Latest / Scrappy but Successful [Consultant's Personalities When No One's Watching] / 9. The Scrappy Strategist: How La Tonya Roberts Went from Cosmetologist to COO with La Tonya Roberts

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9. The Scrappy Strategist: How La Tonya Roberts Went from Cosmetologist to COO with La Tonya Roberts · Scrappy but Successful [Consultant's Personalities When No One's Watching]

• 0:03
  Jack Tompkins: What's going on everybody? Welcome to Scrappy But Successful. It's a show where I sit down with your favorite consultants and we take the comedic route through their early life, find out if they're successful today because they're sophisticated or because they're a little bit scrappy. I'm your host, Jack Tompkins, the CEO of Pineapple Consulting Firm with fun fact of the day, crows can remember and recognize human faces and they hold grudges folks, so be careful. But that's neither here nor there. Today I'm joined by my friend, La Tonya Roberts. She's the founder of Harmony Consulting Group. She's much more than that. She's a mom, she's a fractal COO, AI strategist, she's the host of the podcast called Systems That Set You Free. Very impressive resume. We're gonna talk much more about that throughout the episode. But, La Tonya, first question. We know you're successful, but do you think you fall more on the sophisticated side or more on the scrappy side?
• 0:53
  La Tonya Roberts: definitely scrappy.
• 0:55
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah, okay. I'm in the same boat. We will see if the data agrees with you. Take me back to the beginning. Where did you grow up? Did you have any entrepreneurs in the family?
• 1:00
  La Tonya Roberts: Alright. I grew up in Army Brat. So every three years or so we moved until we finally settled in Maryland. So California, Germany, Alaska, South Carolina, Maryland, and then eventually Virginia. And now I'm out here in Atlanta. ⁓ Entrepreneurs, had an aunt that was an entrepreneur. And then, ⁓
• 1:18
  Jack Tompkins: Well.
• 1:31
  La Tonya Roberts: Eventually as I got older, me, my dad, and my sister, we all went into entrepreneurship at the same time while working a job.
• 1:39
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, wait, so all at the same time, different companies put out the same.
• 1:42
  La Tonya Roberts: All around the same time period, we all started our own businesses.
• 1:47
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, what was the first thing that you started?
• 1:51
  La Tonya Roberts: HR consulting firm where I really focused on resume writing and interview prep was the first thing I started with.
• 2:02
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, okay, very nice. So interview prep for college, for jobs, for promotions. Okay, okay, very nice. Okay, so you've been an entrepreneur for a while now, I love it. Did you always have that spirit, like did you have a lemonade stand as a kid or anything?
• 2:08
  La Tonya Roberts: For jobs. For jobs. Yeah, that was back in 2013. Mm-hmm. I had a lemonade stand, a chocolate bar stand. I sold Girl Scout cookies. I did the whole MLM route as I got older. I sold insurance at one point. And then I sold business contracts as a consultant. So yeah.
• 2:31
  Jack Tompkins: Okay. Yeah, that's okay. All right, we got a lot there. So are you doing all of these at the same time? like, are you selling candy on the side lemonade at one stand? Like, how's this all working?
• 2:50
  La Tonya Roberts: You know what? It was whatever I felt like. So the lemonade stand was and actually in the candy all while we lived in Alaska. We were stationed at Fort Wainwright, Alaska. And I feel like I hit the jackpot in terms of where we live because most of the people had to come past this parking lot that was close to my house. And I monitored when the soldiers were done with PT. I'm like, ooh, they're finished. Because my dad was a drill sergeant. they're finished, they just ran all these miles and did all these things, they're gonna be hungry or thirsty. Let me set up this stand right here in this parking lot that's at the entry point of housing. And so, yeah, so I sold lemonade or chocolate bars. Yeah.
• 3:39
  Jack Tompkins: Amazing. That's so strategic. How old are you at this point?
• 3:43
  La Tonya Roberts: ⁓ I was in, I think third grade, so whatever that is, 7-8.
• 3:50
  Jack Tompkins: That's impressive to be able to strategically say, OK, my best asset is a hungry audience, so let me put this in front of them as they walk by.
• 3:59
  La Tonya Roberts: Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. You go to where they are.
• 4:02
  Jack Tompkins: Are you bartering with... Right, exactly! Just meet in the market where it's at, there's nothing wrong with that. Are you bartering with friends as a kid or anything?
• 4:15
  La Tonya Roberts: Yes, I parted with friends as a kid, as a college student, as an adult. Yeah, I'm like, you got something I want, I got something you want. Let's exchange here.
• 4:24
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, lots of handshake deals going on. Did you have to sell your parents on anything? So like, if we take bartering to a next level, like hot commodity that you want as a kid, did you have to sell them? And did you end up getting it?
• 4:35
  La Tonya Roberts: Hmm. Yes, so we didn't grow up with a lot of money. at one point I wanted to be a lawyer and I would practice my negotiation skills. ⁓ So I do presentations for things that I've wanted, like the big Christmas gift. And even in college, ⁓ my dad and I actually, he was ending his military career.
• 4:50
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah.
