely no there’s no cost to talk with us. And we’ll talk as long as you want to kind of get a handle on what you’re learning needs are and if we’re going to be a good fit for you. But, uh, if you’d like to talk with us, flagship LMS is our site, and there’s a button right there. You can schedule a free call with us. Um, again, we can talk as long as you want. I’m happy to just even hear what it is that you’re doing. Um, because anything associated with e-learning is kind of a fun thing for me to to converse about.

Lee Kantor: Well, I really enjoyed the conversation and congratulations on all the success. I think you’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Christopher Dundy: Well, thank you so much, Lee. It was a pleasure being here.

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

Designing Innovation: From Concept to Market Impact

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Atlanta Business Radio
Atlanta Business Radio
Designing Innovation: From Concept to Market Impact
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On this episode of Atlanta Business Radio, host Lee Kantor welcomes Wayne Li, a senior product development and design leader whose career has been defined by turning ideas into revenue-generating businesses. With deep expertise in industrial design, brand management, and global product strategy, Li has helped Fortune 500s like Panasonic, Northrop Grumman, and Home Depot—and advised academic institutions worldwide—reshape their approach to innovation. Beyond driving profits and market growth, he also brings a unique perspective as an expert witness in intellectual property litigation, spanning consumer products to advanced technologies. Tune in to hear how customer-focused design, strategic differentiation, and design thinking can spark innovation and create lasting impact in today’s competitive marketplace.

Wayne Li, Director at Design Bloc, he is a senior product development and design leader who specializes in turning ideas into profitable, market-leading businesses.

With deep expertise in industrial design, brand management, product differentiation, and product planning, he has a proven track record of driving innovation, expanding market share, and building strong global partnerships with vendors and manufacturing teams.

Beyond product leadership, he serves as an expert in intellectual property litigation, advising on cases related to product design, customer safety, and patent infringement.

His experience spans utility and design patents across diverse categories, including consumer electronics, vehicle and control interfaces, hardware, home décor, furniture, and baby products.

As a consultant and executive education trainer, he has helped Fortune 500 companies—such as Panasonic, Northrop Grumman, and Home Depot—as well as international universities including the Universidad de Concepción in Chile and the University of South Africa in Pretoria.

His work focuses on advancing design thinking, customer discovery, and innovative product development practices for both industry and academia.

Connect with Wayne on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Design Empathy and Contextual Awareness: Frames of Reference for the 21st Century Creative

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio. And this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, CSU’s executive MBA program. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on the show, we have Wayne Li, who is the author of the book: Design, Empathy and Contextual Awareness Frames of Reference for the 21st Century Creative. Welcome, Wayne.

Wayne Li: Thanks, Lee. Wonderful to be here.

Lee Kantor: Well, I’m excited to learn more about the book and also your work at Georgia Tech as part of the design block. Where would you like to start? Do you want to start with Georgia Tech or the book?

Wayne Li: Why don’t we start with Georgia Tech? Sounds great.

Lee Kantor: Sure. So tell us about the design block. What are you doing over there?

Wayne Li: Yeah, I’m happy to. The. So the design block is a joint initiative with the Colleges of Engineering and the College of Design. I was brought on to the campus or invited on the campus to be a professor here to bridge those disciplines. Right. To basically try to give our our highly trained, technologically trained students a sense of humanity and empathy and an understanding of how their technology is placed within society. So it’s a great initiative. You can consider it kind of like a lab on campus. We teach classes, we have workshops, we have social events and things like that. So we’re actually in a reconditioned cafeteria. We renovated a cafeteria between the Woodruff North and South dormitories here on campus. And so, yes, we hold classes and social events and all kind of related to what will be that topic of the book, right, is what are the things we can do day to day to really practice honing our empathy skill and our creative thinking. And so the Georgia Tech teaches critical thinking amazingly well. We just want to we want to couple that and supplement it with the creativity and kind of drive of understanding people and how to build for them.

Lee Kantor: Well, I’ve been working with technologists and startups for many, many years now, and I’ve seen a lot of times a disconnect between the most brilliant people and then really having kind of that human understanding of what they’re the thing they’re working on, how it’s going to work in real life and how people are going to accept it. And kind of the human side of the clever idea, and it’s great to see them being proactive in bringing you along to help. Kind of be that bridge. Are you sensing that elegant design is is almost a must have in today’s world that that it’s not a nice to have anymore?

Wayne Li: Yeah, I would agree with that. I mean, I think, you know, when we say elegant design, it becomes something about that is appropriate. It’s resonant. Right. It is, you know, beautiful in its simplicity, but at the same time has a certain level of sophistication in the understanding of how a person does that goes through their lives or has their activity. So if you’re designing for someone going through their life, right, let’s say they’re making food and you’re making and you’re designing kitchen utensils or something like that, you know, how do you understand their kind of makeup, what they’re thinking about as they go through about that activity? And then how do you provide the tools that are simple and effective? Right. It’s not technology for technology’s sake. Right. So I would agree with that. I think what you were saying before about sometimes technologists get enamored with their work is sometimes when you work inside a lab and it’s, you know, and it’s just about, can I prove this? Can I prove or advance this technology and this kind of way? And it’s like, Eureka! I was able to improve this 20% and that’s great. Or that’s, you know, you know, compared to the previous. That’s amazing. But then you forget that in that lab that’s a lab setting. And when then you bring it back out to the audience, they may not even care about that 20% improvement. Right. So it’s while it is interesting to prove that it can be done or unique or exciting because it pushes the boundary of what technology can do, it may it may not actually be what is relevant for the society’s use. So that’s that’s something where you have to kind of go back and go, yeah. Is this design elegant? Does it make sense with people?

Lee Kantor: Yeah. One of my favorite marketers is a guy named Rory Sutherland. And he brings up this point about technology in the train system in Europe. And he’s like, they spend billions and billions of dollars to speed up the trains, when if they would just take a fraction of that money and just improve the experience while you’re on the train, people would wouldn’t care that it’s saving you 30 minutes or 10 minutes or however long it’s saving you if you’re just enjoying your time there more.

