The Small Business Safari
Have you ever sat there and wondered "What am I doing here stuck in the concrete zoo of the corporate world?" Are you itching to get out? Chris Lalomia and his co-host Alan Wyatt traverse the jungle of entrepreneurship. Together they share their stories and help you explore the wild world of SCALING your business. With many years of owning their own small businesses, they love to give insight to the aspiring entrepreneur. So, are you ready to make the jump?
The Small Business Safari
The Solopreneur's Survival Guide | Liz Steblay
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Liz Steblay joins us to share her expertise on successful solopreneurship, drawing from her experience building multimillion-dollar businesses without employees. She reveals the essential strategies that help independent consultants and service providers build wealth and create sustainable businesses.
• Definition of solopreneur: self-employed person without employees who doesn't aim to grow beyond themselves
• Commit to one hour of networking weekly—just "one person in person once a week" keeps your pipeline full
• Create a North Star document that clearly explains your "why" for being self-employed
• Establish a clear niche—clients want to hire specialists, not generalists
• Build wealth and pay less tax through intentional financial planning
• Solopreneurs can still build significant businesses using contractors and fractional leadership
• The Professional Independent Consultants of America (PICA) provides community and resources
• Being self-employed doesn't mean doing everything alone—strategic outsourcing is key
Discover Liz's book "Succeeding as a Solopreneur: Six Keys to Taking the Leap, Winning Clients, and Building Wealth" and connect with her at sixkeys.info or through the Professional Independent Consultants of America at picawork.org.
www.PICAnetwork.org/why
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/solopreneurs-business-development-relationship-liz-steblay/
https://highmarkdistillery.com/pages/private-barrel-experience
Liz’s Profile
linkedin.com/in/independentconsulting
Websites
- ProkoConsulting.com (Company)
- PICAnetwork.org (Company)
- SuccessfulIndependentConsulting.com (Blog)
Thanks to our sponsor Smart Hire Solutions LLC!
Introduction to Small Business Safari
Speaker 1Did you just make up knowledge workers? No, not. Oh, dude, you're walking into a terrible spot.
Speaker 2Oh, welcome to my web. You're going to insist, we're going to wield your experience on me and how stupid I am.
Speaker 1Well, let me tell you a little bit about knowledge workers.
Speaker 2Alan, look at you, ready to pontificate.
Speaker 1And let me tell you where it came from A little guy named Peter Drucker. You may have heard of him, Alan.
Speaker 2Is he the UPS guy? Oh Alan, oh, I almost made him spill his bourbon. That would have been a win.
Tax Woes and Entrepreneurial Beginnings
Speaker 1Welcome to the Small Business Safari where I help guide you to avoid those traps, pitfalls and dangers that lurk when navigating the wild world of small business ownership. I'll share those gold nuggets of information and invite guests to help accelerate your ascent to that mountaintop of success. It's a jungle out there and I want to help you traverse through the levels of owning your own business that can get you bogged down and distract you from hitting your own personal and professional goals. So strap in adventure team and let's take a ride through the safari and get you to the mountaintop. Alan, we got to get going. We got to talk about the beginning. The beginning, yeah, I just got to go back to it because this guest brought flooded memories back and I'll never forget.
Speaker 1Right before tax time, when I was working at the bank, I had made that big daddy job. I was like, oh my God, here I am making all this money that I hadn't made. I really jumped up my salary and my bonus structure from going from consulting to this. And tax time came and between my wife and I we were two W-2 employees with no other places to put it. You paid a lot in taxes. So I went in there and I'll never forget this. I went in there and, as we all know, I can be pretty colorful and my CPA wasn't ready for what was about to hit him, and I hit him with what the F is going on here.
Speaker 1He says, well, this is what it is. I'm like I don't have that money. He goes well, why didn't you hold it back? I said I asked you he goes well, I just I did what you told me you thought you were making. I said well, I didn't realize I was getting this bonus and I didn't realize those options actually came as income. I said so now what he goes? Well, you pay it. I said well, I don't have the money. Said what do rich people do? He go they're doing what they're doing. Now he said have you ever thought about starting your own business? I'm like, as a matter of fact, I am, that's right. And so that became the. I know what I'm gonna do yeah, again another lesson.
Speaker 2You learned the hard way, right I?
Speaker 1was a lot. Uncle sam got a lot of money oh my gosh, nowhere to go with it. So that's, uh, that's my story and my journey to oh, oh boy, maybe it's time to become an entrepreneur. So today we've got Liz. Oh, liz, I forgot to ask how to pronounce your last name.
Speaker 2Why don't we have her do it? So you don't screw this one up too.
Speaker 1Let's not do it I know Go ahead, liz Stable, oh I would have said Stable, I would have, I would have.
Speaker 3Sure you would have.
Speaker 1Yeah, barrio Sarasota, I didn't do that one either. All right, liz, great Liz, you're here with obviously talking about solopreneurs and successful solopreneurs, and we can't wait to talk about your journey. But I guess one of the big things I want to know before we get started is that you went to USC out in Los Angeles when you were going to school. There were you like I'm only going here so I can be a solopreneur.
Speaker 3God, no, I never had any ambitions of being an entrepreneur or self-employed solopreneur or any of that, although I did major in business and I sort of had a dream that, wow, someday it would be cool to have my own business Because I'm the daughter of an entrepreneur. But no, I didn't study entrepreneurship when I was in school. I studied in school. I studied organizational behavior.
Speaker 1Uh-oh.
Speaker 2You know what that is right? I think you need some.
Speaker 1What Right I'm exactly right Corporate shrinks yes, I've met them three times. Have you been through a couple of assessments?
