Latest / Six-Figure Chicks / Episode 26: Why We Almost Walked Away From a Six-Figure Client with Cristina Amigoni
Transcript
- speaker-0: Hey there. Welcome back to the Six Figure Chicks Podcast. I am delighted, like I'm always so excited to talk to these amazing women. I have Christina on today, who I just recently met, had the pleasure of talking to. So thank you, Christina, for being on the show. Why don't you share just a little bit about your awesomeness with the audience? speaker-1: well thank you. I'm excited to be on this show and just being a little bit at least ad adjacent to the six figure chicks community at this point. a little bit about myself. Well, I have my own company. it's called Ciamo, which means we are in Italian. I grew up in Italy, and I was raised in Italy, hence the the connection there. But we really focus on humanizing the workplace. And helping leaders, teams, individuals truly find their authentic selves and create spaces where everybody authenticity can thrive so that we can be better humans with other humans and cre just create better humans experiences. speaker-0: I love that. And it is all about being just better to each other, to ourselves. And you know, it all comes back. So I was like to start it off with like, what's a fun fact about you that not many people know? speaker-1: a lot of more people used to know this, but I think it's been a while, so I'll bring that one up. a fun fact is that I years ago at this point, twenty years ago, maybe or more, I studied and got certified to be a wine sommelier. speaker-0: What's your favorite wine? speaker-1: Ooh. it depends on the moment and the season. Right now it's summer and it's hot, so my go to is a lambrusco, which is a sparkling red that you keep chilled in the fridge. speaker-0: I love a spark so would that be like a sparkling rose? speaker-1: No, it's actually red. It's full on red wine, but it's sparkly and it's still dry. It's not sweet. but you chill it and yeah, it's it's a great summer one. speaker-0: I'm gonna have to try that. I love bubbles. okay, so let's talk about business because that's what we do share in the six figure chicks is all those like roadblock moments, those challenging times. Like, what's one big thing that comes to mind that you've had to face in business? speaker-1: The one I thought about when I knew the question was gonna come up is a few years ago, we had at the especially the beginning of our of our company, we were working with a client and everything was going well. And at some point we hid a roadblock where even though we kept asking for feedback every single week, so in every single meeting we asked, like, how are we doing? Anything we need to change. What's working, what's not working, let let's keep, you know, the communication open. And for for a few months, it was like, yep, everything is great. Keep keep doing what you're doing. And then we were invited into a meeting with some other people that we didn't know yet. so brand new meeting. We had created the the information we were gonna share. It was just gonna be a very quick we were part of a bigger meeting and our portion was only a few minutes. So we had shared the information ahead of time to all the participants. like a week or two. So no it was not gonna be any surprise what we were gonna talk about and share. They all knew it was more of a meet and greet, here's an overall status of things. And we were almost immediately met with resistance over what we had been doing and criticism over what we had been doing and how it wasn't what needed to be done. And because we had been asking actively asking for feedback the whole time we were shocked. It was it was one of those shocking moments in in this room. But also the the the way the whole thing, the conversation was approached and the the you know the the gap in how to treat other humans in a room was very evident, which we had not seen before. And so after the meeting, at the end of the meeting they, you know, we we we left and they asked us like what, you know, like what do you need from us? And we said, well, empathy and grace. We're talking about human behavior changes here. It takes a while. It's not gonna go as smoothly as you think it is. And then we, you know, we we left a meeting and we regrouped, my business partner and I regrouped and we seriously thought about firing the client because we were there to create human cultures that treat humans better. and that was our goal. That was what we were hired to do is to help change a culture to To influence a culture so that it's respectful and people can thrive. And we were met with out of the blue, this situation where we realize if this is the culture, there's nothing we can do here. It doesn't matter how much we work. We can't change this when it comes out of the blue like this. And so we one of our core values as a company is we talk it out. So we don't make decisions in a vacuum. And so we had decided that we were gonna go to our weekly meeting with our sponsor. And the first thing we were gonna talk about is what happened two days ago. That's not okay with us. If that's how things are gonna be going, we and this was a large engagement. So we were gonna walk away from months for from months of work. And we said, like that's not okay for us. If that's the norm and you think that's okay, we're not the right vendor for you. You're gonna have to look for somebody else. speaker-0: So what happened? speaker-1: So they what happened, you know, and for us it was like we're gonna be walking away financially, we're gonna be walking away for something that is a huge impact to our to us as a business. But we have core values for a reason. And we started this business on our own for a reason. And what happened is it kind of opened up a whole new level of possibilities because the client was used to the type of behavior happening that way. And they didn't realize the impact that it has on on people. And so when we pointed that out, they were like, no, you're right, that's not okay. And we're gonna st you know, we would love for you to reconsider and stay, and we're gonna commit to being better and making sure that doesn't happen again. And what happened after that, I mean, we were then working for years with with these clients in many different ways, but what happened after that was almost this realization from a senior leadership perspective that it's like we are the example and if we want to change this culture, we need to actually start addressing the things that we keep not addressing and maybe pushing aside and pretending didn't happen that they're okay. speaker-0: Wow, I love that. Cause yeah, it does definitely top down. you know, has to