Wayne Li: No. Absolutely. Yeah. And I can I can see that. I mean, I think one of the things we talk about, uh, that I teach is understanding that people like sometimes when people think they know a problem, like, oh, it’s just the speed of the train, let’s just make it faster. They forget that, like the product you’re introducing has infrastructure on it, right? So if you’re in a train system and then you’ve got crossings at certain places and you have to stop based on factors outside of your control or based on other factors within society, you probably can’t improve it to be faster anyway, right? Or if you did it, would you know they still have to stop for, say, like a boat crossing when the drawbridge moves up, right? So you still have to like even if you’re from A to B, quicker, if you have to stop and wait for the drawbridge to open. You’re not going to really move the needle that much, right? You’ll just get to the drawbridge quicker. Right. So part of that is understanding what is that true human requirement. Right. The the levels of human requirement. If you look at the psychology, there are many levels of people wanting something. And so the part of what I’m trying to teach is like you’re saying if I, if I enjoy my time there, if it’s more sociable, more, uh, I get to talk to my I get to meet a new person. Right? I won’t notice the time flying by because I’m engaged. Right. So in that situation, they’re they’re they’re addressing that need to socialize or be entertained, right. Rather than the need to say move or transport my body from point A to point B.

Lee Kantor: But that’s one of the challenges for technologists. You know, if they have a hammer, then everything looks like a nail.

Lee Kantor: A nail.

Lee Kantor: Um, so it’s sometimes they don’t have kind of that holistic view of kind of what really does the human want at the end of the day here? Do they want to go faster or do they just want to have a pleasurable experience?

Wayne Li: Right. And that’s yeah, I mean, that’s kind of like I said, what design Block does here is it teaches students how to identify those different needs. Maybe it categorize them, find out if there’s conflicting requirements, um, challenge the system, see where the infrastructure is going, like where the things that revolve around the product by changing your frame of reference, like all those things that we’re talking about, like you said, right. Where. Yeah. You know, again, if a technologist makes something in a lab and they’re enamored with the fact that it’s 20% more efficient, then everything they’re going to go around is like, I’ve got a hammer looking for a nail, right? And that’s not necessarily a good framework, right? If you only look at the object or the technology and the function of what it does right, like the primary function, if the nails like if the hammer’s primary function is to drive a nail and that’s the job there is like, hey, drive that nail. Um, then you forget everything else, which is the person that uses that hammer. Are they building? Are they a construction worker? Uh, building a home as part of their livelihood? Or are they a dad making a tree house for their daughter? Those are two different things. And based on that context, which is contextual awareness, do you understand that they would use a hammer in a different way?

Lee Kantor: Right. Is that is this a challenge for you to kind of open the mind of the technologists who, you know, a lot of times their ego and identity is tied to their brilliance and their great idea. And then if you start saying, you know, you start challenging them around the edges of this, uh, they might get defensive. How do you kind of create an environment that makes them comfortable and kind of appreciates their brilliance, but also kind of widens their lens a bit?

Wayne Li: Oh, that’s a wonderful question. Uh, I do. I mean, I always think about these kind of funny stories, too. About about about that. I mean, so on the one hand, I, I don’t want to cast technologists in the wrong light. Right? Obviously, designers can be just as egotistical, right? So, um, you know, if you think of a fashion designer who’s got a collection, they may not be going out and asking, what would you like to wear? Right? They’re just like, this is my vision. Deal with it. Right. So, um, you know, that would be the opposite of what, you know, kind of like. So if you look at design design’s a very broad spectrum, right? And what I’m teaching here is something that’s known as design thinking or human centered design. Right. And obviously the opposite of that would be ego centered design. So if you’re a high fashion designer who’s just I just love, you know, silver silk then. Okay, well, you know, you’re not really asking. You’re just exploring that color, that material, that type. It’d be the same for a technologist who’s just enamored with augmented reality, right? And so, so.

Wayne Li: And yes, their ego is based off of that, right? Their ego is based off of kind of how they define maybe who they are sometimes, but what I try to do is one use humor to kind of diffuse the situation, and then two ask, well, okay, great. Um, what happens if I take this technology out of the lab? Right. And so what I try to do there is to bring the community in, in some kind of way to engage with the lab or or if, if viable, bring that technology out to the people. And then I record it and turn it into what’s called an ethnographic film. And usually that when then when the design now it’s not me telling them. Right. It’s, it’s it’s society and its application telling them. And and instead of making it confrontational, I try to make it inspirational to say, look at what these people are doing and how they’re reacting to what you’re doing. How would how does that inspire you to modify, adapt, change? What would you do? And now I lead a discussion, hopefully inspiring someone to adapt, something that makes more sense.

Lee Kantor: And so far, how’s it going?

Wayne Li: Not bad. I mean, I think, um, with the with design block, we’ve got, uh, living learning community that, um, that students who are in housing get to do. And we work with local artists. We have several we created over, you know, 20 different touchpoints classes, lectures, workshops, things like that. Um, and yeah, that’s codified itself, at least, um, to a certain extent into a design minor for the entire campus.

Lee Kantor: Now, are people, um, I mean, this is where it gets tricky, where art and science and art and commerce kind of intersect. And you do want some artists out there that are just, hey, this is my vision, and I’m making this thing, and you’re coming along for the ride or you’re not, and that’s okay with me. But in a lot of times in especially, I’m sure the people you’re working with that are trying to be get a startup and get funding, and there’s going to be KPIs. And I got to get certain numbers and certain times there has to be, you know, more compromise, I would imagine, in that. And it’s harder to be that kind of all in artist. Um, is this becoming I mean, I think what you’re doing is so important. I just, I just don’t know if a person has that brain type that are usually the technologists, that they can open up their mind to this empathy side of things.

Wayne Li: Yeah. No, I mean, so I think there’s interesting things here, right? I mean, I myself have been in been in startups and some of them have been quite successful. Um, what I would say is this you have to find the right balance, and you have to remember that your development process is cyclic. It’s iterative. So yes, maybe you’re a vice president of design will have a distinct what we call point of view, right? Like, I have a distinct point of view about why I think this product should be right. But then you have to remember, you’re part of that startup process. And entrepreneurial process is a creative design or a creative process of design thinking. I tend to think of as design thinking process, right? That’s the one I adhere to. Um, part of that is testing with customers. So again, if you have a certain point of view, like it must be this way, and then customers either react to it and they buy into that way, they’re doing it. So again, like you might have said like I’m going to make an app for, um, you know, let’s take something simple that people can understand, like something like, you know, like a bus tracking app. You’re going to ride the bus, you’re standing on a motor station, and you want to know where the busses are. You know, something like this exists. That’s great. But let’s just take that example and you say, well, listen, my vision for this software is that you can see every bus on a giant map, and they’re all blue like little blue lights, and it’ll flash red if they are late, blah blah blah.