Speaker 2Any of them voluntary.
Speaker 1No, nope, not one of them, no, three times though.
Speaker 2Big Trojan fan. Dun, dun, dun, dun dun. Look at her, she's got the little fight on yeah.
Speaker 1Look at you. You know I've always had a soft spot for the Trojans. You know, because growing up in Michigan you go watch Notre Dame. I always play them every year. Yeah, and of course, a Notre Dame. I say I'm a Notre Dame fan because I'm a Catholic kid. Go Pope, go Pope. Oh baby, oh, I'm on the watch party. I was telling Alan, this is work Right now. Just to date it a little bit, the Cardinals are in conclave getting ready to elect our new successor Pope for our Catholic faith. Do you have a betting pool on it? So, as a matter of fact, I'm going to. After this, I said I will not do that. That's what sinners do. I can't believe that. What are the odds? Again, yeah, I'll take the Catholic. Give me 50 on the Italian. I'll take 25 on the Asian.
Speaker 2So I knew you would be betting on this.
Speaker 1Come on man, this is great, this is great you know, speaking of USC.
Speaker 2You know, Cousin Brad.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2His wife Holly, who's a saint because she's married to Cousin Brad Right, four-year starter at USC. Women's basketball played with Cheryl Miller.
Speaker 1Really. Yeah, that is super cool. Yeah, and now they have Juju Whitaker Juju is her first name. She's really good. Liz, are you a women's basketball fan?
Speaker 3Not especially.
Speaker 1Okay, well, I'll hold this one for you. So she is really good, I mean, and she is fun to watch and I wouldn't say I'm a women's basketball fan, but I am a sports fan. She is an extremely good athlete and a great role model for a lot of young ladies. So this has been just super to watch her blossom, kind of taking on what Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese had built and the people before them. So it's cool watching women's basketball come back in. But that's not why we're here. Why are we here, chris? We're talking about how to become a good solopreneur. So first, I have to mention this is that literally just a couple of weeks ago, somebody asked me what that definition is, and it was in a networking event and I was like huh, that's interesting. So, liz, you want to tell us what your definition of a solopreneur is?
Speaker 3Sure. The short version is it's a self-employed person who does not have employees and does not have ambitions to grow bigger than themselves and have employees in a larger company. We just like to do the work that we like to do, make a lot of money and call it a day.
Speaker 1Like it. So you came out of college. You got your first job, probably in org behavior doing something.
Speaker 3No, my first job was selling car insurance.
Speaker 1Look at you, oh my gosh. So you come to USC and you start selling car insurance. How fun was that.
Speaker 3Yeah, horrible Dialing for dollars, right, but it was the job I could get right. So there you go. You got to start somewhere.
Speaker 1So how did you? You arced in throughout the corporate world, but it was the job I could get right. So there you go, you got to start somewhere. So how did you? You arced in throughout the corporate world, and when did you decide that it was time to go on this entrepreneurial journey?
Speaker 3It was by accident, so I had been through the corporate world for a long time already, so I'd worked for one of the large. After car insurance, I did a couple other jobs. I ended up working as a consultant for Pricewaterhouse that's how old I am and then they became PricewaterhouseCoopers or PWC. Then my daughter was born and I said, okay, well, this model isn't going to work anymore, because my whole life is not about consulting. And so I went internal to Levi Strauss and a position as director of organizational readiness for the implementation of SAP, which is like boring as hell. And then I got laid off because they shut down the whole program.
Speaker 3So I called a former colleague that I'd known through PwC and I said, hey, I just got laid off. Do you have any projects? Do you need any help? And he said Are you kidding? How soon can you get here? So I had my first consulting contract following week, didn't even have a laptop, and I just said, okay, well, I'll just do this for a little while. And then earlier you talked about how you were caught short on taxes. I discovered that rule that first year, and also the rule of not networking and not always doing business development. I was caught flat footed. At that point, I was a single mom and I didn't have more work lined up, and so that's when it became less accidentally self-employed and more conscientious, like how can I make this work?
Speaker 1That's interesting. You brought that up because that is one of the ones I wanted to get into, because I have chosen not to do the solopreneur. I've got 32 employees and I'm starting to delegate even more and more now, which has been hard, but I built that. And solopreneurs, especially in consulting, as I've talked to others about this, doing the work is one thing, but finding the next gig and keeping that pipeline filled is a whole nother avenue and work effort. How did you figure out how to get into that and how much time did you put into it, like, say, per week, compared to your real work?
Speaker 3Yes. So without that for sure, I didn't really do much of any, which is why I was caught flat footed, and so actually I have a book out now that I'm sure we'll discuss later. But one of the six keys to success, of being successfully self employed, is to constantly grow and nourish your network, and so now I advise people that you need to spend at least one hour a week doing outreach or business development whether that's reconnecting with an old colleague or sending personalized emails or whatever at least one hour a week. Now the rule of thumb is 20% of your time, which would be one day a week.
Speaker 3Right, I don't know anybody who spends a day a week doing business development or outreach or marketing, business development or outreach or marketing, but I do know a whole lot of self-employed people who do not even an hour a week. So even if you just do one hour a week, you'll be far ahead of most self-employed people. And I don't even call it business development, because like that sounds boring. I just call it outreach and keeping my network warm and connecting with people. When I was in person as a consultant, my cardinal role was one person in person once a week, so that meant at least once a week, no matter how busy I was, I was having coffee or lunch or a drink with somebody One person in person once a week, and that was enough to keep my pipeline going.