• 5:05
  La Tonya Roberts: at the same time that I was an undergrad and he was finishing up as I was coming in and he went to school for business. And so started doing presentations for him, like formal PowerPoint presentations. And like, here's the pros and cons and this is what I want. This is what I'm gonna do with it. And then my sister who's four years behind me in school, when she wouldn't want something, I'm like, girl, this is the trick. This is how you get this, right? And so she got a car. I didn't get a car. I got a down payment for a car. She actually got the car. So she had some lessons learned through me as the big sis. And yeah, so we would do full-on presentations of what we wanted and the benefits.
• 5:46
  Jack Tompkins: You had a whole investor pitch framework that you could deliver. That's awesome. ⁓ How successful were they? Were you like every other time you were getting the thing that you were asking for?
• 5:51
  La Tonya Roberts: Hope they have speeches presentation. Yeah, they were good. My parents loved it. ⁓ If you ask my mom, would say that, actually both my parents, they say I came out running the show. And so everyone had to get on my schedule. They quickly learned, like they were both in the military at the time. They were used to structure and doing these things. And I came out like, clean me up, keep me clean, keep me fed. keep me happy and we won't have any problems. So my mom would literally drop me off at the babysitter with a note that said, if this happens, then do this. There's an extra outfit in here, do this. If she gets cranky, she's either hungry or she needs a book. If you want your day to go smoothly, these are the things that she needs. So she said we got on, they got on our schedule or my schedule. And then, yeah, I was a pretty good negotiator as a kid. I usually got what I want. My dad quickly learned like, you're going to do what you want to do anyway. And as long as you're not hurting yourself, or it's not too bad, I'm going to just let you go with it. And I'm going to help you figure things out along the way. But yeah.
• 7:10
  Jack Tompkins: And we'll call it supportive parenting. Do your kids do the same thing to you now?
• 7:12
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah, support a parenting. What a very headstrong kid. Yes, they do. They are, it's so funny. My mom would always tell me you're gonna get it back to you times 10 and I do. Right? Like most millennial parents, we raised our kids to know that you have a voice and you have choices. And my kids took that to heart. And they have really good memories.
• 7:29
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah.
• 7:44
  La Tonya Roberts: better than I do, especially that younger one. It's like that second kid. I always say she's my no limit soldier. Like she just holds onto everything and has no fear. And so ⁓ she throws things that I say in my face all the time and they let me know, hey, mom, you're wrong. Cause you said do this and now you're doing this. Or you said if we did this, then we can do this. So they call me out on my stuff all the time and ⁓ it is hilarious. I'm like, you know what, you're right. ⁓ Got it.
• 8:14
  Jack Tompkins: man. Okay, negotiating with somebody that has an impeccable memory like that's so difficult because they're like, you're either wrong a year ago and you've been lying to me for a year or you're wrong right now, you choose.
• 8:29
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah. yeah. And they have no fear. Like my, my oldest, she's 21 and I would always tell them you're not in a, I don't care what the government says. You are not an adult till you pay bills. Well, she pays her own bills. She pays her rent. I, I still support, right? She doesn't pay everything. Lord, she would lose it, but she pays a lot of bills right now. And so she reminds me as soon as she turned 21, she's like, you cannot call me the kid anymore. I pay my own bills and according to you.
• 8:40
  Jack Tompkins: Yep. Wow. Do you have to be like really steadfast in what you tell probably like a 12 year old in your case because they're going to remember it for the next dozen years?
• 9:14
  La Tonya Roberts: My kids? Yes, yes. Mm-hmm. What's coming back?
• 9:15
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah. Because you know it's coming back. So you have to like, do you have a like, this will apply to business too, but like, did you start with like a parenting framework of here's the rules and stuff that we're going to do. And it's going to be, it's going to evolve, but it's going to have the same set of principles because we know it's going to come back to us.
• 9:38
  La Tonya Roberts: No, I don't think that any parent really can because it's like you go into it thinking you're going to be one type of parent and then this kid comes out with all this personality and they look cute and you want to give them everything that they want and ⁓ yeah that goes out the window fast but
• 9:39
  Jack Tompkins: Okay.
• 10:04
  La Tonya Roberts: what I did know and that I took away from my childhood was that I wanted kids that were pretty independent and could take care of themselves. And I learned their little personalities and realized, hey, we could have a lot of fun here and we could make a game. And if I sung a song, they would do anything. So everything was a song in my house. Most things were a game. So all their chores, know, all the clean up, clean up, clean up songs and you know, if you like it, you might try it. And I got them involved in all the house stuff because when they were younger, I was a single co-parenting mom. So it was just me. And at one point when I became a newly single mom, I was working a full-time job at Booz Allen Hamilton as a consultant, still newer in my career. My kids were toddlers and I had just started grad school. So I had a lot on my plate. So me, doing it all after a few months, I'm like, I'm going to crash and burn, or we put some structure in place to get even my three-year-old to help out a little bit with the one-year-old and help keep the house clean because everything was going to fall apart because when was I going to clean a whole house? ⁓ So that helped out a lot, keeping that structure. And then ⁓ when they got in high school, I started looking differently, like, okay, now you're getting, I'm preparing you to leave the house. So I did what I call life school. And they had to learn to do certain things that, mostly that I would feel comfortable than being away from the house and knew that they would make good choices and they would be able to take care of themselves. So it evolved as they got older, but it started. young so now when I look at my friends and their kids are like eight and nine and they don't do chores I'm like what are you doing you are setting yourself like no wonder you're stressed girl I was doing laundry at eight I was like pull a step stool up to that that sink and get the kid to start washing dishes so what if you have to go back and wash them again eventually they'll get it so right right exactly so yeah
• 12:07
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, you've got free helpers in the house. Let's use them. I love it. How are your kids grades in high school versus your grades in high school?