Wayne Li: And so that’s your vision for what this thing should look like. Then you go talk to people and go, well, I don’t need to see every single street in Atlanta. I really care about my route. Right. So now you have new feedback from customers. What are you going to do to change that? Right. Do you have two different views an overview map and a detail map. How are you going to change that? You can you can allow that flexibility right while still maintaining this vision. Ultimately your vision is your branding strategy, right? Your vision is we want you to know where you’re going to get your next bus. And it be on time every time. Like that. If that’s your vision statement, well, that probably will not change because that’s what you founded the company on. But the actual product you make could change. As long as that vision stays true. So that’s kind of how I try to counsel startups is that, you know, yes, there’s key performance metrics, right. Like you said, um, and you may have a point of view, but now engage with potential customers and get feedback. Get data about what it is they would like to engage with. Stay true to what you founded the company on, but be ready to pivot should your product or service not quite match up.

Lee Kantor: But how do you do that with kind of the major disruptions? Like if they were inventing the car and at that time nobody wanted a car. They didn’t know what a car was. They wanted a faster horse. So how do you kind of make kind of a major breakthrough and a big disruption when people don’t have any frame of reference of what you’re even talking about?

Wayne Li: Yeah, no, that’s a great question. I actually use that exact example because I used to design cars for Ford Motor Company and Volkswagen. Right. So, um, you know, they used that quote a lot to say, well, you know, Henry Ford said that and, um, that’s an interesting, you know, like, we don’t really know what what what? There’s a technique there that’s in the book called Design Abstraction. So you actually it’s kind of it’s very similar in engineering parlance to root cause analysis. So what you would do is say, okay, well, wait wait wait what? All right. Someone said, I want a faster horse. And obviously Henry Ford did this when he made the car. So you don’t want a faster horse, because, remember, a human need is not a noun. A human need is always a verb, right? A hammer can drive a nail as its primary function. It can also build a tree house for your daughter, right? It can also make you feel, uh, empower you to be creative. Right? Those are different human requirements. So if we were to say, well, this person said they would like a faster horse. Well, a, they don’t want a faster horse. What’s the human requirement behind a faster horse? I want to get somewhere quicker or I want I would um, I would not like to be soiled as I move from place to place. Or I would like a, I would like to move smoothly through space. Like now all of a sudden we have different human requirements that we’re asking you to creatively think and empathize with that person. When someone says they want a faster course, really empathize, what do they actually mean? And so if you’re able to abstract the human needs from the statement, now you’re able to obsolete the product, right? If someone says, you know, I want to drive a nail, but really what they want to do is to make a is to build a tree house or impress their daughter. Well, you actually don’t need to make the hammer. You could just make a tree house building service.

Lee Kantor: Now, when you’re working, it just strikes me that the people, a lot of the people that you’re dealing with kind of have a different brain type than maybe the the other the other brain type is the more design side of this and the more empathetic side. And it just I just find it fascinating to try to attempt to be this bridge. Like, is it difficult to find in one person kind of both of these qualities, or is this or is this kind of an argument for this is why you need more two people, uh, startups rather than one person founders.

Wayne Li: This is wonderful. I mean, okay, um, so, I mean, obviously it is tricky, right? You’re in we’re in a technology school. But let me answer the question that you’re talking about. One. My background is I actually do. I have I have a degree in a Bachelor of Fine Arts and Design and I have a bachelor’s I have multiple degrees in mechanical engineering. So, um, so, I mean, the good thing is, yes, you inherently and this is in the book where I describe the neuroscience behind it. Everyone, everyone, everyone has the capacity to be creative. It is not it is not a God given skill. It is not inherent talent. Yes, there are some things that make someone inherently talented, you know, in certain senses, right? Like if you were born to parents who are both musicians, then maybe there’s some things in the genes there. But the fact is that your parents played music since you were born is going to be the nurture argument to that, right? So everyone has the neural networks possible to be creative, period. The question is whether or not they exercise them. Right. And so, you know, creativity, art, science I mean arts, drama, music programs have been destroyed in public schooling, right? They’ve been nixed out every time there’s a funding cut. Right. So in those types of situations, like you’re talking about art, the opportunities to explore those neural networks versus reading, writing and arithmetic, right.

Wayne Li: Versus stem versus steam. Right. We have to provide those opportunities, right. We have to provide opportunities that make our students more creative, that give them more agency over their learning and provide flexibility in their assignments. Right. If all you do is give someone a problem set like here, solve these 15 math problems, you’re not you’re not addressing their creativity, right? You’re not addressing what the math means. You’re just making them do math problems. And so that’s not creative in that situation. Um, so absolutely like yes, everyone inherently has both. The question is whether or not in schooling they decided to pursue it. And so that I can you know, I can guarantee you, yes, you have both neural networks. You have both networks. We looked at the neuroscience between creativity as well as analytical thinking. And yes, that’s in the book. So in that sense, yes, everyone can cultivate those through exercises that we we give. Right. And then the book has some exercises as well to help push your creativity. Now yours. Now let’s talk about business because you’re talking about the team. So. Yes. Um, I’ve been in a couple of different startups, but, you know, having a founder, right? And this is really important for startups who create a diverse team. Right.

Wayne Li: Don’t pick a if the CEO you don’t want to pick a CTO exactly like you. Right. You you know, you want to you want to pick a CTO that will that can help challenge you, can help make you think about the technology in a different way. As an executive, you’re not a chief marketing officer who should be diverse or different than you, right? Who understands the customer so that you can have those lively discussions? It’s it’s a really important thing for a startup to have a very one focused founding team on the customer. Right. That’s critical, but that they also have diverse mindsets and skill sets that they bring to the table. If everyone is of the exact same type of mindset. And again, when I talk about mindset, we can talk about three different mindsets. Right. Empathy or empathetic mindset. Creativity, right. Um, a creative mindset and a critical mindset or an analytical mindset. Right. So that’s critical thinking. So if you look at those three types of mindsets, which are all governed by different areas of the brain, everyone has those areas of the brain. So the question there comes down is if someone tends to favor one side or the other, then do you have a founding team that favors the other types because they surface Workers themselves in different ways when you develop products.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. And and I think it’s so critical to have, um, you know, the team that has each of those qualities because it’s so easy to just fall in line and everybody just yes each other and then think that they’ve figured something out when they could have a huge blind spot or just some bias that they don’t even realize they have. And you see it so often in terms of technology, especially where all of these unintended consequences start bubbling up, where in hindsight it seems obvious. But while they were doing it, nobody thought of it.

