Profit Is A Choice

On the podcast for our yearly review and process session is Ceil DiGuglielmo of the Sew Much More podcast. This is a joint podcast that we love and look forward to each year. This year we seemed to really look at our personal lives and how they intermixed with our business lives a bit more. Also, listen in to hear the one thing that we both struggled with this year that we have enjoyed so much in the past.

• Proud moments

• Reading

• Lessons Learned

• Rest

• It also made us realize what's most important in our life. And in our family. It's just always that reset button. Then it also made me thankful for the business that I've built, and the processes that I have, so I could take a step away for a week or so. Michele (7:34)

• My job is not my whole life. Most of us started our businesses for that reason, we wanted to work it around our lives. So where did we lose our way that the business is controlling our life? Ceil DiGuglielmo (14:30)

• I had to and still am having to learn how to navigate that with joy, and with calm and even when it doesn't feel calm. And how to be curious, and how to be kind and soft, not hard hearted, and irritated and angry and frustrated when my plans keep getting disrupted. Michele (17:27)

• There are also a lot of us who are the parents of adult children, and there are times we have to stop everything, being a teachable moment because our children have become adults. But I also think that our children learn from us when they see us in difficult circumstances. Ceil DiGuglielmo (23:55)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Website: The Sew Much More Podcast

• Website: The Curtains and Soft Furnishings Resource Library

• Facebook: The Sew Much More Podcast

• Facebook: The Curtains and Soft Furnishings Resource Library

• Instagram: @ceildi

• Instagram: @csf_resource_library

• Email: [email protected]

• Work with Me

• Metrique Solutions

This week we're rerunning episode 131 of the Profit Is A Choice podcast, "How to easily create a strategic plan for your design firm." This is an awesome topic that we processed through a couple of years ago. And I will say to you, it is still relevant and it's something that we work on and focus on in Scarlet Thread Consulting all the time. I want to encourage you as you wrap up this year, and get ready for next, that you take the time to consider your strategic plan, what it might look like, and how you can improve upon it from moving forward.

• Vision

• SWOTT

• Milestones

• Goals

• A strategic plan, simply put, is a document that tells where a company or organization is going. Consider it your road map for traveling into the future with your business. Michele (4:54)

• Part of the beauty of creating a plan is having an idea of where you are going so you can plan in advance. Michele (10:24)

• Every company has a limited supply of resources. These resources can be time, money, and people. Knowing how to spend each of these gives us an advantage. Michele (15:40)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today

• Traction by Gino Wickman

• 12-Week Year by Brian P. Moran and Michael Lennington

• 6 Pre-Planning Tips for Your Design Year - EP 116 with Michele Williams

• 4 Year-End Steps to Prepare Your Interior Design Business - EP 118 with Michele Williams

• Year End Planning for HR, Marketing and Finances for your Design Firm - EP 121 with Michele Williams

• 5 Reasons Successful Interior Designers Use a Strategic Plan - EP 129 with Michele Williams

Do you know how to define a toxic workplace? Are you the one bringing the discord into the office or is someone else? Maybe you are looking for a job and want to know what to steer clear from. Today, we are going to talk about what makes a workplace feel yuk – and how to spot areas for improvement.

• Bullying

• Belittling

• Anxiety

• Fear

• It is possible for even the healthiest of companies to have some dysfunction, just like any family or group of people. However, a toxic environment is even more than generalized dysfunction – it is harmful. Michele (1:11)

• Toxic work environments can be created by the owners and managers or by the employees. What is most important is that these attitudes and actions are recognized and stopped immediately. Michele (3:31)

• Creating a company that others want to be a part of takes intention. That is what we focus on so much on this podcast – profitability by intention. Michele (6:34)

• Just because your environment is toxic now doesn't mean it must stay that way. And just because it is safe doesn't mean it won't become toxic. Michele (8:15)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today

• The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni

It is not often that I get to dive into a topic that is totally foreign to me when we start the podcast. Usually, I have heard something about the topic and have a little knowledge. The 831(b) plan was a new thing – and Ed Bryan joins me to help us understand this tax deferral and risk management opportunity.