Speaker 1After that very first Early on gold nugget right there. Just one hour. I think that's easily to implement in anybody's uh business. When you look at a week, if you just find one hour or you got drive time, you're sitting in the windshield. I know you guys listen to the podcast. A lot of them are driving around. I would tell you one of the contractors I know does a great job of this is that I'll get a call from him once a month and he goes. Hey man, I'm driving between jobs, Just was checking in and I can see what other things are going and I finally asked him what are you doing? And he goes, he goes. I just come up with a list of everybody I want to talk to that week and I know when I'm in the truck instead of you know, just listen to sports, talk radio or whatever. I said, well, you could listen to my podcast he goes listening to. He kept going. But no, I think that's a great idea. Just one hour once, once a week and it's really hard.
Speaker 3It's enough to keep your network warm.
Speaker 2Yeah, yep, it's hard to do that when you're when you're busy, and when you you have to. You have to remember to do it or you're going to get caught flat-footed, like like you just said. I, chris, I'm sure I told you this I've got a friend of mine actually it's a friend of cousin brad's's out in California, double mention, very successful solopreneur, and he has a little rule of thumb where, if you consider you're working eight hours a day, whether he does or not, once an hour he does something to advance his business and that's just his little tick, tick, tick, tick. If he wants to play golf and cut the day short, then he will come up with eight things that day that will advance his business and then he feels like he can go out and play guilt-free golf and it could be just firing an email, picking up the phone, that kind of thing, and it's a very simple little metric that he has and he's just wildly successful.
Speaker 3Yes, the trick is to remember to do it successful. Yes, the trick is to remember to do it. So I one of my favorite tricks is I have a standing calendar reminder every Monday from nine to 10 AM, cause I'm a slow starter in the morning and let alone on a Monday and it says outreach and that's the hour I have set aside to do the outreach. Now, if it happens to be perfect skiing weather and fresh powder, I might move that to the next day, but it's on the calendar so I make sure I get it I like it.
Speaker 3Why did?
Speaker 2you choose Monday.
Speaker 3Because I just, like I said, I'm a slow starter. I don't want to. I just it's easy for me to like send notes to people or reach out to people or, you know, comment on people's LinkedIn postings or whatever it is, and it doesn't take a lot of brain power. So I don't do any critical deep thinking on Monday mornings.
Speaker 1Fair enough, I don't, I've got rules.
Speaker 2Yeah, man, when's the last time we did any critical thinking.
Speaker 1Well, I never make big business decisions on Monday. I always make it Tuesday, just so I can have time to think about it, because Mondays in my business are manic. It's putting out the dumpster fire on Monday, right. For us in the home services world, people had all weekend to look at their house. Look at what you did all weekend to look at their house, figure out what they want you to do. So we're usually manic and things are going crazy. So I never try to schedule anything on a Monday, only so I could be there as support. Now I've got, I think, a lot of buffers. That's helping me. But back to being a solopreneur when you've got to make it happen. That's how I was in the beginning. I mean that's. I felt very solopreneur-ish in the beginning. When I first started my handyman business and got going, all I had was one employee, he was another handyman and I was doing everything else. And then, as eventually as I grew, I became the sales guy, but also the scheduler still solopreneuring. So it's a pretty lonely world, right.
Speaker 3It can be, but I do want to point out that just because you're self-employed and a solopreneur doesn't mean you're doing it all yourself. You can have lots of subcontractors supporting you. So, for example, I have two businesses, but the one that really makes money is a matchmaking agency for consultants. We place them with Fortune 500 companies. Think of like a sports agent or creative artist agency in Hollywood represent actors, we represent consultants. Okay so so in that business I don't have any employees. It's a multimillion-dollar business. We've been on the Inc 5000 list of fastest-growing companies twice and I still don't have any employees. But I have a core team of four fractional or contract leaders who are running that business for me.
Speaker 1Beautiful.
Speaker 3My CFO, our COO, our operations manager and our head of talent are all part-time and they're all paid on 1099.
Speaker 2I think you're kind of pushing the boundaries of the definition of solopreneur there, aren't you? That one is pushing the boundaries a little bit, but even a lot of a lot of executive, a lot of executive coaches or independent consultants that I know they'll have.
Speaker 1They'll outsource their social media planning or strategy or they have a virtual assistant or a bookkeeper, right for sure yeah, I do know, guess, as the former banker. Yeah, I thought he was going to be really good at bookkeeping. I can do it Not so much. Yeah, yeah, that's there's. There's 17 years of pain and agony in there. Actually, I'm going to say I'm going to take that back. I've been in business for 17. I would say only 15 years of pain and agony.
Speaker 2That's been good. So if you had, to do over again?
Speaker 1is that one of the decisions you would have done differently? I definitely would have gotten in, uh, I would have spent the money for a good bookkeeper, uh. But you know what I found, especially with that one just brought that up, uh, when I know that's not the episode, but, um, the definition of what a good bookkeeper is for you is so dependent on what you are in your business and what you need. You know, in the mastermind group I'm part of, I mentioned it all the time. I really had to workshop this a lot to figure out what the best one for me is, because I had gone through three not so good ones.
Speaker 3I did too. It took me a while to find Goldilocks. The first one was too small, like couldn't think strategically enough. The second one was too big, was too expensive, and finally the third one was just right. I love that.
Speaker 2Goldilocks. Just right Now is your focus on helping solopreneurs who are in the consulting space, or just anybody that defines himself as a solopreneur.
Speaker 3Doesn't need to be consultants, financial planners, executive coaches, interior designers maybe, but anybody who's selling a service and their expertise. I mean they may have other physical products, like download this assessment tool for $10 or whatever, but for the most part, it's a knowledge-based business and, yes, my, my passion and my specialty is helping people launch and grow their own business.
