Latest / Black Girls Consult TOO! / Episode 98: Building a Consulting Business that Works for You [Consulting Simplified Series - Part 5]

Transcript

Episode 98: Building a Consulting Business that Works for You [Consulting Simplified Series - Part 5] · Black Girls Consult TOO!

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: There's a misconception that we don't exist, that somehow our ability to excel at the highest level of our industry is limited, that overcoming barriers as a woman of color would be insurmountable.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: But what would happen if we decided to venture out on our own, despite everything we're up against?
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: I'll tell you Welcome to the Black Girls Consult 2 podcast.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: I'm your host, dr Angelina Davis, a healthcare consultant, consulting coach, high performance fanatic wife and proud girl mom.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: I help transform female professionals into thriving solo consultants and, just like you, I'm wearing all the hats and doing all the things.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: So this podcast is to empower the busy female professionals to move past fear to start and grow a successful consulting business, despite the obstacles you may encounter.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: We'll dive deep into consulting practice, business strategy, mindset and more.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: So grab your cup of coffee or tea, if that's your thing, and let's get started.
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: Hello, hello, hello.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Black Girls Consult 2 podcast.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: Consulting simplified podcast series.
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: I cannot believe that we are already at episode five.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: I am so happy that you have joined me on this podcast series and today I wanted to dive into something a little bit different, especially as we're closing out and talk about building a business that works for you.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: So, as we're thinking about consulting being a simple process, something that we can do easily, I want us to talk about how that fits into our lives and how that is, I feel like, the key to you being able to achieve success and longevity over the long term.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: Because if it doesn't fit into your life, if it's not something that you can easily do, it would be very hard for you to sustain.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: So one of the reasons why many consultants have difficulty growing their business is because they have created a business that's not a reflection of what they have envisioned, and it's very challenging when you're switching from your nine to five, for instance, to entrepreneurship.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: And one of the reasons why that's the case is because many times, we are carrying the same limited view and the same unnecessary restraints into our business.
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: So all of those things that we felt were suffocating us or that were limiting our creativity, that were keeping us from functioning in a way that we would be most effective.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: We carry much of that into our business, oftentimes because it's what we've seen over many years, and so it makes sense.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: It is something that has defined everything from the hours that we choose to work in our business to what we define as even a professional appearance.
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: This is just spag it.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: It creates an unnecessary obstacle that doesn't have to be there, and this is part of what complicates many business models.
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: Even the most simple business models can get complicated because we have not been able to shift gears from this nine to five mindset or this practice that we had in our careers, and I have definitely been there before.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: That's why I wanted to use this opportunity to share with you how I build a business that works for my life, and how you can do the same thing too, because for me, I had so much going on at the time and I knew that I wanted to pursue my dream.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: I still have other things that I desire to do and accomplish, and I wanted to not sit on those things any longer and move forward, and so I was juggling a lot, and I know that is just like you, and what I want to stress through this podcast series, through all the work that I do, through the programs that I offer, is that you can build a business that is highly successful and is something that also fulfills you in every aspect of your life.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: So this leads me right into the first thing I had to realize, which is that my business was an extension of my life experience and it was not a separate reality.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: One of the reasons why I believe so many people have difficulty being the face of their business or their business brand is because they don't believe that they actually embody the high standards that they've set for the business that they're creating.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: So if you are a woman, especially a woman of color, and you carry weight from corporate America, where you've mastered this whole art of quote-unquote coat switching or playing the game in order for you to rise to the top I know that's what I did, so I was very familiar with that it's difficult to unlearn that pattern, and so you feel as if you need to be somebody else, embody somebody else, present yourself a different way in order for you to achieve success.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: But this is no longer necessary in your business.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: It's not.
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: You're building a business on your terms, and so when you focus on building a presence in your business where you can show up authentically as yourself, it's going to become easier for you to begin to integrate that business into your life.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: And this actually stood out on a recent trip that I took with a couple of girlfriends.
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: We were doing a working vacation and at that time I was just taking a couple of clips here and there in order to record it on my phone and I made a really quick post and put up this video.
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: It probably took me all of maybe 15 minutes at the most to make and they were really taken aback and astonished that I was taking care of all of my content creation and posting and marketing for the day while we were actively working.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: And it was new to them because they were used to carving out time in order to make those things happen, to capture the content that they needed to create the quality of content that they need, they felt they needed to put out, and I was just doing it.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: And one of the reasons why I felt comfortable in that space is because I found a way to be comfortable being myself authentically in my business.
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: So that's the first thing is that I want you to embrace who you are and realize that who you are is enough that you can show up as you are in your business, on your terms, to attract the clients that would be truly aligned with you and who you are at your core.
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: So that's one of the first things that I had to learn.
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: The second is that I had to understand that a blanket and very general approach was really designed to provide more of a roadmap, but I had to actually do the work to adapt that roadmap to my destination.
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: And I want you to think about this like any physical map that you will pull out for a trip.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: I know we don't do that any longer, but when I was growing up, we would take road trips all the time.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: We would road tripping family and my father would have this massive map wherever we were going.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: And I remember one year we were going up to Rhode Island because I had family up there, and he mapped out the whole journey.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: Back in the day we didn't have I'm telling my age now Back in the day we didn't have the comfort of, and ease of, google Maps and things of that nature, so you had to map out your stops and where were you going to find a hotel and things like that along the way, and so he would sit there and map out the journey.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: And that's because there was more than one way to get there.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: There were different routes that you could actually take and if we wanted to get to our specific destination, just because someone may tell us how to get to the state of Rhode Island.