• 12:29
  La Tonya Roberts: ⁓ so all of us are overachievers. Me and the youngest, the most, so A's and B's most of time. My oldest struggled a little bit. There was a time, and I'm like, girl, just get a C. Please get a C. We will work from there, and then eventually she got it together. And so on a roll, they both graduated with, one was like a 4.2 GPA and the other 3.7 or something like that. So they did good.
• 12:48
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah.
• 13:06
  La Tonya Roberts: They finish strong. The start is very, but they finish strong. Yes, I was not over a 4.0, but it was up there. I got a full scholarship to undergrad, so it was good enough on academic scholarship. So there we go.
• 13:09
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah. Okay, and yours, similar boat A's and B's. Okay. Hey, that's a win. Talk about a KPI to measure success. Free college will do it.
• 13:30
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ and that was definitely a KPI in my house. Both my kids got full rides to school. yeah. And I'm like, well, this is the deal. Like, you want a car and you want all these things, you got to take care of college and you can do that with your academics.
• 13:37
  Jack Tompkins: Wow. Okay, so you're back in your high school, you're killing it, you're getting a full ride, you're also running all these kind of side hustle, side businesses going on too. Plus you're moving every few years. Do you develop this whole like, okay, that was yesterday, today is today, and I'm just gonna go meet the new people at the new school kind of mentality?
• 14:10
  La Tonya Roberts: You do, I did. I moved every three years until I got in middle school. ⁓
• 14:16
  Jack Tompkins: Okay.
• 14:20
  La Tonya Roberts: literally right after I graduated middle school, my dad got stationed from Maryland to Virginia, but my parents split up. So we stayed in Maryland. So I was able to matriculate into a not, I went to a technical high school, which that was a whole other hustle. I stayed at the high school, but my mom ended up getting a new job in Virginia, actually close to where my dad moved to. What was it?
• 14:39
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah.
• 14:50
  La Tonya Roberts: sophomore or junior year. And she's like, I think we're going to go move. And we had gone and looked at new schools and new places to live. And I was like, I'm not moving. You can go. I'm not moving. I'll move in with my best friend. I've already negotiated. Like I've talked to her mom. I'm there every weekend anyway. You go. I'll see you on the weekend. So my mom ended up staying until I left for college and then she moved, but she traveled.
• 15:05
  Jack Tompkins: You already set the proposal in.
• 15:19
  La Tonya Roberts: several miles back and forth, several hours every single day to get to work because I refused. I refused to move. like, I'm done. I have friends. I like them. I have a life. And I was a shy kid. So I'm like, don't do this to me. And so it was nice. And she got it. My mom was also a military child. So she understood the struggle. And yeah, she, my mom loved me and she stayed and commuted for two years from.
• 15:28
  Jack Tompkins: It was the house of- Right.
• 15:49
  La Tonya Roberts: Aberdeen, Maryland, all the way to Alexandria, Virginia, which is, if you're from the DMV, you know, that it's like a good two hours. One way.
• 15:59
  Jack Tompkins: That is love quantified if I've ever heard of it.
• 16:01
  La Tonya Roberts: It is, it is. She got me in college and like the week later she was like, I'm out. And she moved.
• 16:08
  Jack Tompkins: I don't flavor that's I mean again. This is the house according to La Tonya. I love it. You're laying down the law What's the first like a quote unquote real job? Like maybe it's a W-2 or something like that.
• 16:23
  La Tonya Roberts: My first real job was working, well the first job I ever had was a snowball stand before that babysitting. like real, real job was actually, and I did the whole, worked at KFC, but I would say like my adultish job was, I was a cosmetologist. So I worked at Haircuttery when I went to technical high school. ⁓ I majored in cosmetology, so I was able to work in hair salons and I did that for a while. until I had my daughter. I was already working in hair salons starting in the 10th grade. I started out as a shampoo girl ⁓ and then once I got my enough hours right before I got my license I actually moved up to be a hairstylist.
• 16:53
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, okay, so this is in high school, you're also doing cosmetology. Wow. Okay, gotcha. Okay, so there's different like you could sweep the floors without a license, obviously you could do shampooing.
• 17:19
  La Tonya Roberts: Right, could shampoo and help out and then once you hit a certain number of hours you can actually become a stylist. And so I started out working at a day spa as a shampoo girl and then when I was able to actually get behind the chair I moved over to Haircuttery, you know, like you don't expect a lot from a chain hair salon. it was pretty easy. ⁓ So I moved over there and was able to keep that roll till... I about sophomore year in college. I just moved to a different salon that was closer to my school.
• 17:54
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, I know this happens with like ⁓ some stylists and barbers and stuff like that too. Were you an LLC that was basically renting the chair or were you part of hair cutery?
• 18:03
  La Tonya Roberts: No, this is a long time ago. So that model did not exist. Or at least it wasn't well known when I started working as a stylist. It actually, I think it was, yeah, hair cuttery started the model where you would have your own salon suites when I was in college and ⁓ it started growing and I am.