The Power of Networking: One Hour Weekly
Speaker 1Man, that's a. That's a great niche, I think, to be in. In knowing that you said something, I think it was good that a lot of people say is hey, who do you work with? I'll work with anybody. Yep, again, you know networking and I see you're already shaking your head. Can't say that, give me something specific, because I might lock onto it and go yes, she knows how to work with knowledge workers who are in consulting or helping people out.
Speaker 3Yes, and that's actually the second key of my book, which is, to be memorable, be known for something, you have to have a niche. You can't go to market as a jack of all trades or Jill of all skills, because if you put yourself in your client's shoes, they don't want to hire somebody who maybe can do it or has done it once before. Your clients want to hire an expert got it?
Speaker 2did you just make up knowledge workers?
Speaker 1no, not, it's not. Oh, dude, you're walking into a terrible spot, oh really welcome.
Speaker 2You're gonna we're gonna wield your experience on me and how stupid I am and well, let me tell you a little bit about knowledge workers alan, look at you, ready to pontificate and let me tell you where it came from.
Speaker 1A little guy, guy named Peter Drucker. You may have heard of him, alan.
Speaker 2Is he the UPS guy? Oh?
Speaker 1Alan.
Speaker 2Alan.
Speaker 3Alan.
Speaker 2Oh, I almost made him spill his bourbon. That would have been a win.
Speaker 1Oh my gosh, I can't even know where to begin. I need to get back to Liz. No, peter Drucker obviously is a well-known coach theorist, but actually one who really helped set up how business works, and he is the one who coined the term knowledge workers before computers were even around and talked about how they have to utilize, how do you utilize their minds and their space and what's their work output and how are you able to manage that? And I use a lot of Peter Drucker's books. When I was at SunTrust back when I was managing 400 people and trying to figure out how to best maximize and not only manage but also figure out how they're ticking.
Speaker 2Let me ask another dumb question so you can make fun of me. Yes, when do you need a coach versus when do you need a consultant?
Speaker 1You know, I'm so glad Liz is here, liz, I'll let you take that one, because I'm still spent for my Peter Drucker.
Speaker 3I actually wrote an article, a blog article. I've written dozens and dozens of blog articles.
Speaker 2So are you saying that's a good question, Liz?
Speaker 3It's a very good question. The article says consultant or coach. Be wary of mixing the two. So you would hire a coach if you want somebody to help you figure out the answer for yourself. You would hire a consultant if you want somebody to come in diagnose the problem, put together the plan on how to fix it and help you get that done. So one is more help me, help you, and one is just don't make this happen, Like Terry McGuire.
Speaker 1Yeah Well, she actuallyire. Yeah well, she actually. I mean, she actually put herself in that. She's kind of that, that kind of person too. She's the agent between consultants and uh, I might immediately went to I wonder if they all have headshots. And it must be hard to manage the talent, right.
Speaker 3I mean, this is like right out of the managing these consultants it's not consultants, thankfully are a lot easier to manage than I think actors I perceive actors to be a little bit more difficult to manage. But, yes, a headshot's mandatory.
Speaker 2A coach is more like a shrink right.
Speaker 3They help you come up with the answers. They're not going to give you the answers.
Speaker 2And then a consultant is just somebody with huge depth of knowledge and experience in a very particular field that you need for your business.
Speaker 3Yes.
Speaker 1Okay, confirmed. I was waiting for her to say yes. I was like, yeah, I'm buying what you just said. I think that makes sense to me.
Speaker 3Now there are people who are both. So, that's where they have to be careful. What is the client asking for? Are they asking for you to help drive the solution or are they asking you to help find the solution? Because if you go into a situation and you're being more collaborative and asking too many questions and you're not moving the ball down the field, they can get frustrated and feel like they've Damn it, alan.
Speaker 1All right guys? Yep, we had a little glitch. Guess what. You know what Technology is awesome.
Speaker 2I asked such a good question. I froze, liz. You know what? You broke the internet.
Speaker 1Alan, I did Dude. I just literally had my router upgraded this weekend because it was time to rock and roll.
Speaker 2And.
Speaker 1Liz froze and we went liz I thought she was thinking for the right word, liz and he's like, wow, she's really thinking hard? I think no I think we really broke it and so we're back. But when we get liz back on, what does liz do? She flashes our favorite drink alan she's got a bourbon cheers.
Speaker 3so let's stop for a minute. What is? Is this? Did you craft your own bourbon? So for a thousand bucks you can fill your own barrel. You wax it, you name it, she stores it. You get to create your own labels, you do the bottling and you can do whatever you want with it.
Speaker 2Do you get to pick your flavor? Like you know flavor profile on it.
Speaker 3You can, if you wish. I use her original recipe because if I didn't want all 24 to 27 bottles, I could sell it back to her and she would distribute it under her Highmark label. But I've done three private barrels now and I always take all the bourbon.
Speaker 1So how many bottles do you get out of a barrel?
Speaker 3Anywhere from 25 to 27, depending on the angel's share.
Speaker 2See now, this is really nice.
Speaker 1I know. You know what I actually. I feel like. I mean, I actually now feel like I'm in, I'm in the, I'm ready. I mean I think we're in the high wasp.
Speaker 2Liz, do you share? Do you give it to clients or friends, or is it just for you? I?
Speaker 3I have been known to share. So this is. I'm holding up a whole bottle, but get back here.
Speaker 1You cannot fly to reno now.
Speaker 3Get back he also allows you to do half bottles or small bottles, and so um one year for christmas, my company did send small half bottles of bourbon to clients beautiful so that is so cool, uh, it worked.