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: It didn't mean that we were going to get to the actual house my aunt's house that we needed to get to right.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: We had to have a more personalized view of the journey so that we can get to our actual destination, and that's very similar to what we're doing in business.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: Each and every one of us has a different goal, so it really is very unrealistic to expect your personal desire outcome to be something that you achieve without doing any additional work.
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: That part just doesn't really make sense when we think about it.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: Part of the growth that many people desire is actually tied up in the boring work.
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: Right, it's attached to the repeated processes, the data tracking, the analysis, the adjustments and doing things over and over again.
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: That's the boring work, and there is a journey to reaching simplicity and it comes from going through this.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Probably, what people see is a boring and mundane approach, and I was like to say that the simple business you desire Is on the other side of the work you have yet to do.
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: The benefit of courses and coaching programs and consultations and things of that nature are to shorten this journey, remove the number of the failed options from the table and it really does provide you with what is the most likely path to success as you move forward, but it is not meant to give you your actual outcome.
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: That outcome is something you still have to create.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: You have to be able to do the work.
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: I had to stop swiping my car for ten thousand different programs and become more intentional in determining what I actually needed in order to move my business forward step by step.
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: So as I made investments, as I decided to make Other large decisions, as I design strategy for my business, I had to make sure that I was doing it with intention.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: To lead me to my desire destination, I have to fall in love with the journey, and the clarity that gain from that process is what freed up so much of my time and energy and money, to be honest.
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: But it really did.
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: It made things simpler and less complex because I was focused on getting to a destination and thinking about how I navigated the road map that had been provided to get me there safely In, safely being within a reasonable time frame, without losing a lot of money and causing my business to fail.
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: So that was one of the second things I had to learn is that I still had to do work to adapt the road map I had been given to my personal journey.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: Then the third is that I had to actually accept that there was a critical mass that I had to reach before the momentum swung in my favor.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: One of my first coaches Told me years ago to focus on building a critical mass of content, and at that time I did listen for a while and then, when it got hard and I saw other people Seemingly move faster than me and get ahead because they were taking shortcuts, I decided I was going to switch gears and try to find a shortcut to Do.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: You know what happened?
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: I'm sure you can probably guess.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: I wasted so much time spinning in circles, trying tactic after tactic, only to return to the initial piece of advice I received.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: And what?
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: Do you know?
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: That when I did that, the momentum started to build and it was evident to me that the key to longevity and Achieving the success that I wanted was in consistently doing the work when you don't feel like it's paying off.
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: There is a lot to be gained when you're able to build credibility and trust.
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: But credibility, trust, respect for your work that is something that is not won overnight the word of mouth advertising that many people talk about in order for you to sell your consulting services, grow your business and move ahead.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: That is something that will not come, typically, from one client.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: Every now and then people get someone who is really big in the field.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: That may allow them to attract more clients because of that particular referral recommendation, but most often your business will grow as a result of you amassing a critical volume of results you need to put in the reps.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: That's just a fact in the reality and when I accepted that, that's when everything took off, because when you do, you build a level of self-trust and you create processes that are more predictable.
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: So you build a level of predictability in your business that helps you move to the next level.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: The thing is it takes time, and if you have been listening to this series and you want to build a business that works for your life and becomes simple for you to actually execute and navigate, you have to understand that these things take time and you have to fall in love with the journey.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: I want you to focus on building success along the way so that the result of your work, the things that you do, actually serves as evidence to other people of the possibility that actually lies ahead.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: Because, in the end, what people can see demonstrated through what you do is what's going to sell your business faster than any testimonial, all the testimonials that you have combined.
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: It is so, as you're thinking about simplicity as you move forward from this podcast series, I want you to realize that there are a few things that you need to do In addition to just trying to simplify your day-to-day approach.
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: You have to realize that your business is an extension of your life experience, so you can incorporate it more seamlessly into your day, that you have to put in the work to adapt the roadmap you've been given to your specific destination and then accept that you're going to have to do the work to build momentum.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: But once that momentum is achieved, then oh my gosh only.
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: But the best things are ahead.
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: So I hope you've enjoyed this series.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: I hope it's been helpful.
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: I hope it's helped you think about ways that you can build some simplicity into your business so that you can achieve success and longevity.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: That is my mission and my desire for you, and so, with that being said, I will look forward to talking to you again later on.
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: The Black Girls Console 2 podcast.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: All right, take care.
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: Thank you for tuning in to the Black Girls Console 2 podcast.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to leave your review on Apple Podcast, subscribe and share it with a friend.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: We're on a mission to increase the success and longevity of women in consulting, and you can help us do that.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: Also, I'd love to hear from you, so let's connect at Dr Angelina Davis on Instagram or LinkedIn, and don't forget to visit excelatconsultingcom for more information to support your consulting journey.
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: Until next time, take care.