• Insurance

• Tax deferral

• Risk management

• Plan

• It's like traditional insurance. But what you're doing is building up this money, we always say with the 831B plans, they're not worth anything when we set them up. There are no funds, and there are no assets in there initially, but after two, three, four, or five years, these things have the potential to be worth millions of dollars. Ed Bryan (15:42)

• I think that would be important to know how you are taxed in order to determine how much you're trying to put into an 831B plan, whether you're really trying to use it for long-term savings in some ways, or if you're really using it to mitigate risk. Michele (27:22)

• We've seen a significant upswing in the last three to five years in business owners looking for real cybersecurity insurance that covers things like phishing, social engineering, and those types of things. And we're seeing a lot of pressure there, because unfortunately, people that are attacking, especially those, those hackers and cybersecurity criminals, they know that small to midsize business doesn't necessarily have the awareness in the cybersecurity that a fortune 500 company does. Ed Bryan (31:55)

• Even in my coaching and consulting practice I work with my clients, I'm talking to their accountants with them, I'm talking to their bookkeepers, their financial analysts like we're working together, because everybody has a piece of the puzzle. Michele (35:47)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Instagram: @MetriqueSolutions

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• Website: MetriqueSolutions.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Website: 831b.com

• Instagram: @SRA_831b

• Facebook: SRA831b

• LinkedIn Ed: Edward Bryan

• LinkedIn SRA: SRA 831(b)

• YouTube: SRA 831(b)

• Vimeo: 831(b)

• MetriqueSolutions.com

• Work with Me

Today I am welcoming Erin McGhee to the podcast. Erin describes herself as an Accounting Manager for service-based businesses. Her big goal – to put you in charge of your money. As you can tell, we have a lot in common. Listen in as we discuss what is needed to have you in the driver's seat of your business vehicle and what it takes to keep you there.

• Organize

• Implement

• Maintain

• Financial Process

• My process and any service that I offer my clients, we follow the organize, implement, and maintain framework, and that organizes the first piece with any client where we truly dive into those foundations. Erin McGhee (8:55)

• Your chart of accounts needs to be detailed enough that you can look at them and analyze and make decisions for your business, it doesn't mean you won't have to dig down further here and there, but you should be able to look at it and make decisions. Michele (9:55)

• My goal is simple. It's to put owners in charge of their money. Erin McGhee (16:21)

• I do not ever want the owner of a company to feel like they don't own their books, you own them, period. Michele (18:03)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Instagram: @MetriqueSolutions

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• Website: MetriqueSolutions.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Website: ErinMcGhee.com

• Instagram: @erinmcgheellc

• Email: [email protected]

• MetriqueSolutions.com

• Work with Me

• Recommended Chart of Accounts from Erin McGhee

• A Strong Core for Body and Business Ep 040 with Kolleen Losch

• E-Myth Revisited by Michael Gerber

Lately I have been thinking about the value in building a community of support for your business. We really are not in business alone. In this podcast I am going to share some of my community, how I chose it, how it supports me – and how you can do the same.

• Community

• Needs

• Alignment

• Early on in my career, and probably life, I thought that I had to find the one best friend or the one resource, or the one online tool to solve my problems or meet my need. Instead, what I found was that each community and person I meet can fill a different role or need in my life or business. Michele (4:28)

• We probably need more than one to meet the current and future needs of our business. Michele (5:26)

• I aim to create communities that are safe for everyone. Communities that hear a wide range of voices and respond in kindness. Communities that welcome others and when the room gets too full, we get another room and build a bigger table. Michele (7:14)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Instagram: @MetriqueSolutions

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• Website: MetriqueSolutions.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Work with Me

• Metrique Solutions

Joining me again on the podcast today is Jack Tompkins of Pineapple Consulting. Jack and I, along with a whole team of people, work on Metrique Solutions, a financial dashboard developed to support creative entrepreneurs – like you! Today we are talking about how Metrique Solutions is a financial partner in your business. It is not a replacement for your accounting or project management software, but an adjunct.

