06: Starting a woman-owned small business

After almost 20 years as a structural engineer, Patricia Rodriguez reached a point where her career had gotten somewhat stagnant and she was ready for a change. She jumpstarted her next chapter by teaching and founding her own firm and teaching—the dream combo she had imagined in graduate school.

Patricia shares how she opened new doors for herself as a woman-and-minority-owned small business and how her long standing relationships in her industry helped her land her first clients as well as a teaching position. She recalls the ups and downs of starting her own business, which included learning new skills to run her firm, PAR Engineering, in New York City.

Find PAR Engineering at par-eng.com. 

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
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Transcript

Lixandra: Hi, everyone. I'm Lixandra Urresta, and this is Career Switch Podcast. This show is here to encourage you to take action with whatever career change you've been considering or are working on. In some episodes, I talk to people who've made their own career switch, whether by choice or circumstance. They share the good, the bad, and the truth about their journey, including what worked for them and what didn't. In other episodes, I speak with experts who offer their best career advice on issues that can come up during the process of making a career change. After all, it takes guts to switch things up, and it's not easy. However, it is possible. So. I hope you hear something in this episode, an idea, a suggestion, a piece of wisdom that'll spur you into action with your own career switch, whether it's taking that first bold step or trying something new. Welcome. I'm glad you're here. 

After almost 20 years as a structural engineer, Patricia Rodriguez reached a point where her career had gotten somewhat stagnant and she was ready to switch it up. When her large corporate firm downsized and she was let go, she jump-started her career by starting her own firm and teaching, the career combo she had dreamed about in graduate school. Patricia shares how she opened new doors for herself as a women- and minority-owned small business, and how her longstanding relationships helped with her career switch. She recalls the ups and downs of starting her own business, which included learning new skills to run her firm, PAR Engineering in New York City. Welcome, Patricia. Thanks for joining us. Let's dive in. Take us back to 2012 when you were working as a project manager for a large engineering firm. What led up to your career switch?

Patricia: I practiced as a structural engineer for the entirety of my career. I had been working for a larger firm and I had been there for a number of years. I had been in the industry actually for under 20 years at that point. Like a lot of other places, we're starting to downsize based on the workload that they had. And so I started thinking about some of the work that I had been doing. We were doing building design, so structural engineering and building design and typically those types of projects, they don't take that long, you're done with the design within a year or so, then they go into construction. I had the opportunity to work on a large project, which was the United Nations renovation. And that was, you know, very interesting project, but it was a project of several years. So at some point, it did become a little bit repetitive in terms of the work that I was doing. So that was really the beginning of me starting to think about what were the next steps? What did I want to do after that? Did I want to continue, join another firm perhaps and continue doing what I was doing? And I realized that really wasn't something that seemed attractive to me at the time. And so that planted the seed of looking for what else is there out there that I could potentially do.

Lixandra: What were your first steps after your company downsized and you were let go?

Patricia: So initially it was more about just Taking a step back and taking a breath to just understand what had happened, especially after being somewhere for so long and doing something for so long, right? I didn't do that much initially. I did take some opportunities to do some work as an independent contractor. So I did work with some old colleagues. basically assisted them with some of the projects that they were working on. So I did that for a little bit as I started looking into what other opportunities there might be out there. I looked into, for example, being an engineer in a sales position, not doing sales, but working at a company that put out a product and being an engineer for them. So that was something that I looked into. And I found that that just wasn't the right fit for me. And that is also the time when I started to look into academia and see if that was something that might be a direction for me as opposed to continuing in the industry.

Lixandra: Why academia?

Patricia: I actually went to graduate school with the intent of teaching. That was something that I always thought that I might go into. I was exposed to some great professors at that time. And there was one in particular who was doing a combination. He was teaching as an adjunct professor, so he was teaching part-time. But he also was working full-time as an engineer at a firm. And I remember thinking when I met him that this is the dream. This is, you know, what I would love to have, this mix of these two things. At this point, this was a time when I thought back about that idea that I had had. I also ran into someone who was a friend and who was also an old colleague, and she thought that would be something that would be a good fit. So she also reinforced, I guess in some ways, what I was already thinking.

Lixandra: Why did your friend think this was a good fit for you?

Patricia: I was managing projects and she was an engineer on those projects. And so she felt that in many ways I acted as a mentor at that time to her. She felt that the way that I approached that was in a way that she felt I would potentially be good at teaching as well.

Lixandra: So along with teaching, you also thought about starting your own firm. How did that come about?

Patricia: So the starting my own firm was also a process. I was working at the time on some larger projects an old colleague had going on. And he was very encouraging of me starting my own firm and pursuing some additional opportunities that way. So this was back in 2014. So seven years ago, I decided that it made sense. You know, I had to think about it because obviously this was a point where you make the conscious decision of OK, well, I'm not going to pursue being an employee and, you know, really going in a completely different direction. But I felt that it was the right decision at that time. This really does go hand in hand with the academic route as well, because at the same time, I was teaching full-time as a substitute professor. So while I was teaching as a substitute professor, I also started, I incorporated, and I started putting into place the systems that I would need to really focus on ramping up my firm.

