Breaking Through Biz

How, in this post COVID world are small and medium business owners dealing with the challenges and struggles from a perspective of fiscal and financial management?

Across the country business leaders embracing new business opportunities and thriving after having been impacted by the COVID pandemic. Other business leaders are frozen with indecision. So how do we re-engage the cash flow drivers to sustain and help us flourish our business?

Today we spoke with Debi Corrie and discussed these problems and solutions she has seen put to the test and work!

Debi is the owner and CEO of Acumaxum. She is a Strategic CFO, that dedicates her time on business, and building relationships. Her company helps business owners increase cash, maximize profits, scale their businesses, and creates the financial roadmap to breakthrough their ceiling. Her journey began in August of 2016 when she decided to become a partner at a strategic CFO company. She ran her own practice and helped business owners with higher level strategy to grow their businesses. By March of 2020 she had built a successful practice, been in 2 bestselling books, and ran her own tax practice. When the world shut down in 2020, she saw so many business owners suffering that she decided that she could serve business owners in a new way by starting her own business named Acumaxum. She serves business owners now by taking their 5-year goals and making the roadmap they need for success. She provides project work, taxes, and accounting for smaller and larger companies.

In this episode, Debi provides her in-depth experience on evaluating small and medium sized businesses and provides tips and tricks on how to successfully navigate the “unknowns”.

Key Takeaways:

“You can’t live your life in fear, you just have to plan for your future.” – Debi Corrie

“There are eight cashflow drivers that business owners can pull in order to help improve their cash flow.” – Tabetha Sheaver

In today’s podcast, we held a meaningful discussion with serial Entrepreneur Ola Ayeni, the Founder of Claim Academy – an Accelerated Skills Based coding and cyber security boot camp committed to changing people’s lives by getting its graduates meaningful employment in technology development.

Today we discuss content related to growing pains and solving the massive software developer shortage both in the Greater St. Louis area as well as nationally. Ola explains his process in pursuit of developing several businesses – simultaneously – and addressing the great resignation which many business owners have come to experience.

Ola described one of his toughest challenges as not being able hire additional software developers which would allow to scale his business.

According to the St. Louis Business Journal, there are more than 10,000 tech openings in the St. Louis region. His academy has a 93% placement rate in companies and his students on average make $72,000 to start even without a college education.

One of the things that Ola has engaged with to address the growing pains and scalability blocker is to re—evaluate the job description and how he interviews people. Additionally, he is beginning to look at how the required roles for his organization are established.

Key Takeaways:

“I experienced a bigger gratification from Claim Academy’s mission which is to save lives.” – Ola Ayeni

“It’s not just about finding the right people but making sure we have the right people in the right seats and making sure the skills sets are aligned to the business needs.” – Tabetha Sheaver

Today’s podcast includes content related to talent acquisition and creating a positive culture which attracts the people you want in your organization. While speaking with Greg, the principle of C12, we will discuss the resources, tools, the business guidance, peer accessibility, and accountability brought forward through C12.

Greg began his professional career while in the Air Force and worked with developing training technologies. Following his 22 years of service in the Air Force, Greg moved on to work around leadership development and executive coaching for Boeing’s emerging leaders.

Key Takeaways:

“More than anything, Tabetha, I think it’s about meeting people – regardless of the size of the business” –Greg Atchison

“The search for talent and the trouble with getting talent which is driven by two things. First, are we creating a culture where people want to work in that organization? Secondly, do we have operations where people thrive and see a purpose?” – Greg Atchison

“How does an owner, who is running a business, know when it’s time to call or to become engaged with a group like C12?” – Tabetha Sheaver

“Building great businesses for a greater purpose.” – Greg Atchison

Ways to connect with Greg Atchison:

· https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregatchison/

· https://www.joinc12.com/chairs/greg-atchison/

Today’s podcast with Steven Crawford highlights time management and provides some best practices of deciding what to do with ones’ time. We delved into not only time management within our work life, but also into the synergy of a healthy work/life balance.

As a Director and Executive consultant at McGhee Productivity Solutions, Steven has positively impacted his clients around the world helping them build cultures of alignment, accountability, and productivity via the many changes management, coaching and training programs MPS offers.

Key Takeaways:

“It’s what we do with our time and how we prioritize our time to make sure were getting more of the right things done.” – Steven Crawford

“Time blocking started with getting everything out of our heads and onto calendar.” – Tabetha Sheaver

“Sometimes saying no to thing is really a way of saying yes to the most important things.” – Steven Crawford

Ways to connect with Steven Crawford:

· [email protected]

· https://www.mcgheepro.com

Kim started her own company, Vivid Performance Group, after years in corporate America. Drawing from her background in training and developing medical device sales reps, sales leaders, and those in marketing and scientific roles, and her own personal ups and downs in management, she applies her passion for human performance improvement to the so called “soft skills”.

Her mission is to help employees, teams and leaders work better together in what she calls the business sandbox…because to quote Kim “employees get hired for what they know and can do and fired for who they are and how they act”. Her vision is a world where managers and leaders are capable of creating effective teams and coaching them to greatness.

By using proven assessment, training, coaching and facilitation methods that reveal and develop individual and team abilities, Kim helps create employees that are better able to communicate, innovate, solve, team-up, lead and manage, so that the business mission becomes their business focus.

Kim lives in a St. Louis suburb with her fiancé Jeff and pooches Pop who is a cairn terrier and Newport who is a maltipoo. A little known fact about Kim is that when she was younger she loved a thrill. She’s taken trapeze lessons from the Flying Walendas, raced around the Daytona speedway, completed a tandem skydive, and performed acrobatic sailplaning.

These days- when she’s not working- her feet are on terra firma, and you can find her at the gym lifting weights which she says is a love/hate thing, or doing body combat-which is definitely a “love” thing.

Her favorite quote from Neale Donald Walsch sums her “why”. She wants to help you “become the next greatest version of the grandest vision that you ever held about who you are”.

Ways to contact Kim Baker:

Email: [email protected]

How do you get the right people in the right seats in an era of “The Great Resignation”?

Across the country stunned business leaders are struggling to maintain their workforce as turnover reaches new highs due to the COVID-19 pandemic among other challenges such as finding “qualified applicants”. This has prompted many to re-think where, how and why we work.

What do business owners use as a guidepost to finding “good” talent? As organizations are finding, more and more companies are discovering that the right cultural fit is more important now than ever.

Nancy Jonker helps individuals and teams identify their natural talent so they can effectively manage their time and energy, reduce work-related stress, improve team cooperation, and get the right people in the right seats. Addressing challenges and opportunities at the team dynamics level has brought Nancy’s clients to double-digit gains in productivity along with a more rewarding work-life experience. Nancy holds a PhD in Psychology, is an author and speaker, and has worked successfully with individuals, partnerships, and families for more than 27 years.

In this episode, Nancy sheds light on what organizations of all sizes are doing to find the best talent for their company. Recognizing and ensuring cultural values are in line with the companies’ values is more important now than ever.

Key Takeaways:

“As we’re giving feedback to people and going through onboarding processes, we really want to catch them in the act of doing well and that is how we conjure excellence.” – Nancy Jonker

“The National Federation of independent business reported that 51% of businesses have job opening that they can’t fill.” – Tabetha Sheaver

“Now you must really be intentional about creating a job advertisement – some people are using videos to talk about their culture, their values and what their work environment is. People’s eyes have been opened to what is possible in their work life in terms of reduced travel, being able to work from home and having specific reasons to go to the office. We know that flexibility and culture matter.” – Nany Jonker

Ways to Connect with Nancy Jonker: [email protected]

www.nancyjonker.com