Speaker 1So, jelly on this one. Oh my god, uh, alan's on the bourbon trail. Chris can't seem to get there because, uh, it requires somebody else to drive him and he needs to not drink the entire first tasting Uh, so that's why I stay here in John's Creek. But that is so cool that, uh, that you did that. So obviously a little fun. If you guys check out Liz uh and her book, uh, maybe you know what you'll find a little bit more about bourbon. No, talking about solopreneur success, let's go all right. So we've already hit on a couple of your uh, a couple of your secrets. I want to hear, uh, another one, um, and that is what secret you're solopreneuring? You're off, you get going, and then what do you do to get out of a rut? Because a lot of us, I think, as we're doing, we all get in them, right? Yes, you know nobody's ever asked me.
Speaker 3I've been on dozens and dozens of podcasts and nobody, because a lot of us, I think, as we're doing, we all get in them, right?
Speaker 2Yes, you know, nobody's ever asked me, I've been on dozens and dozens of podcasts and nobody's asked me that question. So, liz, the reason why, yes, that is probably he's in a rut and he's looking for some free advice.
Speaker 1That was earlier this year, yes, but actually who are we kidding? Chris is a daily rut. Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 3So when somebody's in a rut, that must mean that you wouldn't call it a rut if you were really loving what you were doing. So if you were really really loving it, you wouldn't be calling, you wouldn't refer to it as a rut.
Speaker 2What would you call it? What would you call a rut? If you loved being in the rut?
Speaker 3I'm crushing it, I'm just knocking it out of the park. I'm living the dream I love what I'm doing nope no kidding guys.
Speaker 1Yeah, so in that situation, we had a guy, the podcast that says man, I think, every day I feel like I'm going to the candy store, I'm like dude, every day I feel like I'm going to the shit digger station and I'm digging out of yet another hole.
Speaker 3Hit in the face with a shovel Right so if somebody came to my office hours and said that I would counsel them to go back to their North star document or their original. Why so? I run a bootcamp for people who are thinking about making the leap to independent consulting or solopreneurship and want to do a really well-founded launch.
Speaker 2Did you coin that phrase, or was that another famous person?
Speaker 1I really don't pay attention to yeah, the North Star, the North Star, that's a new one. No, the North.
Speaker 3Star document. I don't know if I invented it. I don't think I probably borrowed it from somebody. I think you did, but let's say I did.
Speaker 1Yeah, drucker did it. I can confirm this. Drucker did not, so she gets it. Drucker did not.
Speaker 3He's too busy delivering packages. And even if you haven't done one and you already are self-employed, chris, it's important to understand your why. Why am I doing this? Why am I taking this path? How do I want this to change my life? How do I want this to change my finances? How will this change my relationships, my home, environment, my health? And you have to be very clear on the why.
Speaker 2Because, being self-employed, as you know, is the hardest job you'll ever have. You have to figure things out. Just a basic why, or is it a Chris?
Speaker 1why Wait? You mean hypothetical.
Speaker 2Chris, is this the character in a?
Speaker 1book, Chris? Or is this the guy over here on your left, Chris? Damn it.
Speaker 2Why me? Why now? Why?
Speaker 3Why Because, if you feel you're in a rut, it's probably because you're not aligned with your original. Why? What's your original purpose for being self-employed?
Speaker 1Going to Vegas big boat, fast cars yeah, reno, then out to tahoe and back.
Speaker 2Did that too, yeah no, I like to have a little fun golf you know, yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1Well, you know what happened. Yeah, I had to go do christmas with the family, kidding, kidding everybody. Sarcasm coming through the podcast. All right, um, no, you're right. Uh, back to the why. You know, going back on it. You know, here we are, 17 years later. The kids are now out of the house, but they were in middle school and grade school when I started the business and everybody says, well, you did that so you can be with your kids more. I'm like nope, I did it to make a lot of money and it didn't happen in the beginning.
Speaker 1It's a lot of money thing, but I you know what I I just got done telling somebody else they're getting ready to start coaching their kids in baseball.
Speaker 1when I said, dude, probably the best times of my life were out there on the baseball field, the softball field, with my son and my daughter screaming at the ump, uh, yeah, usually uh just barely getting kicked out or getting censored yet again from another watching from the hill where you had that, whatever the the boundary was that you couldn't cross I'm sure I'm not the only one who had this distinction, but, uh, I was the only one at this tournament at least. Uh, my daughter also played tennis at a usta tournament where she actually, uh, told the usta person to have me removed and uh, oh she I did not know this story the lady comes over from the net and says sir um, that player has asked that you uh, please.
Speaker 1I said that player is my daughter. She goes yeah, I think it'd be best. Probably. I'm like fine, that's fantastic.
Speaker 2Liz, I got a question for you. So you're a champion of solopreneurs and this podcast. For how many years we've been doing it? Three, three and a half, three and a half years. You know we're focusing on scaling and we talk to a lot of solopreneurs, but the whole mindset is is getting out of being a solopreneur and scaling, but it sounds like you're championing people who remain solopreneurs. So what's the exit strategy for a solopreneur? So, yes, there is a, there's a good question.
Speaker 3there's often a junction where somebody's solopreneur business is going so well they're at a decision point. Do I bring in people to help me grow this into a larger organization, which would be more of a longer term equity play, which leads itself to an exit strategy in the more traditional path? Or do I just raise my prices to meet because demand is outpacing right? Or do I just raise my prices, keep it small and make more money, sock that money away and then the retirement account is the exit strategy? So it depends. It goes back to your North Star document. Why are you doing this? There's a lot of headaches with expanding, but on the other hand, it's an equity play, so you should be here on this head how many headaches do you have, chris?