Lixandra: What excited you about starting your own firm and what made you hesitate?

Patricia: That's a great question. Well, I'll start with what made me hesitate. There's a lot of fear of the unknown, of course, that goes into it. There's a lot of business practices that I felt that I needed to know. The biggest issue, of course, is how are you going to secure work? That is a big unknown. In terms of what made me, I guess, excited or looking forward to do this is that, as I mentioned before, I felt that I was a little bit stagnant in my career. And all of a sudden, I needed to look into all of these things that were new to me. On the one hand, it seems scary. But the flip side of scary is exciting. You know, it's exciting to learn new things. Especially when you've been in your profession or career for a couple of decades, you feel like, well, I know certain things. But then to learn something new is very exciting. That to me was an impetus to keep going.

Lixandra: What new skills did you have to look into and learn?

Patricia: In my business, you need two types of skills. You need the technical skills to be able to direct other engineers or to do the engineering yourself, especially as you're starting out. Then there's the business aspect, the administrative aspect of it. So for me, it was not relearning, but almost reverting back to early in my career where you had to do all of the busy work that now there's no one else to do it, you know, initially until you start hiring people. So it was kind of refining those early engineering skills. At that point in your career, you know, I was in a more management position, you know, as a project manager. So I didn't have fine-tuned anymore. So I had to revisit those. And then on the other hand, the business side of it, I really had to learn a lot of business skills. I mean, accounting, marketing, I mean, all kinds of skills that I really didn't really need to tap into in my previous roles.

Lixandra: So how did you get those first clients since securing work was one of your main concerns?

Patricia: At that point in my career, I did have quite a few connections. So I did tap into some of those connections and just getting the word out there that this is what you're doing now. So some of the work did come through some of those connections. Also at the same time, I was networking and just trying to meet people out there. We really wanted to push getting work in the public sector, working with city and state agencies. And so that took quite a bit of networking and a lot of time, actually, to get out there and start meeting people and making those relationships. How did you network? A big part of our setup as a firm was to pursue certifications for women and minority-owned businesses. There are a lot of events that are specific to those types of firms. Each of the agencies will also have different events. I also took advantage of mentoring programs. One in particular that I had done with a larger firm was great. It took place over several months. The intent was for small businesses that were considered emerging businesses. I actually made some great connections there that I'm still in touch with. In some cases, we've collaborated on several projects that actually was invaluable. The other way was through organizations such as the AIA, which is an architectural organization and other similar events to get out there and meet people.

Lixandra: What are some ups and downs you've experienced running your own firm?

Patricia: You know, definitely it can be a struggle to find work in the beginning, getting a portfolio of experience that is actually through your firm so that you can prove that that's work that you've done and that you can perform. I mentioned this actually recently, you know, while I was on a career panel, we were talking about just how so many of us had the experience of working at a larger firm. Maybe we worked on some nice, fancy projects that we're proud of. Now, all of a sudden you're working on a lot of smaller things, you know, that you weren't working on before, but it's all fine. You know, it's all work. So just to keep that in mind that, you know, maybe it's not going to be the most glamorous, you know, the fanciest project, but it's all work. You're building up to hopefully a mix of some of the larger, more glamorous projects too along the way. The ups are definitely, you know, when you get to a point where you can hire is definitely, I would say that feels great. And you know, when, when you want to work, it's, it's a great feeling.

Lixandra: Speaking of winning work, does it help to be a woman and minority owned firm? Would you recommend going this route for a small business?

Patricia: Definitely getting certified as a woman owned business and or minority owned business is something that I would recommend, but do it with the right expectation. First, it's a process to get certified. But that process in and of itself is not really a deterrent or the big challenge. The big challenge is to actually eventually find work. I think a lot of others sometimes approach it from the point where they think that as soon as I get certified, I'm going to get all this work and, you know, like it's just going to fall on my lap. I remember going to some seminars at the time saying, look, that's not going to happen. It comes down as anything else to relationships, relationships that you build. Also, these certifications were set up for a reason. And the reason is because women-owned businesses, especially in the construction industry, which is where my firm falls under that category, you know, it's just difficult to get a fair share sometimes because the majority of work was going to other types of businesses. And so the fact that they have these certain percentages that they have to award to these kinds of firms gives you a little bit of an in. Within my industry, I know that I have felt some of that bias in the past, especially as a woman. One of the stories that sticks out in my mind is my involvement in a project where it was clear that the owner's rep did not feel that speaking to me or dealing with me on some of these engineering issues was as valid as it was speaking to my colleague, who happened to be a white male. This is something that you do get sometimes. I think it's important not to take it personally and understand that the issue doesn't lie with you, it lies with the other person. But I think that's where being certified also can really help in some of these situations, but it doesn't preclude coming across these situations.