• 18:06
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah.
• 18:31
  La Tonya Roberts: kicking myself because I was like, that is an amazing idea. I should do this and I never did it. It was my Bitcoin moment and I missed out. But yeah, so that model actually didn't start until the earlier 2000s and it became popular and yeah, hair cutter was one of the first people to do it.
• 18:52
  Jack Tompkins: Nice, okay. Was that the end goal where you're like, all right, this is good, it's working enough, or were you going destined for consulting kind of right out of the gate?
• 19:02
  La Tonya Roberts: I was destined for entrepreneurship. What that looked like at first was one, I was like, okay, I'm gonna be an independent stylist and I'm going to go work in New York for a little while. New York was a short train ride from where, from Baltimore and like an hour and a half, two hours. And I could charge $600 for a haircut and I could make my rent in a weekend and I'd be.
• 19:28
  Jack Tompkins: world.
• 19:31
  La Tonya Roberts: Good. And then I would teach at hair shows or cosmetology schools. That was plan number one. The other plan was, and a little bit later it was, I'm going to open up a salon in the Caribbean and I'll work at a spa in the Caribbean and I'll do that. ⁓ The consulting thing I got introduced to, and remember I said that my dad was in school at the same time I was. So. He retired in Alexandria, Virginia. So like think Pentagon and all that stuff is around him. And when he retired, he walked out in a uniform and in a business suit, he was working at this place called the Hoffman Buildings. And he became a consultant and I had never, I never knew what that was about. And I remember my English professor asked me as freshman year, what do you want to do when you graduate? I was like, I don't know. I want to stand in front of people. I want people to listen to me. I'm like, I, can solve problems, I'm great at that. I just want people to listen to me, right? A little five foot four hundred nothing pounds. You're gonna listen to what I have to say. right. Exactly, exactly. So my dad, he started this thing called consulting and we got to talking. I like, well, what is this? And then when I graduated, he...
• 20:40
  Jack Tompkins: just like my parents did.
• 20:54
  La Tonya Roberts: got me an informational interview with one of the ladies that worked in his building and I got a chance to walk around and I'm like, my gosh, this is amazing. ⁓ These people, like, I'd only seen this on TV or in the movies. And I didn't get the job right then, but then about six months later, she brought me back and she's like, hey, I have an opportunity available for you. Would you like to take it? And that's how I got into consulting. And that was in 2006.
• 21:21
  Jack Tompkins: Okay. Okay. So 2006 consulting, 2013 is the first year on your own business. did you build that on the side?
• 21:22
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah, 20 years ago. It was a side hustle. It was like, oh, you're really good at doing resumes and you helped me out getting this job, like friends out. And then people just started referring to me. So I do a few a year. I didn't go all in on my business until 2020.
• 21:49
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, that's become what it is today, Harmony Contola. Okay, tell me this. Tell me the story of launching that. It's like what, helps make the decision. It's COVID times, it's 2020. Tell me the story of what's going on there.
• 22:07
  La Tonya Roberts: Well, when I, so let's back up to 2015 and I had just started at Deloitte. And when I went into Deloitte, I said, I'm either gonna leave here as a partner or I'm gonna leave as a business owner and leverage the relationships that I built. Right? Yeah, I'll always have a plan. Okay, always have a plan. And then,
• 22:25
  Jack Tompkins: Always got a plan, okay?
• 22:33
  La Tonya Roberts: Things started happening, life started happening, and I was like, you know what, I think I want to go out and do this on my own. And I started working with some friends of mine. had one girlfriend that I actually kind of coached her through leaving consulting and eventually the government into running her HR consulting business full time. And she would always say, when are you going to fly? And I'm like, that stuck with me for years. I'm like, you're right. She was like, do it. And I was scared. I'm like, I'm going stay with mom. If this fails, like I'm not married. I was like, I am the plan. I never depended on anyone before. you know, my oldest kid, broke her ACL. Then we immediately, she had surgery. I take off for three months to take care of her. Come back to work at the beginning of February, 2020. Two weeks later, COVID hits. So it's a lot of change, it's a lot of change. And I was like, okay, it's getting real. And I was like, what do you wanna do? I started asking, what am I doing? Like a lot of people. And ⁓ eventually that same friend that said, when are you gonna fly? She had an opportunity and I just decided I'm moving to Atlanta. ⁓ I wanted it to lower my cost of living because if entrepreneurship was gonna be a real thing, if it was going to be my plan A, I had to cut some. expenses. And living in the DMV was very expensive. So she and I, ended up partnering, we got a contract and a year later, I'm in Atlanta, much lower cost of living. And it was costing me more to stay on the job than it was to go full time. And I left. And that was the goal when I moved to Atlanta, I said I'm gonna give myself a year. And I two days short of a year, I was my last day at Deloitte.
• 24:31
  Jack Tompkins: Holy crap, okay, this is strategic scrappiness up till this point, right? You've always got a plan and the plan seems to pretty much always work from what it sounds like, right?
• 24:36
  La Tonya Roberts: Mm-hmm. Yeah, if you ask my boyfriend, like, can you please dream? Because a lot of things come to me in dreams. like, can you please dream of the lottery numbers? Because you manifest like nobody else I know. And I'm like, I'm sorry, but the numbers aren't coming to me. I dream of business ideas and problem solving.