Speaker 1Well, let's see how bold am I now? Yeah, so yeah, I get the North Star document All right. So you actually briefly mentioned this Kickstarter class or a class that you have. How can people find this class and go check it out?
Speaker 3Yeah, my name's hard to spell. The name of the book Succeeding as a Solopreneur is hard to spell, so I created a landing page which will take you to the book or more about me, or to my organization called the Professional Independent Consultants of America. The landing page is sixkeysinfo, not sixkeyscom, because that was too expensive and I'm all about keeping expenses low. So, sixkeysinfo will take you to find the book, to find out more about the organization PICA, and on PICA's website is my boot camp.
Speaker 1So cool. You started this PICA group. How long ago did you do that?
Speaker 3We just celebrated our seventh birthday, although technically I started it nine years ago.
Speaker 1Nice.
Building Community Among Solopreneurs
Speaker 3It took me two years to go live. Okay, so that's how that math can use your fingers.
Speaker 1Oh yeah, that was hard. I know that's what I was doing.
Speaker 3I'm like what happened the gestation period was two years, which is a long time to launch a baby business did launch a baby business.
Speaker 1That's a great phrase. Two years to launch my baby business, all right. So you launch your baby and so now peak is an organization people can join, obviously, meet other consultants, get a chance for community. What do you guys do to build that sense of community?
Speaker 3Yeah, so we do when, when I had too many thoughts, yeah, no not too many, but too many keys hit the keyboard at the same time, which is an analogy.
Speaker 2She's in the middle of her day, ellen.
Speaker 3Yes and I am in the middle of my day.
Speaker 2It is a few hours earlier than us.
Speaker 3So to build community, a few different things. One I hold office hours once a week where members come and ask questions and maybe meet other members. We do meetups for different groups. So once a quarter there's a healthcare, life sciences, biotech group that does meet up and networking. We do in-person events where there's critical mass. So last week in Denver I hosted a solopreneur happy hour and 25 people came. And then we there's about once a quarter, twice a year we do an event up in Oregon. It's just where somebody says hey, let's get some people together and go do this thing. So that's all very organic and we have a private LinkedIn group. So you have to be a peak of member to have access to that group and that's where people will post things like hey, I'm working on my website, I've retweaked the headline, what do you guys think? And then we'll offer feedback to each other.
Speaker 1So do you have one in Atlanta?
Speaker 3yet we do have several people in Atlanta and I think it was two years ago I was down there and I did a solopreneur happy hour.
Speaker 1All right, hey, alan and I would be fun to be at your happy hour.
Speaker 3Yes, we would, I'm sure.
Speaker 1And we can identify as solopreneurs if we need to. But no, we'd love to hang out and do that stuff. But that's awesome, that outreach.
Speaker 2Have we established? I'm going to ask another dumb question.
Speaker 3You ready?
Speaker 2This is three Did we say what PICA stood for? She did what.
Speaker 3Professional Independent Consultants of America.
Speaker 2Okay, she did what. Professional Independent Consultants of America? Oh, okay, pica, because they're training P-A-C-A.
Speaker 1It's right in her background. 17 syllables is a lot.
Speaker 3So that's why we call it PICA. And had I known this? So I started the business, working on the business nine years ago. That was before the term solopreneur was even part of our language. I agree that was not a phrase when I that was before the term solopreneur was even part of our language.
Speaker 1I agree, I, I. That was not a phrase when I started mine 17 years ago, which is why when I said years ago, yeah, so that's why I was at a networking event and I want to go back to networking. Go ahead, alan.
Speaker 2Well, I just Googled PICA and it says the definition of PICA is craving and chewing substances that have no nutritional value.
Speaker 1That and chewing substances that have no nutritional value. That might be.
Speaker 3P-I-C-A. Yeah, there is a syndrome called PICA.
Speaker 1yes, Did you know that, chris? I did not know that. Okay, so quick.
Speaker 2Okay, look at you, holier-than-thou, Mr Waiting-for-the-Pope, yeah, I am, but I didn't have to Google that.
Speaker 1You Googled it.
Speaker 3That's not your knowledge I know, peter trucker, you don't I used ai, oh, you do but to find out more about pika, the organization, you would need to go to picatnetworkorg okay I'm gonna do that while you're.
Speaker 1Yeah, please don't engage in our conversation, please can you be present, please, please.
Speaker 3Independent consultingorg will take you there too.
Speaker 1All right, you know what, listen, I'll kind of hang on this the adults are gonna keep going.
Speaker 2Yeah, we're just gonna keep going.
Speaker 1All right, you know what listen, I'll kind of hang on this.
Speaker 2The adults are going to keep going, yeah we're just going to keep going.
Coaches vs. Consultants: Finding Your Path
Speaker 1All right, please, without this. So god, there was another big one, one of the things as solopreneurs I think I have pika. Yeah right, you got you got a lot you got a lot more. We picking on chris, but yeah, there's a lot more with alan, my uh, my steadfast co-host, who I uh, by the way, he's not paid to be here and I said, hey, man.
Speaker 2You're getting every dollar's worth. I'm getting every dollar's worth. All right, let's back to Liz. Please. So I like that being self-employed can be scary. We've got your back.
Speaker 1I do like that. What a great tagline.
Speaker 2That's where I was going with this, See.
Speaker 1I actually did something good, right, chris? Yeah, you did, okay, so let's, let's build on that, because I just had another guy tell me he's in a franchise network and he goes yeah, this other franchisee doesn't really believe in networking. And I looked at him, and he looked at me and I went. We had one word and it was failure.