Wayne Li: Yeah. Yes, I would agree that’s 100% true. I mean, again, like when you if you are developing a technology in the lab and you’re not engaging it with it outside, then yeah, those and again if you have like you said, if you have groupthink. Right. Right. Um, you know, part of this is how well you run a We very just quickly move into the kind of startup space. How egalitarian do you run your company? Right? If it’s my way or the highway and you don’t believe your founding team is equivalent to you, and then everyone just says yes to you like you just said, then you won’t surface those. Well, what if this happened? And then those situations where you said that cause problems down the road, you never identified them, right? But if you treat them all like everybody on this team is equivalent, everyone on this team’s ideas are welcome. And and now we are we are having a an educated discussion amongst equals who have different points of view. Well then now all of a sudden we’re able to identify those things, right. Because then that empathetic person was like wait, wait wait wait wait. I’m of the empathetic mind. Um, I really want to talk to about 5 or 10 different customers. I’ve got them on speed dial over here. I’m your chief marketing officer, and I want to see what they think about this.

Wayne Li: What can we do that’s publicly available that kind of hints at this lab technology. And how might we engage with those people? Right. And then the technology officer then kind of looks at and goes, oh, you’re engaging with people about this. Uh, let’s change this. Let’s make this a little bit easier and simpler. Instead of this technology taking 15 steps in 15 minutes to do, I can do it in two steps and only five minutes. So that way you can test with more people, right? So now all of a sudden you’re identifying those things that could be roadblocks in the end. Because let’s say you didn’t do that and you were the chief executive officer. Like, let’s just stay in the lab and let’s optimize this thing. Well, now you got a 15 step, 15 minute thing, then nobody really wants. And and no matter how fast you optimize that technology, it’s still 15 minutes and, um, and 15 steps because you didn’t ask your CTO what they could do. Right? And the CTO was inspired by the person because that’s what the CMO is doing. So in that sense, you have to have that. Yes. And culture. Right. Which is yes, I hear your idea and let’s build upon it kind of culture to truly make a startup work well.

Lee Kantor: Yeah, I agree 100%. And it sounds like you’re using some of, you know, uh, that was obviously a reference to Improvization. Um, and when you kind of start implementing those, um, techniques that make people think bigger and larger and outside of their normal frame, that’s when real creativity can happen. And you find those things, the unexpected things, the serendipitous things that a lot of people miss because they’re so kind of, you know, heads down, focused on just the task at hand and not looking, like you said, at optimizing to the bigger picture of what is the outcome we really desire, not how cool this technology can do something.

Lee Kantor: That’s right.

Wayne Li: Yes, absolutely. And I’ll just kind of wrap up that answer too, because I really do. You just I mean, you nailed it, right? Like when you are so task focused. That’s part of this neural network we talk about. Right. This kind of very like I got to get this done right now type of network. Right. And that’s one side of that brain. Right. That we’re we’re you know, that, you know, um, you know, that that’s just super task oriented, right? And that’s not necessarily the creative side. Right? That’s one that tends to be the more, um, task positive network. And so, yeah, I mean, the when technologists favor that too much, then they lose sight of that. And we teach we actually teach improv workshops at Design Block. Right. Because the improv. Yes. And that’s the opposite side. That’s that playful side, that creative side, that positive thinking side. The task positive network tends to be stress and anxiety ridden. It’s like, let’s get this done or or you don’t want to know what will happen next, right? Like that’s that side right now. The, you know, um, the other side of that, the other network is more playful, right? It’s like, hey, how might we do this? Yes, and let’s do that. And so that becomes this nugget of creative thinking that is that is key. So yes, that is leverages improvization, uh, that leverages um, ideas, brainstorming techniques. Right. Which also use. Yes. And as a technique right there, brainstorming rules. So all of those are focused on creative thinking, right. And Improvization. So absolutely I would agree with that.

Lee Kantor: Now, um, or is your work primarily with the students there Georgia Tech, or are you open to like organizations that want to play as well?

Wayne Li: Oh yeah, absolutely, I love that. So, um, so the short answer is yes. And both. Right. So, um, at tech here as a professor, um, obviously I teach classes, and so we work with undergraduate students and, and graduate students, um, in facilitating these courses and teaching them, but also just, you know, through the School of Industrial Design in partnership with engineering. Uh, we are also open to we have an executive management course. So I do teach in the MBA school. Right. We, uh, I have a design thinking course for graduate students over there for MBAs. And then we have executive training. So there is an executive education training. If you type in, uh, a Google search, you know, Georgia Tech professional education or GTP and design thinking, it’ll immediately pop up to that web page, which is, you know, we can work with outside companies on on a teaching contract where we will teach exterior external entities these techniques. Right? Well, yeah, we’ll make you do improv, right. Like we’ll, you know, we’ll do those types of things to shake people from that. I got to get this done right now type of mentality. Um, and so that that will help and also help with leadership skills. So absolutely we will work with outside communities. Um, and some will do in a nonprofit manner. Some of them will do with executive education. Um, and, and and there’s also and then yeah, those are, those are most of the things that we do in design. But just for kicks, I also have a transportation design lab just letting you know. Right. So because I used to be a car designer at Ford Motor Company, Volkswagen. Um, and so like, we we’ll, we’ll do research in automotive design as well, but, um, that tends to be straight up automotive design.

Lee Kantor: So if somebody wants to connect with you, learn more about design block or get a hold of the book, what are the best coordinates?

Wayne Li: Yeah. No that’s great. So obviously so my email is just w l I. And then the number 78 at Georgia Tech GA GA edu. Um, that’s the best way to get Ahold of me is just as far as direct email for the book. So yes, if you’re interested in this kind of book, I think this book is targeted for entrepreneurs, young professionals. You know, it’s targeted at college design students if you’re, say, in your second or third year, but definitely but it doesn’t you don’t have to be a designer, right? You can you can be a music producer. You can be, you know, a founder for a startup. You can be an MBA looking to get into marketing, right? So all of those and any or any creative professional, because we’re talking really about frames of mind mindsets and how you can shift and improve upon those mindsets when you’re so maybe used to only thinking in one. Um, this book is dropping. It’s already dropped in London. It is dropping on September 2nd, so just a couple of days from now on Amazon. So if you go to Amazon.com, type in my name, Wayne Lee, last name spelled L, I, and then the title of the book, design, Empathy and Contextual Awareness, should be the first one that pops.