• 25:02
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, so that's actually, it's one of my somewhat standard questions now is were you ever really into playing the lottery or was that too much out of your control? Yeah.
• 25:11
  La Tonya Roberts: No, no, I know. Because they said there's like a one in how many million? I'm like, the probability here doesn't make sense. I can't control that. I can control how hard I work.
• 25:21
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah. Yeah. Yep.
• 25:26
  La Tonya Roberts: or I can control what I put in place, the systems I put in place. can't control it.
• 25:32
  Jack Tompkins: Exactly. Yeah, that's I've got a plan. I'm saving the plan. The plan's working. I'm not going to trust anybody else with my fate.
• 25:37
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah, and if a plan doesn't work, we pivot and we rewrite the plan.
• 25:41
  Jack Tompkins: Right. So speaking of that, so 2020, you're in Atlanta, lower cost of living. Hopefully this entrepreneur, this full-time entrepreneur thing works out. It starts pretty strong. Because you go in with one or two business partners. Okay.
• 25:55
  La Tonya Roberts: Two, she said to me, I had this other person that came to me and said, we want to do some stuff on DEI. Because if you recall, at the same time, DEI was a really big thing. And I was already doing some DEI work internally at Deloitte and working at Human Capital. And so it was right up my alley. And so we did it. And we slowly built a book of business that had taken us from roughly $300,000 to a little over a million. ⁓ in a year and then there was a big contract and I was like, this could help me walk away. Like the money is secure. And we needed a CIO at the time. And I'd been sort of serving in that role as the CIO plus HR consultant. And so I created a job for myself. I said, this is what I need to make it happen. Cause I was like, there is no way that I'm going to let you bring on. So I was a sub. under the prime. And I told her, I was like, there's no way I'm letting you bring in someone else to take over the work that I've built, that we built. And she's like, okay, design the job. And I did. I said, I'll do this, this and this. This is the minimum that I need to make it happen. We got this new contract, let's go. And that was it. That was it. So two days, shy of a year. I was full time. June 18, 2021 was the last time that I had a job.
• 27:29
  Jack Tompkins: it. I love it. You're just again, this is the same as a lemonade stand. Hey, the market is meeting me here. I'm going to give it what the market wants and this also works for me. So this is gonna be a win win.
• 27:39
  La Tonya Roberts: Absolutely. And do I do that type of work now? No. And not the DEI side because again, the market changed. Right. I was like, okay, so we've pivoted a little bit.
• 27:42
  Jack Tompkins: Right. Right. Yeah, I made some DEI dashboards around that same time too, because it was corporate clients and they needed to actually quantify it and measure it and town acquisition and the whole process around that too. How much has the ICP changed ⁓ since then?
• 27:58
  La Tonya Roberts: Mm-hmm. ⁓ a lot because my original ICP was ⁓ businesses, usually smaller businesses, although I did work with larger. So when I left Deloitte, originally I was working with the government, federal government and the military. When I left, the majority of my clients were nonprofit organizations. A lot of them international nonprofit organizations and a few... other commercial, like smaller commercial. And then I had two big companies that I worked with too. And years go on, I decide, okay, I'm leaving that partnership. It's no longer working out. And I want to go do this work for other people. So that was two, almost two years ago, so a year and half ago. And ⁓ that same friend that introduced me to this opportunity, I was like, this is where my head is at. And she happened to be my very first friend in college, undergrad. So we've known each other for 20 plus years at this point. And she was like, well, what do you want to do? And what do you like? And I said, well, I love executive coaching because that was also part of what I did. I was like, and I love operations. And she's like, well, you could be the COO and continue to do this because there is that element of executive coaching in there. I was like, you're right. So I went all in.
• 29:03
  Jack Tompkins: wow. Okay.
• 29:29
  La Tonya Roberts: as a fractional COO. And then my ICP has been service providers, so you think your coaches and consultants that are more visionary leaders, but they need someone that has the mindset that I have to put things in place and set up their systems, but can also help them get clear on the vision. So that's who I work with now.
• 29:39
  Jack Tompkins: Mm-hmm. How do you define success with that? Because I work with lot of visionaries as well, I don't know where I fall in the EOS terminology, but I find visionaries.
• 29:58
  La Tonya Roberts: Mm-hmm. Yes, I'm an integrator. I am a visionary integrator, someone told me. Because you can do both.
• 30:04
  Jack Tompkins: Okay. Yeah, you are, you are the hybrid of everything from what I've heard so far. So what does success look like when you're working with somebody that is true 100 % visionary as a client?
• 30:08
  La Tonya Roberts: Yes. Uniform. my gosh, getting them to slow down enough. Let's be honest here, getting you to slow down and say, all right, I know you have this great idea, but we need to put some structure or some systems behind it and execute it enough to where it is repeatable. We can train other people to do it and we can actually scale your business.
• 30:20
  Jack Tompkins: Hahaha Okay, so this is very much, again, the through line through all of your life that I'm hearing so far is we're gonna make a plan, that plan's gonna be ambitious, and then we're gonna make it happen.
• 30:52
  La Tonya Roberts: Absolutely, we are gonna get shit done. Let's go.