Speaker 1I this guy is going to fail. And I said I don't know how you can grow your business sitting in office and starting up a franchise business, especially in home services, without networking. So it's a scary thing. But when you went, when you were in the corporate world, we didn't call it networking right, we did our thing, we worked around, we worked our networks, we did what it had to do to get things done. Similar to you, liz, and your background, I was at Accenture for years, so you learned that path that we didn't call it that, but you knew how to do that. Bizdev yeah, you did BizDev. You channeled up. We use words like channel up, channel over, so you didn't know that. What do you tell somebody who's thinking about doing this? And they're like I don't even know what networking is and I don't get what you're saying.
Speaker 3Yeah, it's, even if you call it business development. Really, one of my favorite articles I've ever written is business development equals relationship development, because it's about developing relationships, establishing trust, becoming known for something. Nobody is going to hire a solopreneur without first having a conversation with them, and in that conversation you're looking to build credibility and trust.
Speaker 1So you can call it whatever you want, but basically you need to connect with other people somehow. But I would tell you, some of the best articles I've read are been you know, sometimes networking for introverts, introverts are a better networker than extroverts because they get more out of the conversation and they dial in and dive in. Because you don't care about what we think. I really don't care about what you think, so back to me, but they listen better.
Speaker 3They tend to be better listeners.
Speaker 2Don't we All right?
Speaker 1So Alan is a learned introvert. No, this is not fun, let's go back to I'm kidding, so it. But he's right, and we've talked about this and actually that's how alan and I met. He was the uh, he was the president of our jans uh john's creek chamber association, part of the uh business association. Yeah, but you were still the chamber. Yeah, we said whatever, but he was a president. And then later I get to meet him. Later he goes. You know, I I hate doing that stuff. I'm like, no, you don't, you're really good at it. He goes no, I had to learn how to do it. And I'm like but you develop such great relationships and that's what liz, that's what you know you guys have both taught me is that it's so big to be in networking. I love to talk to people, as you know you love talking to people I know I like I love listening really Liz.
Speaker 2Liz does listening, liz define listening for us does it actually mean I'm an active? Listener. Yeah, listening for the Gap so that you can start talking again.
Speaker 1So I can interpose my wisdom about Peter Drucker? Yes, of course so you know.
Speaker 3Earlier you asked me about the difference between a coach and a consultant. I just had a term pop into my mind marriage counselor.
Speaker 2Been there too. Are you suggesting we need one Just?
Speaker 1saying Alan, he is so hurt with this extroverted introvert. All right, let's get back to Liz, shall we?
Speaker 2I've been listening the whole time. No, you were on your.
Speaker 1Google phone. I'm actively listening.
Speaker 2I'm Googling the article she said was the best one she ever wrote.
Speaker 3Business development equals relationship development.
Speaker 1That's exactly what I Googled. I do. I agree with that one. That was a great line. Let's talk about your book a little bit more. So when did you decide to write it and why?
Speaker 3Let it and why? Let's ask your north star why did you write your book? I'm going to use north star a lot from now on. I did it a little bit backwards most people write the book and then they said oh well, now I had to develop an organization and services and consulting right and use the book as a calling card. I sort of did it backwards in that I started the organization and coaching people and running workshops and running my bootcamp and blogging right. So I've been blogging for nine years and finally I realized there's got to be a better way to help more people than having live workshops. So I took all of my best blogs, materials from all of my workshops, things I've learned from myself and other solopreneurs, and I put all my best thinking in this book. And so now I'm thinking why am I even running this organization? People should just read the book.
Speaker 1Right. So why did I write my book? Just because I wouldn't know I didn't. I don't know I did. I did because? No, I did it because I kept joking about it. The whole reason, my whole why was was I, uh, I joked about it, uh, that I wish I would have had resources like this when I started my business. I wish I had a podcast like we have before. I did this because if I would have listened to all this beforehand, I think I would have escaped a lot of stupid things that I did and mistakes. I probably would have gotten scared a lot quicker.
Speaker 2But, entrepreneurs are just so freaking stubborn. I mean, it's the awesome thing about it.
Speaker 1I definitely would have kept going. There's no doubt about it.
Speaker 3I mean it is one of the character strengths of a successful entrepreneur solopreneur, and some people call it grit, I call it stubbornness.
Speaker 1Yeah, you know I and I. I find out about myself. You know you're optimistic, you start to solve problems. So I wrote my book because I was hoping that people would avoid making the same mistakes I did, or pick up just a couple little gold nuggets off that. I didn't want to make it a heavy read. Actually, we joke about Peter Drucker. I'm not going to, I'll joke back. It took me a lot I mean, that was a lot of reading, a lot of annotating for me to really digest what he was saying. You know, when you think about the seven habits, which is another great book, I mean that's not one. You just read over the weekend and go got it. Okay, oh, look at me, I'm successful. No, you really got to digest it. My book is you can read it over the weekend and go got it. I see his journey. It was a good read. I picked up a few things. I'm going to put that in my life. That's all I want to do.
The North Star Document and Finding Your Why
Speaker 3Well the thing about my book. So the subtitle is Six Keys to Taking the Leap Winning Clients and Building Wealth. It goes sort of from beginning to end, right? Is this even the right path for me to be self-employed Then? If so, how do I launch my business? How do I determine what my niche is? How do I grow it? How do I find clients and win clients? How do I price my services? That's all in the middle of the book. The last two keys in the book are about how to build wealth and pay less tax.
Speaker 2That's something I don't think are in a lot of books, that last piece of it.
Speaker 1So would you say that somebody doesn't have to read all seven chapters? Could they bounce around?