• Financial partnership

• Financial translator

• Visual financials

• Metrics

• Metrique Solutions is going to be an addition to your tech stack if you choose to use it, but it is solving a problem that neither the project management tools out there or the financial tools currently out there solve. And that's why it's a great partner to them. Michele (4:49)

• This is the audiobook to go along with the visual or in this case, it's the visual to go along with the audio. Here's what happened when QuickBooks did your invoicing. Here's another way to interpret it. Jack Tompkins (10:50)

• What I hear a lot, especially in the design community, is all this information in my project management system and I've got this information in my financial management system. I don't know how to make them work together. Michele (16:52)

• It's a great comparison and sort of analogy to Metrique as well, much like the football analogy, you get to see where you're ranked over time. Jack Tompkins (20:30)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Instagram: @MetriqueSolutions

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• Website: MetriqueSolutions.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Website: pineapplecf.com

• YouTube: Jack Tompkins YouTube

• LinkedIn: Jack Tompkins

• Email: [email protected]

• MetriqueSolutions.com

• How to Easily Understand Your Interior Design Business Financials Ep 136 with Jack Tompkins

• Seeing is Believing in Your Design Firm Ep 206 with Jack Tompkins

Today on the podcast we have Carolyn Boldt. Carolyn is passionate about holistic health and wellness and has crafted a business that focuses on designing in these industries. There are so many good takeaways in this podcast and Carolyn really has a heart to share and teach. Listen in as she shares the journey to focus on a niche that she loved and how it has prompted a different way to scale.

• Niche

• System

• Strategy

• Space

• We could say we ran a business, but we just owned our job. Carolyn Boldt (13:22)

• You can't be all you have to graduate up. Which is why a lot of us talk about now and scaling, having the CEO somebody to do operations in management and then the technicians to execute. Michele (14:23)

• Residential design is very much about the human being in the space. How do I want to feel in the space? How do I want to represent myself to my friends, etc. In business, it has to be about the return on investment. Carolyn Boldt (23:15)

• We began to see the elements that we needed to scale. We needed to create a system of the design process, which all the design processes go through and then create a system, so that our deliverables basically are the same. The designs are different, but the process is the same. Carolyn Boldt (30:01)

• The one thing that I would recommend is when we're looking to hire, the question is do you have time to train and to give this person the opportunity to ramp up? If you do not have that you do better to hire more experience to get it done. Michele (42:07)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Website: chiropracticofficedesign.com

• Facebook: CrossFields

• Pinterest: @CrossFields

• Instagram: @crossfields_chiro_design

• Twitter: @chirofficedesign

• LinkedIn: CrossFields-Inc

• Email: [email protected]

• Work with Me

• E-Myth Revisited by Michael Graber

• Megabundle Offer For Profit Is A Choice Podcast With Michele Williams

Can we just talk about perseverance? Perseverance is defined as doing something despite the difficulty or delay in achieving success. With all the things happening in our world and industry over the last two years, I would say that most of us are living in this space right now. Listen in to today's episode where we discuss how we can keep going, even when the road seems long ahead of us.

• Failure

• Risk

• Goals

• Continual Improvement

• Now, more than ever, it is important to make sure you are working with your ideal client. Michele (2:35)

• Don't be afraid to fail. Failure and success are so very close to each other. Failing forward, as John C. Maxwell describes in his book is what builds perseverance. Michele (3:13)

• When I have clear goals, it is so much easier to attain them as compared to when I am not really sure what is expected of me. Michele (5:54)

• Perseverance doesn't happen by accident, and it doesn't happen without focus. Staying focused on your goals, your why, the journey and improvement strategies keeps you in the game. Michele (7:25)

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Work with Me

• 212 The Extra Degree by Sam Parker and Mac Anderson

• Failing Forward by John Maxwell

• Metrique Solutions

Joining me on the podcast today is Jack Tompkins of Pineapple Consulting. Jack and I met back in 2020. And we shared the love of numbers and metrics instantly. Jack and I began working together early in 2021 to bring visuals to my clients and now we have joined forces to create Metrique Solutions, a software application for business owners, and to give you the ability to see your KPIs in a quick visual dashboard. And so today on this show, we are going to talk specifically about the power of seeing your financials in one place and at one time.