• 30:54
  Jack Tompkins: Right. I love it. Okay. Are there KPIs that you like, I'm assuming it changes with everybody, right? But like, what's a KPI of them slowing down? And what's the KPI of them like, hitting a milestone? Like, do you have data points that you actually ⁓ prescribe for that?
• 31:13
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah, so getting them to slow down is, there's a few things. So we're looking at the average sales per month, their MRRs, or their monthly recurring revenue. What categories does that fall in? Are we in 10 categories or have we streamlined it? These are the one, two, or three things that you sell. The most of this is what people are asking for. These are your only service offerings. So I like people to... to simplify and niche down, right? Because if you sell 10 things, how are they referring you? If they can't come back and say you're the go-to person for this because you're doing 10 different things for different people, we can't work with it. Baby, you are not Coca-Cola. You don't need 20 flavors of soda. Okay, so one, two, or three. And if it's one, even better. Go all in on that one thing. So MRR. buy segment, product or service, right? ⁓ Your sales conversion rates, your sales cycle times, your retention rates, big one. I think that is one of the things that not only in my business, but also in the clients that I've served is our retention rates are super high. Once people come in, they stay and they keep re-upping on their contracts, right? And then I'm also going to look at your team. Are your team members happy? Right? So like we do our NPS scores for ⁓ customer satisfaction for our clients, but you have to also think that your team members are your clients too. And that maybe it's coming from a human capital world. I am all about the person. I'm a people first person. When I started consulting, I was doing strategy and I'm doing major business transformation. So. what I found was people were always focused on the thing that was changing, whether it's technology, a process, a reorg. But I'm like, okay, but the people have to make it work. How are you setting up the people for success? Are you training them? Are you communicating with them? Are you telling them what's in it for them? Are you telling them the impact to them? Right? And so I always bring that people first element into anything that I do. And so now we're here in the age of AI, right? And everyone is scared. Am I going to lose my job? How does my job change? It's the same thing. What's in it for them? What is changing? How are they set up for success? And then also reminding them that AI is a tool. It is not the end all be all. Right? So you still need human judgment. You still need someone to oversee, even if you have a team of agents, a hybrid team, and I work with clients when creating their hybrid team. So people and AI, someone still has to manage that process. Someone still has to go in and make sure that the AI is doing what it needs to do and it's not hallucinating and making stuff up, right? And someone has to go in there and change the prop. The prompt, our AI tools are changing all the time. They're evolving. Your team's processes should also be evolving to get stronger and be more efficient as well. And that requires a human to come in and do it.
• 34:39
  Jack Tompkins: So I'm forced to ask now, what are the main one, two, or three things that Harmony focuses on?
• 34:46
  La Tonya Roberts: ⁓ strategy, AI integration, and operational excellence.
• 34:51
  Jack Tompkins: and you had that answer queued up. I didn't think I was gonna stump you. I didn't think it was gonna be that straightforward either.
• 34:55
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah, that's it. It's strategy. What's the plan, right? What's the strategy? What are we doing here? How do we integrate AI and then how do we operate with excellence?
• 35:04
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah, and with the human element in there too, I think is really important because we do some similar, well, I don't know if it's similar, but we'll do some AI analyst builds for clients and stuff like that. We'll do some integrations there, but it's still human led. It's still human focused. A human still has to go execute and go sell the thing, whatever it is, ⁓ How do you have that conversation with somebody that's really scared of AI?
• 35:28
  La Tonya Roberts: One, we have to get real about if you want to grow your business, you are gonna have to evolve. You can't be afraid to evolve. And so we can look at things that, you know, a lot of people can relate to. Blockbuster. Then we had Redbox. And then we had streaming services like Hulu and Netflix. I remember growing up and every Friday night we went to Blockbuster when we picked out a new movie and that was part of it. We don't do that anymore. Right? Look at how Uber has taken over for taxis. The only, well, I see them every now and then here in Atlanta, but really New York is the only place where you really see taxis anymore. Right. So are you evolving or not? And if you're not, well, you are.
• 36:12
  Jack Tompkins: Yep, I've seen two in Charlotte in the past year, that's it.
• 36:22
  La Tonya Roberts: eventually moving yourself out of the market. You can't keep up not just in terms of being innovative, but you can't keep up from a talent standpoint either. Because who wants to work for a company that is not evolving and is not investing in them? Because at the end of the day, people aren't staying in their business their entire career. They need to go to a business and it's a mutually beneficial situation. I'm going to do this for you and you're going to help me grow and make me more marketable. I'm not doing the latest thing. I can't move to another company. And I don't think that some founders who have a more old school mindset understand how important it is to constantly evolve and keep up with the changes if they truly want a business that is going to not only sustain where they are right now, but also be here for the long term.
• 37:18
  Jack Tompkins: Do you want to grow? Great. If you want to grow, you're going to have to evolve. Great. How do I evolve? I use AI.
• 37:25
  La Tonya Roberts: And that's just one way. One way. I use AI, but how do you use it?
• 37:27
  Jack Tompkins: Right. Strategically, I'm guessing.
• 37:34
  La Tonya Roberts: Absolutely. Yeah, it's strategically. It is absolutely you need to have a plan for anything that you do, whether it's bringing in more people, changing your process, changing your technology or your systems. What's the plan? What is the why behind it?