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

Wayne Li: Thank you. Lee. It’s been a wonderful and a wonderful time and pleasure to talk with you.

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

Clarity, Confidence, and the Future of Leadership

by

High Velocity Radio
High Velocity Radio
Clarity, Confidence, and the Future of Leadership
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On this episode of High Velocity Radio, Lee Kantor welcomes Tami Imlay—International Women’s Achievement Coach, CEO of Tami Marie Coaching, and host of A Leader’s Purpose Podcast. A former U.S. Air Force Captain turned master coach, Tami helps leaders and entrepreneurs find clarity, confidence, and purpose so they can create lives of impact and joy.

Tami Imlay is an International Women’s Achievement Coach, CEO of Tami Marie Coaching, host of A Leader’s Purpose Podcast and an Enneagram Expert. With a background spanning military service, therapy, coaching, and corporate training, she helps ambitious, high-level leaders and entrepreneurs gain clarity on their true calling, transforming their success into a life of impact and significance. Drawing from her own journey of resilience, she empowers women to step into their purpose with confidence, strategy, and joy.

Growing up on Air Force bases across the world—including Japan, Italy, and England—she learned the value of adaptability, leadership, and service from an early age. She followed the path of excellence, earning a BS in Information Systems at Auburn and an MBA in Organizational Management at University of Phoenix as well as participating in ROTC during college.

Rising to the rank of Captain in the U.S. Air Force, she later stepped away from military life to focus on her family. When her husband was tragically killed in action, she  faced an identity crisis that led her to rediscover her purpose. She pursued a Master’s degree in Marriage and Family Therapy but soon realized her passion lay in coaching—helping others focus on their future rather than being bound by their past.

Now a Master Certified Enneagram Coach and Master Certified Neuro Coach, she has spent over a decade guiding women to embrace their strengths and align their experiences with their purpose. She is a sought-after speaker and corporate trainer, partnering with Tulsa Technical College to provide transformational leadership development. Her approach combines intuition, empathy, and strategic insight, equipping her clients with a clear roadmap to fulfillment and a lasting legacy.

Beyond her work, she is a devoted mother to two teenagers, whom she homeschools while traveling extensively and immersing them in global experiences. She finds joy in gardening, raising chickens, and cheering on her son and daughter in their sports endeavors. With a heart for adventure and a passion for seeing others shine, she is dedicated to helping women break free from limitations, step into their God-given purpose, and create lives of deep impact and joy.

Connect with Tami on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

Building a legacy of leadership: Blueprint for high-level entrepreneurs and leaders

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

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

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show, we have Tami Imlay, who is with CEO of Tami Marie Coaching, host of a Leader’s Purpose Podcast, and an Enneagram expert. Welcome.

Tami Imlay: Hi. Thank you so much for having me.

Lee Kantor: That is quite the resume. Before we get too far into things, let’s talk. Start with your coaching. Tell us a little bit about your coaching practice. Who you serving and how you doing?

Tami Imlay: Well, this has been a journey. And as anything um, it’s been a process. But I serve high level leaders, those who are ambitious, those who are go getters and help them figure out how to combine their There their love for what they do. How to bring in their core motivations and self-awareness and really get the life that they want. So it’s not just achievement, but it’s also fulfillment and legacy as well.

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

Tami Imlay: Okay, well, let me take you back 13 years. 13 years ago, I was driving home from a four year old birthday party, and I was in the window. I was your typical, like, high. Well, type a mom. Like, I had just gotten out of the Air Force. I had two toddlers, and I was in the window of time of getting the kids home, getting them fed, and getting them through nap time. And most moms know that if you miss the window, then you’re done for the rest of the day. Like everything’s going to be more challenging. And well, I got home, started doing the things that I needed to do, and I got a knock on the door and I was like, who? Who knocks anymore? Who drops by? And I opened the door and there were three men in uniform. And at that moment I realized what was happening. My husband was on deployment and this was actually his first operational deployment. He’d been gone for two weeks. Two weeks in eight hours, actually. And I got the knock on the door telling me that he was killed in the line of duty. And that sent me on a a discovery like I it it broke me. But it also created this new fire inside of me. And what I, what I felt is I lost who I was. I not only lost my husband, my best friend who I went to high school with, lost the father of my child. But I also lost who I was in that moment because I was no longer a spouse. I was no longer a wife. And so I was like, okay, what do I need to do? Be in the action oriented, be in the gut instinct person? I am like I wanted answers.

Tami Imlay: I didn’t want to deal with emotions. I wanted to just get through it. I wanted to work it out. And so I started on this journey and I became a therapist because I was like, you know, that’s what you do. You become a therapist if you, uh, you are trying to work things out and which was great, which helps me. And then I realized when I moved from California to Oklahoma that I was really it wasn’t the the past that I really wanted to help people with. I felt my calling was really to help people with the future, help them get what they want and who they are now, because we we go through these things that shape us and we have two choices. We either allow them to make us bitter, we allow them to become not only part of our identity, but our whole identity. Or we take it and we’re like, okay, what can we take from it? Where can we go grow through it? And who am I because of it? And when I realized that that’s really what I wanted to help people do, and specifically like high level people, because who don’t slow down to figure things out. We like typically we bulldoze through and we just figure it out and stay busy until things fall into place. And that doesn’t typically work. And so that’s what I do, is I help people navigate these life defining moments in their lives, whether it’s life, whether it’s business, whether it’s family, and just help them take what they’ve been through and use it to become who they are meant to be.

Lee Kantor: So in your mind, you see, like that’s a line of kind of delineation between therapy and coaching is therapy is more backwards looking and coaching is more forward looking.

Tami Imlay: Yes, 100%. And this is um, this is one of the things that you, you learn in therapy because we always it’s working on, um, identifying and, um, coming to grips with or understanding the past. And I loved that work. And then I would get to the point of, okay, now we’re at health. Now it’s like we get to look forward. And that’s like ethically, that’s when we’re supposed to, you know, well, break up with them. That’s when we’re supposed to send them on their way. And that’s the part that’s like, this is when the real work starts. And so yes, that is the that is the delineation. That’s the moment of where coaching happens. And we no longer work on therapy.

Lee Kantor: Did you have a coach to kind of see it and feel it for yourself and have that realization? Or like how did how did kind of that evolution happen for you to say, okay, you know what, the therapy thing is great for a certain person at a certain time, but maybe there’s something that can be more focusing. And then you found coaching. Like how did that kind of evolution happen?