be in line with what they they want to fix. So, like, what's a tip that you would give somebody that's kind of facing that same hurdle or dilemma of like, that's that's tough having those conversations. speaker-1: It is tough, yes. the tip that I have is be very clear as a person and a business what your values are. And be very clear where the non-negotiables are when those values are challenged. because in those situations, that's what we went back to. We said this is not okay. Why is it not okay? Because we built a business with these values. If these values are not present in how we show up, in how our clients show up, then this is not longer working. speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: And if you let go of that and you pretend it didn't happen, let you just, you know, if you accept it once, that's the culture you're gonna keep building. It means that you're accepting it, you accept the next level even worse next time, and the next level even worse. And we had seen that on the receiving end and working for other companies multiple times, where we would hear a message internally and then externally when a client is present, it would be the opposite behavior because we don't want to lose the money. speaker-0: That's the big thing, right? And like you said, it just keep like snowballing. Yes. You know, is you know, if that's what you put up with or decide to take on and and just deal with, then you know, that's going to be the MO for the rest of your time. speaker-1: Yes. speaker-0: It's even more challenging going backwards through years of, you know, taking what you're not really happy with. In career or business, right? Like, I love that. And talking about time, going back, looking at your younger self. I know we kind of talked about this before. you had some time to think about this. Like, what is something that you would love to tell your younger self? Like one piece of advice. speaker-1: I would want to say You don't have to have it all figured out. You never will have it all figured out. Get comfortable with not knowing and get comfortable that not knowing doesn't mean you're stupid. It doesn't mean you're not capable. It doesn't mean you're not enough. speaker-0: Love that. Yeah. 'Cause I know when you know, we're all younger, we we compare ourselves to so many people. speaker-1: And we're measured by that because school measures how much do you know? If you know a lot, you're intelligent, you're successful, you're you've made it, you're going to make it. If you if you don't know a lot, then you're failing and you'll have a you know, your whole life will be impacted and it's it's society measures that, but that's not the right measure. That's not reality. speaker-0: Gosh, I know. I love that. Then speaking of like now today, all of us are in a crowded marketplace. Like we are, you know, host some podcasts to try to reach more audience, you know, people, share our, you know, values and visions to more people. Like, what is something that helps you stand out from the crowd that you could share with others? speaker-1: And I'll take what we've heard our clients actually say to us and how we stood out from the crowd. And is a big one is authenticity. A big one was the fact that they realized that what we say is gonna show up in actions. And and it's gonna show up over and over and over. It's not lip service. Well, do we won't say something that we don't actually show up in actions with? that we do show up authentically in all settings, whether we're talking to an executive or somebody who just got hired and interned. It's we don't change who we are, we don't put masks on and change who we are based on who's in the room and who what power they have. and that we are constantly showing our humanity. So one of the things that we do in presentations, especially when we're running workshops, meetings, facilitation, any type of presentations is we know we're human, we know we make mistakes. And we know no matter how many times we look at the brief, the document, the PowerPoint, the the whatever written thing that we're sharing is, there's there's gonna be a mistake most likely. we can review it, we can proofread it, we can have 10 people look at it. There's still gonna be a mistake that's get mi gets missed. And instead of pretending there isn't or covering it covering it up, We very often will start a presentation by saying, Hey, there's gonna be Easter eggs. Let us know when you find them so we can correct them for next time. speaker-0: I love that. And it's so present, you know, from you sharing that story of you you risked losing a really high profile client. And he it just did not let you guys stop from being who you truly are, authentically are. Yeah. And that's why I was instantly attracted to you and you know. Soon as we started talking and Alex, I was like, yes, I do want to talk to these people more because that's who you want to surround yourself with is like-minded people who you know, like and trust. okay. Yeah, like, okay, let's get pumped up. what is your favorite song? Like pull you out of a sour mood or to get you ready for your day. speaker-1: So I've been listening, I've been trying to listen to a bunch of songs in the last couple of days to prepare for this. and this morning, as I just randomly played something on on my on on my music choice, the song that came up was exactly the one that I want to share, which is Unstoppable by Sia. speaker-0: Yes. I love that song. Yes. Yeah, I'm gonna have to play that. I mean, yes, I love like that whole era. Like so many good songs. Yes. Wonderful. Okay. Well, final you know, call to action. How can people find you online? or you know, anywhere. speaker-1: So they can find me on LinkedIn, just Christina Amigoni. So C-R-I-S-T-I-N-A and my last name. They can find our company on LinkedIn and on our website. And it's the the company name is Syamo. Our URL is weareSyamo.com. And they can find us on our podcast Uncover the Human in all the podcast places that people usually use. speaker-0: I love that. So are you only on LinkedIn? Is that your primary hotspot? speaker-1: We are on Instagram as well as a company. we're also on Facebook. We don't you know, we have some activity there's not as not as much. so those LinkedIn is our main place and Instagram. We we're on both places. speaker-0: Yeah, awesome. We'll definitely share with everyone all the digital platforms to find you. It has been a pleasure. Thank you for sharing some golden nuggets for our audience to be like, okay, well, if she did that, I can do it too. Thank you, Christina. speaker-1: Thank you. This was fun. speaker-0: Yes. Till next time. Together we rise, together we change lives.