• 37:51
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah. Is that what the podcast is about? We can do a shameless plug for the podcast. Tell us a little bit about it.
• 37:57
  La Tonya Roberts: Yes, yes. So systems that set you free is all about getting behind the scenes of a business and how does it work and eventually creating a business that runs without the founder, right? And so a lot of founders, they design their business, you know, in the beginning, it is dependent on that founder. You know all the things, you have all the answers, you can do all the things, but if you want to scale, you have to start with removing yourself from working in the business so much and more so working on the business and truly creating that, that those decisions and those KPIs and that system that you want to operate in because maybe you want to go start another business. Well, you can't start another business if you don't have the capacity because you're spending all your time in this one business. So yeah, we talk to people about what are the systems that set you free.
• 38:51
  Jack Tompkins: Nice, very cool. I imagine that the self-employed mindset, even when folks have a team, even if it's a team of 20 people, they can still have a self-employed mindset. But the business mindset is totally different.
• 38:59
  La Tonya Roberts: absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely, yeah. Even with a team of 20 or 30, if you want to get free of that, you have to learn to let some things go and you have to learn to put some repeatable systems in place.
• 39:14
  Jack Tompkins: Yep, I love it. Okay, let me hit you with some lightning round Scrappy versus sophistication questions. I think myself and the audience is probably gonna know the answer to a lot of these given what we know about you so far. Are you saying, if somebody wants a meeting with you, are you saying, hey, I'm free Thursday afternoon or are you sending a calendar link? 100 % easy, yep. How many phone numbers do you have?
• 39:19
  La Tonya Roberts: Let's go. I'm setting a calendar link.
• 39:40
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah, yep. Business and personal kind of game separate. Do you recommend books or do you recommend podcasts?
• 39:43
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah. Ooh, podcasts and audible books.
• 39:53
  Jack Tompkins: Okay. Okay. Again, a hybrid answer. Have ever gotten sassy with chat GPT?
• 40:00
  La Tonya Roberts: yeah. Yes.
• 40:04
  Jack Tompkins: Have you ever not gotten sassy with chat chief?
• 40:08
  La Tonya Roberts: I in the beginning, but the more comfortable I am now, like, I train my chat and her name is Chatasia. And she knows that I am a sassy black woman from DC. And so she comes and she's like, hey, sis, we're not doing that anymore. Yes, queen, this is what I'm talking about. So yeah, me and chat, we have great conversations and quad-tune.
• 40:17
  Jack Tompkins: Nice. That's awesome.
• 40:37
  La Tonya Roberts: Well, Claudia.
• 40:39
  Jack Tompkins: that's fantastic. I love it. ⁓ How often do you work from your couch?
• 40:47
  La Tonya Roberts: Not often. yeah, I work, so I have two desks. The desk that I'm at right now, it has my big second monitor, it's 32 inches. So I need that other monitor. ⁓ And then my second desk is, ⁓ it's downstairs, there's more lighting in that room, but then I'm limited to just my laptop. And I'm like, I don't like this.
• 40:49
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, so you're like, when I'm in the office, I'm doing it.
• 41:16
  La Tonya Roberts: I rarely work from my couch. My couch is like my downtime. You you have certain spaces in your house and you're like, okay, this space is for this and I'm gonna be focused on this thing. My couch is like Netflix and chill. Nobody talked to me. I'm relaxing. So yeah, I don't work from my couch that often.
• 41:36
  Jack Tompkins: I like it. If you have a lunch meeting, are you always making a reservation?
• 41:43
  La Tonya Roberts: yeah, if I can make a reservation, we are making reservations. don't like to waste time and I don't like to wait. So.
• 41:53
  Jack Tompkins: You
• 41:57
  La Tonya Roberts: So yes, reservations for anything, please.
• 42:01
  Jack Tompkins: Okay. ⁓ Where does your to-do list live? And do you call it a to-done list when it's over with?
• 42:09
  La Tonya Roberts: ⁓ Yes, I have a done list. ⁓ I do have a done list. have this little, where is it? I have a little to-do list that I can check off that I like to write. then I also have, yeah, I like to physically write down things. So I have a little to-do list tracker and then I also have ClickUp too. So I put things on there and then my calendar. I know when I have.
• 42:23
  Jack Tompkins: I'll get the manual one.
• 42:37
  La Tonya Roberts: lots of reminders and my calendar is color coded so I know what the task is just by looking at it.
• 42:44
  Jack Tompkins: Yep. yeah, it is. All right, taking into the inbox. How many, how many emails unread is too many.
• 42:54
  La Tonya Roberts: I'm so excited about this because I am terrible about managing my own inbox. So my assistant manages it for me. And we have two categories, top priority and second priority. And of course they are color coded. And I go in my inbox, I look in my inbox and I do read the things, but I told her like, if it's a must, please put it in that priority so I know when to get back to it.
• 43:23
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, do you have folders?
• 43:24
  La Tonya Roberts: Too many is, I usually keep my unreads to under 10 now, which huge. Now the inboxes that I manage myself, we're not going to talk about this, they are not at 10. like, well, after a certain amount of time, we're just not getting to that.
• 43:43
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah, when my personal hit four digits, I was like, that's just what it is from now on. I don't care anymore.