Lixandra: What kind of projects does your firm work on?

Patricia: Within the private sector, we do small to mid-sized new buildings. We do quite a bit of work in Brooklyn. We do a lot of renovations, so a lot of brownstone renovations. That has been what we call our bread and butter. More recently, we're doing a lot of hospital renovation work within Brooklyn, and we're hoping to branch out into a Manhattan hospital system. So yeah, this is the kind of work that we've been focusing on more recently.

Lixandra: As a small business, how did you make it through this last year with the pandemic?

Patricia: It's definitely affected my industry for sure. Construction even went on hold for a certain period of time. So, you know, that for sure affected us. For us, we were really lucky, I guess, that we were working on the biggest project that we had worked on to date, had started the beginning of 2020. It was a project that was supposed to go on for a number of years and it did keep going at the pace that it was going for about six months. And it went on hold and then it went away. It was in the aviation industry. We all know what happened with the aviation industry in 2020. So it was no surprise that it went on hold and went away for some period of time. So that was really difficult as a small firm to kind of get through. But as I said, we have some of this other work that we're hoping is going to carry us through until everything picks back up. But it's going to be some time. We've been through this before, back in 2008. That was another time that was difficult on the industry. Eventually it recovers. And so we hope that we'll be part of that recovery.

Lixandra: Let's circle back to your teaching. How did you land your first teaching position with no experience? And how do you like teaching university engineering students?

Patricia: So with the teaching, I did one semester as a substitute teacher. And that position, I found actually just through an ad. On my resume, I did mention the mentoring of younger engineers. So I did have that experience. So even though I hadn't been teaching per se, I had mentored a lot of younger engineers. So that counted They actually have you do a presentation and you present that in front of students and in front of other faculty members. So that's what I did. I was very nervous. I remember because I hadn't done this before, obviously, and I had to put together this presentation on design. And I guess it went okay because I was able to get that job. I believe that because I did that, it more easily really led to my next teaching position with a different university. Also part of the networking, I had attended a meeting actually for a new building. This was sponsored by the university that I actually wound up teaching at. Subsequently, I ran into someone who I had known since my time as an employee. We had a good relationship. I asked if they were looking for adjunct professors and he just basically brought me right in there. That was a great match for me. I love the students there. And so I've been teaching as an adjunct professor at that university since that time. I get a lot of satisfaction out of teaching. It's a different dynamic that you get being around students at that stage in their lives where everything is being absorbed and, you know, just, just all this learning.

Lixandra: What advice do you have for our listeners who are working on their own career switch, especially if they're starting their own business?

Patricia: You'll find, especially when you're setting up business initially, you have to know about a lot of different things and you have to do a lot of things on your own, but know when to seek professional help. What I mean by that is there are certain things that are just going to take so long to do that it's maybe just best to, for example, maybe there's some accounting that you need to have done. Go to an accountant and maybe it's a good investment to have some of that work be done by someone else. In my case, for sure, it was setting up the website. So for the longest time, I wanted to set up a website. I was influenced by others and said, it's not a big deal. You can do it. Use this website builder and blah, blah, blah. I don't like doing those things. And as a consequence, I'm not good at it. So I went to someone, she did a great job. I was very happy. And that was the best investment of the firm's funds up until that point. Keep in mind for those who are looking to go into business for yourselves that there are professionals that can do some of the work. You don't have to do everything yourself and maybe that's the best option. The last thing I would say is to have some faith and to believe in yourself along the way. I found that sometimes it's difficult to do and it was difficult to do for me when things seemed like, well, when are we going to get some work? Or, you know, we've been sending out all of these proposals. We've been networking. I've been doing this for so long. I'm tired. You know, I met some naysayers along the way too. Well, you know, you've got these certifications, but, you know, it's just, you know, like it's nonsense. It's just for show, like the city provides these things. So it really took a lot of belief in myself. And believe me, there were a lot of questions along the way. The biggest discouragement is when you go from a steady, secure position to something that is the opposite. Unsteady, insecure, cashflow is sometimes it can be quite a few months before you see cash flowing in, you know, just cash flowing out. So definitely there's a lot of feeling of kind of questioning, you know, whether that's worth it. And then something happens and it is worth it, you know? So I think it's like so many things in life that you just have to believe that this is the right thing. But I stuck with it and it paid off in the long run. So I would say to hang in there and believe in yourself.

Lixandra: Thank you to Patricia Rodriguez for being our guest today and for telling us how she jump-started her career and achieved her dream combo of teaching and running her own business. You can find Patricia's engineering firm, PAR Engineering, at par-eng.com. 

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