Tami Imlay: So multiple things happened. One is when you change states you have to start your therapy process all over. Um, I was already feeling some tension. Um, and, uh, oddly enough, my ethics are higher than the government’s ethics. And so there was a couple of things that I really didn’t agree with in therapy. And I have a mentor who is a coach who was a therapist, and she’s like, Tami, what you’re talking about is coaching. And I was like, no, because in the therapy world, Worlds. Unfortunately, coaching is looking is really talked down upon because those are the people who can’t hack it as a as a therapist until you find out what it really is. But yes, like I had someone who walked me through and then I, um, well, you’ll know from like, I take lots of classes. I want to understand. I want to, you know, I’ve done a lot of things because I don’t know a lot of things. Like, that’s when I find something I don’t know. Then I just like, let me learn about it. And so I dove into understanding coaching. And the more I realized how they really partner together and they’re not, you know, one is right and one is wrong. It’s how they work together and how sometimes you need therapy. But a lot of times what you really need and what you want is coaching and helping you move through what’s going, what you’re what you’re going through.

Lee Kantor: So part of kind of this evolution for you, it sounds like you were just trying to find the best outcome for your client, and you were kind of agnostic to what that whatever that is, is. Um, so this was kind of helping you, um, deliver that type of, uh, outcome that in a more efficient way.

Tami Imlay: 100%. Like when I embraced coaching and I. And really, um, I started doing Enneagram work. And with the Enneagram, it’s really talking about your core motivations, why you do what you do. And when I saw the power that coaching had, I was working with a client. And after three sessions, she says, Tammy, I have made more transformation, more growth, more process progress in the last three sessions than I did in five years of therapy. I knew I was on to something and I dove in completely.

Lee Kantor: So let’s talk about the Enneagram. Uh, to be honest, I hadn’t heard of this until I was listening to a podcast with Amy Poehler, and she mentioned it, and she’s a super fan of it. So can you explain it to a person who doesn’t know much about it?

Tami Imlay: Yes. So there’s there’s a lot out there If you start googling it, you’re going to find all kinds of information. And there’s a lot of things that we, um, well, we dub the trend diagram like a bunch of memes and things because there are aspects of the Enneagram, which as a whole it is nine types is what Enneagram stands for in Latin, and I believe it’s Latin and it’s really just nine. The best way of thinking about it is you have nine people who do exactly the same behavior, but for nine different motivations. So it’s the why we react, how we do instead of like the behavior that we that we do. And so it’s really understanding our core foundation why we do what our brain filters through, what, um, childhood memories and childhood, um, concepts and beliefs that we caught because it worked in what our motivation is. So I am a type one. I’m an approver improver. It used to be called the perfectionist, and then they realize that it’s really not even perfection that we’re looking for. It’s really we just want to improve things for people. And so, as you can imagine it, you know, it’s not always great to try to tell people what to do. Um, and that’s the other part of the Enneagram is we we first start looking at the negative because as humans, we have that negativity bias that we understand and we we relate to. So by understanding why we do what we do and understanding that, like I as the improver, I can walk into a room and I can see all the mistakes, which again, not a great party trick, but by understanding that and by understanding even how I grieved the fact that once I realized that I was trying to do grief well, instead of just, and I was trying to do grief right, instead of just following the process by understanding that I was able to step back and look at what what I really need instead of what my gut reaction was.

Tami Imlay: And so this is just a lens. It’s just a, a a mirror into our core soul of how we respond to things, how we react to things, how we see the world. And then it gives us this idea of like, doesn’t put us in the box, but it steps us out of the box. So now we can make the changes to be who we really want to be. And so I know that not everything or everyone needs to be improved. And so I can really lean into if I’m if I am looking at things through the eyes of, oh, how can I make this better? And this is not a situation or a person that needs to be better. It is. It’s like gives me that moment to say, okay, let me stop with my reactions and let me really be intentional about listening to listening to others. So it’s just a lens that helps us understand why we do what we do. Like it’s really that simple.

Lee Kantor: But is it something that, um, if I take an assessment and I, um, get they identify, um, what my type is, is it something that’s static, or is it something that can change over time?

Tami Imlay: So this is this is another beauty with within the Enneagram. So first of all, a lot of the assessments people don’t tell you how to take them. This is the one personality assessment that really does come with instructions. Like really when you answer the questions you’re supposed to answer when you were when you were in your 20s. And that’s because as we age, typically we become there’s more gray area. We learn that the world is not all black and white, but when we’re in our 20s, it really is a like this is my belief. This is the hill I’ll die on. This is what I see as right or just or, you know, that’s how you understand the world. And so it’s, it’s something that your, your number does not change. But the beautiful thing of the Enneagram is it gives you a path to growth. There’s, as you can see, the symbol. If you look it up, it’s like a circle with a bunch of random lines there. So seemingly random lines, and those are all paths to stress and health. And so it gives you a understanding and you say, okay, no, I’m I am acting out of stress right now. What do I need to do? How do I need to take care of myself in order to move to growth? So to answer your question, it is static in that we are the same number. It is nature versus nurture. It’s what the lens that our brain collects data, but it also doesn’t keep you there because it gives you that. It opens the the world up to you, to what’s possible.

Lee Kantor: So once you identify your number and and the meaning behind that, how does that help you moving forward? Like what? How do you take that and kind of activate it to to help improve your situation?

Tami Imlay: So the first thing you do is you come to grips with everything that you read that’s on the negative. Like you look to see because most people, when they see it, they’re like it is. They don’t want to share it because it’s vulnerable. First thing you do is you look to see what the negative traits are, because typically those are the things that you may not love about yourself, but then you get to start looking at them as, how have they served me? How have they helped me grow? And so by just understanding, bringing things to light of why you do what you do again, as an approver, if I like. Well, I have two teenagers. Um, one of the chores that they have to rotate is cleaning the kitchen. And I am pretty nitpicky when it comes to the kitchen. There’s a lot of the house. I’m a homeschool mom, so we are. We are not ever like company ready. But I’ve chosen, through my understanding of the Enneagram and my need to have things right that, you know, kindness and relationship is better than having a spotless house. And so but with the kitchen, there’s things there’s always things that you can do to make it look better. Like you can always wipe down the counters. Um. It drives me nuts when there are. I don’t mind dishes in the sink, but I don’t mind like dishes outside of the sink.