• 43:48
  La Tonya Roberts: Maybe. from 2019. We should probably just erase that.
• 43:54
  Jack Tompkins: Right? If you're writing an email, you copy something from somewhere else and you paste it into the email and it's a completely separate font. Do you go in and change the font so it's all standard? Yeah. Yeah.
• 44:07
  La Tonya Roberts: I do. I don't like to see that. So yes, I change. go back and everything is normal.
• 44:13
  Jack Tompkins: It's a sophisticated way to do it, because I get a lot, not a lot, but like when I get that, I'm like, okay, they didn't take enough time to actually care about this email. They probably did, but just it comes off that
• 44:19
  La Tonya Roberts: Mm-hmm.
• 44:24
  Jack Tompkins: How many emails do you snooze in a week?
• 44:28
  La Tonya Roberts: snooze meaning I put off in a week?
• 44:31
  Jack Tompkins: so like, don't know, I use Gmail and you can just hit snooze, like remind me tomorrow or something. Yeah.
• 44:34
  La Tonya Roberts: to move to Senlator. ⁓ I would say weekly, maybe bi-weekly one or two, if I just happen to be ⁓ working late. ⁓ And that's more so coming from working in corporate. And I would always tell people, ⁓ if you're the manager or the senior person on the project, if you are sending emails out at 11 o'clock at night or two o'clock in the morning, your junior team members are going to think that they need to respond to you or you're setting the tone that that is how they need to work.
• 44:44
  Jack Tompkins: Okay.
• 45:09
  La Tonya Roberts: And that's not the case. It just so happened that I have other responsibilities and this is when I can get back on, but they don't see it that way. So, ⁓ yeah, I try not to have anything go out past nine o'clock at night. And also I want to train my clients that I am not available 24 seven to you. So.
• 45:26
  Jack Tompkins: Right, right. Okay, I'm gonna stay in the office for another question or two. ⁓ Is the one that you're in now, the main office, I'll call it, private room in the house, or is it like part of the living room?
• 45:34
  La Tonya Roberts: Mm-hmm. It's actually, and I hate this part, but it just because we ran out of bedrooms, it is a sitting area in my bedroom. Ideally, like when the kids moved out for college, I was supposed to move like my main office in there, but I'm all set up here. So the kids old bedroom is the second office. Oh my gosh, that's a lot of stuff. I have a standing desk, the books, that's a lot.
• 45:45
  Jack Tompkins: Okay.
• 46:02
  La Tonya Roberts: But I'm usually the only one here during the week. My partner flies, so he's gone. So it's usually just me, so it works out most of the time.
• 46:11
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, how many business cards are currently on that desk?
• 46:15
  La Tonya Roberts: None. But I have a section, I have like a little container where all the business cards sit. It's behind me. There's probably about 100 in there.
• 46:16
  Jack Tompkins: Ooh. Okay. And then for the zoom background or whatever background, is it just the background that we can see that is done and built and looks nice or is it the whole room is kind of decorated?
• 46:38
  La Tonya Roberts: No, this little section I have here is my mane and then I do have some some zoom backgrounds that I will pull up and it's very simple. It's like blue or purple, my mane, roll and then like a plant. It's just simple aesthetic.
• 46:55
  Jack Tompkins: Okay, ⁓ last one docking station or a bunch of wires going into the computer individually
• 47:03
  La Tonya Roberts: No, it's the docking station. Yeah, everything is in there and then there is one wire that goes on my computer.
• 47:04
  Jack Tompkins: Yep. I'm going to say this is very strategic scrappiness. It's evolved into quite a bit of sophistication too. I would give yourself some credit. A lot of scrappiness to get here, but strategically and ending with a lot of sophistication. I'm going to say you will have a foot in both worlds for sure.
• 47:17
  La Tonya Roberts: Thanks. Well thank you, I appreciate that. I do what I can. Now you asked me this 15 years ago, was like, we're just surviving.
• 47:28
  Jack Tompkins: You won't. And that's the thing we're surviving it just we're getting shit done We really care how it is, but it's done and then you've got a little bit of breathing room and you've got systems that set you free
• 47:45
  La Tonya Roberts: That's right. That's right.
• 47:47
  Jack Tompkins: Thank you so much for coming on, La Tonya. Anything else? Obviously we've got the podcast. What else do want the folks out there to know?
• 47:54
  La Tonya Roberts: Yeah, the biggest thing, go check out the podcast. Rate it, review it, like, subscribe. Again, it's systems that set you free. It's available on Spotify and iTunes and YouTube. And there's a theme song on there too, because I'm a little bit extra. I mean, come on now, I leopard like I'm extra. I'm going to be big hair. So yeah, so go check out the go check out the podcast and of course the website.
• 48:15
  Jack Tompkins: Yeah
• 48:24
  La Tonya Roberts: and you can get a free download, some prompts that go on there too. And then we run master classes once a month. So I'm getting ready for my April master class, which will be soon.
• 48:36
  Jack Tompkins: from stylist to strategist, fully scrappy and fully sophisticated all at the same time. She's got everything going. Thank you so much for coming out, Latanya.
• 48:44
  La Tonya Roberts: Thank you for having me, Jack. This has been great.
• 48:47
  Jack Tompkins: Take care, everyone.