Tami Imlay: But with the Enneagram, what I’ve understood is like, okay, well, first of all, like 17 and 15 year olds do not even see the dishes next to the sink. Like, though they are materialized there and they’re physically there. They don’t see them at all. And it’s given me that grace to say, okay, is this something that I need to deal with? Is this something I need to bring up or. And do I get super nitpicky with them? Or do I choose grace because I understand they’re 15 and 17, that they did what they thought was was good, and now I say, okay, well, I’m choosing to choose in the relationship instead of making them get up in the middle of the night and fix it, which is kind of what my parents did to me, is if you didn’t finish it, you they woke you up and you had to finish it. And so just that idea of now we know what we’re doing and we get to choose a different response. I don’t have a knee jerk reaction as. As often when things are not going my way, I have an understanding of, oh no, this is my natural tendency. But this is how I want to respond in this situation. And so it gives you that that ability.

Lee Kantor: So now how do you kind of incorporate this? Um, the Enneagram into your coaching. Is that something that happens right at the beginning, that you try to help a person understand where they’re at, and you can use that as a roadmap for how to help them, um, get the outcome they desire.

Tami Imlay: Yes. So that’s probably one of the first things we do is and there’s I have several clients who we start with that and then they don’t want to go any further with the Enneagram than the core motivations. And really, you don’t need to. It’s not something that I, I will dive deep with unless someone’s really interested in it. However, once you understand your core motivations and your core desire. So that’s the first thing we do. Because if you understand what? Lindsay has been driving all of your decisions up until now. If you understand the the limiting beliefs that you have, then you get to put them together and you get to decide, do I want to keep them? Are they serving me? How did they serve me and how do I really want to be now? Like, who am I in this next phase of life? And so I love it so much, um, to do it right off the bat, because when it gets down and dirty, it gets to the, the like core of a person and it breaks that barrier of like, I don’t know what’s going on. I, you know, the I don’t know how many times a day do we stop ourselves saying, I don’t know. Okay. Well, if you did know and if you had a tool that can push past that and be like, oh, I see I’m in stress and I don’t want to be in stress anymore. And with that path to growth, it’s like, okay, now we can take action to start changing that.

Tami Imlay: So I find that by working with the Enneagram as the first thing I do with my clients, it really accelerates our our our program together, our product together, our time together. And it really helps them get the results immediately. Because once you bring things to light, even these things that you feel are your weaknesses. A lot of times understanding how they are actually strengths and then embracing them is a way to, um, well, shift your team, shift your leadership, shift your even the things that you’re doing and your the way you relate to other people. And so yes. So long story short, yes, we start with the Enneagram. We talk about core motivations, your core desire. Because one of the things I talk about as an Enneagram, one as the improver, it’s because I want the world to be the best possible. Like, I want my my kids to be the best version of who they’re who they are. Like, I want people, my clients, I want the best for them. And a lot of times it takes this self-awareness on my part that what I believe is best for them may not be. And so, as with the Enneagram work and with the clients work is they get to see that themselves. Oh, I just had a client who, um, he is an Enneagram six, a loyalist, and we were talking about because he he brought up a subject, a situation, and he’s like, he’s just so disloyal.

Tami Imlay: And I was like, why? Why is he disloyal? And I was like, well, he’s like, well, because he’s not he’s not acting in a loyal manner. I was like, okay, well, let’s first define terms. And I was like, you write what you’re what loyalty means to you. And I will write the definition of loyalty. And we did this and we I, I read mine first. And he’s like, that’s not how I define it. I was like, oh, well, how did you define it? And we started this conversation. And the revelation he had in that moment is the person who he was working with, his employee, his team member actually didn’t even understand, like he was not looking through the lens of loyalty. He was looking through the lens of data. He was looking at like, this is not the right, the right outcome. And so it may have been a similar words that they used, but loyalty to his employee was making sure that the result was right for the organization versus the to the person. And so just having that revelation completely changed how he related to this employee. And now he can by having that revelation, having that understanding, he comes to him with data questions versus people questions. And so it just changed the whole team dynamic when he realized that not everyone sees the world through loyalty or even has the same definition as him.

Lee Kantor: Yeah, I would think that having this kind of the structure of the Enneagram at the heart of what you do, at least then there is an agreement of terms, and then people are kind of calling the same things. The same things. Uh, and that that could increase clarity and communication 100%.

Tami Imlay: It’s so much clarity happens when we just understand because even like success, how you define success and how I define success and in fact, like how I define success in my 20s is not how I define it today. And so by even ourselves having the how do I define this? What is my value and what does it mean to me now helps us bring clarity to what we really want and who we really are.

Lee Kantor: Now, what are your clients struggling with right before they pick up the phone? Or get on the internet and contact you? What is typically the the pain point that they’re going through, where they where they raise their hand and reach out.

Tami Imlay: Typically there’s there’s a couple of a couple of ideas, a couple of issues here. But the main one is, is that there’s a there’s a change, there’s a shift, whether it is a promotion, whether it’s a loss, whether it’s they’re navigating some pivotal moment in their life. That and they come to the idea that I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what my next steps are. I have confidence in I, I know or I did know, but now I don’t. And so, um, what I do is I, I help them with whatever they’re bringing, whatever they’re bringing to me. And typically there’s an unknowing I’m I’m feeling stuck. It’s not typically a burnout because they may be exhausted, but high level leaders don’t identify with burnout really. Like they have to get really bad before they’re like, oh, I’m burnt out. They just keep going. But when they feel unfulfilled, when they feel that there’s a pivotal, a big shift in what they’re doing or their future, and they don’t understand what it is or what it could mean, that’s when they typically come to me.

Lee Kantor: Now, are they typically are you the first coach they’ve ever worked with or are they moving from a previous coaching experience?

Tami Imlay: So this is interesting because I would say it’s half and half. Um, and really they look at coaches, many of them have had like leadership training. And so they consider me as the next level of leadership training. And then I introduced them to coaching. And so understanding we start with the basics. But um, and then but they’ve had because they’ve read all the books, they are they’ve gone to the classes, they’ve done the webinars, they’ve done the trainings. And still they need that personal step. And then that’s when they contact me and they again, they they look and they’re like, oh, I just it’s just the next step of leadership training. And then I get to introduce them to really what coaching is now.

Lee Kantor: Are do you kind of lead with the Enneagram as kind of a hook for them, or is that something that you deploy as a tactic after you started working with them for a beat?

Tami Imlay: So I don’t I don’t lead with that typically. Um, when I do workshops for teams, like I have one coming up and we’re doing an understanding of core motivations and how understanding your core motivations can help the team dynamics. So I kind of pull out elements of the Enneagram. But people, when high level leaders come, when high capacity people come, they are ready for another strategy. They want, you know, tell me what to do and do it. And so I want and I try to break that mold because it’s really not what you do. It’s who are you becoming. It’s less of the action you need to take because all these people are Uber successful and they’re still feeling like there’s something missing. And so we get to step back, we get to and a lot of times, you know, it’s called imposter syndrome or um, different things similar to that. But we get to step back and um, and I just ask them a couple questions. First, get them understanding that they actually know themselves more than they realize. Or maybe they haven’t actually listened to the things that they’ve been saying. So we record all of our sessions because of that. Even our even the discovery calls, like the sales calls, which I don’t really enjoy, the, you know, actual term sales calls, but, um, it’s that that journey of let’s, let’s talk strategy, but then also let’s lean in with, you know, what does that mean to you? And if you could define more so we start defining terms and things. So no, I don’t lead with the Enneagram. But I do talk about okay, if you understand at your core what the purpose of self-awareness. And because when you are self-aware and you have those core motivations, then confidence can come whether you know what’s about to hit you or not.

Lee Kantor: Now, when they’re, um, they’re working with you and they see a change, is it something that is do they feel like that it was something that you helped them bring about, or was it something that they uncovered in themselves?

Tami Imlay: My goal is to help them uncover it within themselves and know that it’s always been within them. Um, I, I love having like, watching and being part of the journey of the aha moment of having them realize that they are the confident leader, they are the aligned leader. They are the person who they’ve always thought and always wanted to be. They just haven’t embraced it yet. And so I my goal is to really help them embrace that they are competent and confident and they have the foundation even without me. Now with that, there are times like I, I was working with a client, um, and he sent me a message today talking about, like, these are some things that are changing. My people are really uncomfortable with it. Is this a good thing? And I was like, well, what do you think? And so my goal is to really remove me from the process because though I’m, you know, I’m the coach and I don’t have all the answers, but I, I ask pretty darn good questions. And my goal is to help you see that you don’t need external validation, that you have it within you already. And so to answer your question, it is my goal is to help you embrace your awesomeness.

Lee Kantor: Now, are you working primarily with that one leader in the organization, or is the leader hiring you to work with their team or their organization as a whole? Or do you do some of both?

Tami Imlay: I do both. And so typically first steps like I will work. I’ll do like a workshop series I go in for um, they’ll hire me for like a, you know, 2 or 3 times I have, um, coming in October. I’m doing a six session series on communication with the team. And, um, but then from there it’s typically like, okay, like, I have a leader who really they’re in the right spot, but they’re they’re floundering. Or, um, my favorite is to work with leaders who are okay, I know I’m good at what I do, but I don’t know why. I don’t know how to keep doing it. And so if they want to take it to the next level that’s in the Enneagram work does wonders with that as well, but I do a mixture of both. I love one on ones, and I love working with small teams and just watching watching those light bulbs go on about like why things happen the way they do, um, within them. So I do a mixture and I really love one on ones, but I also love doing workshops and, um, in a group as well. And just like starting to turn on those light bulbs to what’s possible when you look at who you are and why you do what you do.

Lee Kantor: Can you share a story? Or maybe one of the teams you work with, maybe share what the challenge was that they brought you in for initially, and how you were able to get them to a new level, obviously. Don’t name the name of the organization, but just the challenge and then, uh, how you were able to help them?

Tami Imlay: Yes. So I work with well, it’s in the hospitality industry. It’s a well-known, um, a well-known hotel. And their, their leader, their GM brought me in because they had a lot of new leaders in director positions. And basically what was happening is they were everyone was trying to embrace their position, which caused tension in the in them together. And so as a leadership team, they were still so focused. They were like they had silos and they were not communicating well. And so one of the things he did is he brought me in. So that way we can talk about and again, like we talked about defining terms. First thing we did was start to define the terms. So that way they can start communicating better together. When we understood okay, what is the ultimate mission. And then the department’s mission and see how each of them play a part. Operations can’t work without HR and HR can’t work without operations. But seemingly like they have different missions. But they really didn’t. And so, um, what what we did is we broke down and we got everyone on one goal, one mission for the organization.

Tami Imlay: And then we broke it into how does your department play into this? What is your role in this department? And then say, say operations. And then how can HR help you achieve your goal? How can hospitality, um, work to achieve the operations goal? But by bringing the team together and realizing that they have one common goal, that they’re not in competition with each other, that they work in tandem, then at that moment, and really, it took the first session, it started, things started changing, and I would get texts from multiple individuals being like, I didn’t realize that I was so focused only on the numbers and that I was hurting hospitality because their theirs are the people and the experience. And so that’s what we we do is we break down. The issue was communication, the silos, the the using one definition, one term, but having multiple definitions based on the different organizations, not organizations, the different departments. And so we just broke that down. And then we got to build it back up together. And so now the team is flourishing.

Lee Kantor: And when they realize they’re all on the same team, it’s amazing what can get done.

Tami Imlay: It is. And then realizing that there’s no competitive advantage by you succeeding and the other department. Not like if you both succeed together then you can crush goals even faster, right?

Lee Kantor: Everybody wins.

Tami Imlay: Yeah. The. I love the saying that rising tide raises all ships. It’s like it really does. We don’t need to compete.

Lee Kantor: Uh. Good stuff. Well, if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or your team, what is the website? What is the best way to connect?

Tami Imlay: Best way is on LinkedIn. Um, Tammy. Imlay. Tammy, I’m l a y. And Tammy Marie coaching.com. Which just Tammy again. T a m. I’m a r I e coaching.com. So thank you so much for having me, Lee.

Lee Kantor: Well, um, on that website, they can get information about your coaching. They can learn more about your podcast and they can connect with you.

Tami Imlay: Absolutely. And, um, a leaders Leaders Purpose podcast is my podcast. You can listen to that anywhere that podcasts are. My favorite is obviously Apple along with millions of people. Um, but yeah, just reach out. I love connecting. Um, send me a DM on LinkedIn. It will be me responding to you. Um, I just love talking with leaders and listening to the things that they’re working through.

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

Tami Imlay: Thank you so much.

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

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