Speaker 3Yeah, and they do, and that's what people have told me the chapter and get it.
Speaker 2Is that what you're asking, chris?
Speaker 3no, if you're, if you've been established and you know your niche and you don't need to build your website and you can skip those chapters.
Speaker 1Go straight to the ones that talk about building wealth and paying less tax that's honestly the way I built my book too, cause I've had people say you know, I really, I really uh, identify when you talked about training your employees and and that they didn't talk about the first couple of chapters, about your leap, because they'd already been in it and they're trying to scale. You know what I mean. So I, I, that's why I like it too. So, um, all right, liz, hey, can you put us on the touchpoint networking list, especially when it comes to bourbon? I'm going to tell you the next time I fly out to Reno and we're getting together, but when you come to Atlanta you might want to change your phone number.
Speaker 2Liz.
Speaker 1You probably do. No, I'm a lot of fun. Alan, he is a lot of fun. You know, when I came through Reno, they were having the bowling tournament. Do you know? They have bowling bags that you can carry your bowling balls in.
Speaker 2Yeah, you're from the.
Speaker 1Midwest. Yeah, but the roll-arounds. Oh, like a suitcase Like a golf bag.
Speaker 2Oh yeah, dude, it was like a suitcase, that's super lazy.
Speaker 1No, that's super cool. I was like, dude, these guys are serious. Because, yes, I'm from the Midwest. Yes, bowling was the sport of Kings when I grew up. It wasn't horse racing, it wasn't, it wasn't polo, it was bowling. But no, yeah. So I was in Reno, it was a bowling conference, and I was there by myself and I'm walking around I'm like, oh my, wow, these guys are super.
Speaker 2What could they possibly talk about in a bowling conference?
Speaker 1No, they had a bowling competition there. Oh, it was downtown and I was like, you know what I was doing. I was trying to figure out how to get there, because I was like dude, if they're there, there's beer, I'm going to have fun. Yeah, and I can gamble on it. Yeah, and I'm going to definitely do that. And you know who you pick Always, always, you 100% pick the biggest, fattest guy. As a fat guy, I can say that.
Speaker 3But now you also know there's bourbon in Reno.
Speaker 1So I'm coming to see you, liz, look out, we're coming to find you. All right, liz, this has been amazing. How can everybody find you? We talked about a couple other things. You and I are on LinkedIn together. Love that part.
Speaker 3How do people find you your tough name and everything else? We're going to find out six keys dot info. Now it could be the numeral six keys dot info, or you can spell it out s-i-x info. They all go to the same place beautiful.
Speaker 1All right, liz gotta, we gotta ask our questions because, um, I just love asking these. But the first one what's your favorite book Besides yours?
Speaker 3Oh, besides mine. Now, that's the twist, and of course, it can't be mine. Well, what's a book you'd recommend to a solopreneur starting up? Yeah, well, to a solopreneur starting up would be my book, but another really good one is Name your Price by Kate Dixon.
Speaker 1Oh, haven't heard that one Nice one Name your Price by Kate Dixon. Ooh, haven't heard that one Nice one Name your Price by Kate Dixon.
Speaker 3It's set your terms, raise your rates and charge what you're worth as a consultant, coach or freelancer.
Speaker 1And for those just listening, man, this thing is dotted up, dabbed up.
Speaker 2She has annotated it.
Speaker 1She has annotated it at her fingertips, I mean this is like she was studying for an open book exam. That was awesome, fingertips, I mean. This is like she was studying for an open book exam.
Speaker 3That was awesome, all right now let's get some fun stuff. What is the favorite feature of your current home? The view from my office, because I live on the outskirts of town and sometimes I see wildlife and or the neighbor's horses go by. It's terrific.
Speaker 1What's the coolest wildlife thing you've ever seen?
Speaker 2And know that Chris is afraid of wildlife 100% Watch this.
Speaker 1I'm going to tell her a story Go.
Six Keys to Solopreneur Success
Speaker 3So we were up at the my partner has a house at Lake Tahoe and we saw a bear in the backyard and we were up on the deck and I saw it go past the house. I said, oh, it's going to come out by the garage. I'm going to go take a picture. So I went down, went in to open the garage door to step out to take a picture of the bear which I thought would be in the street. The bear was in the garage, so that was the coolest wildlife thing I ever saw. I'm out of here, got to go everybody.
Speaker 1So my daughter is in Asheville, north carolina. They have small black bears in north carolina and she had just gone back. Alan, to go back, uh, to work in you. Like how I did it. It was horrible, damn it all right. So she goes back, she sends us a video. She's out tanning on the front of her house and a black bear came out from behind her car and she videos it. I can't share the video because there are a lot of chris systems in there. This girl is just like chris.
Speaker 1There is a lot of and a little black bear and she scared it as much as it scared her and he went right and he went and hid in the, but they're right next to her house. I'm like girl, that's enough. You need bear repellent?
Speaker 2I don't even know what that means, but you just got to have it. I know what it means. Liz Chris is not visiting you anymore.
Speaker 1At least not in the night. I'll tell you what if he comes up and I got that bourbon in my hand.
Speaker 2Liz, if you protect Chris, he'll come and visit you.
Speaker 1No, I'll tell you what. If come and visit, no, I I'll tell you what. If I had liz's bourbon in my hand and he came up, you'd be full of courage, I'd be in. Hey dude, it's me or the bourbon let's go.
Speaker 1I'd like to see that oh god, I'm scared, I'm running my ass off. I just have to run fast. I just have to run faster than you, yes, which means I have to trip everybody. All right, liz. So one of the things that we talk about we haven't talked about here, but we did so. We love customer service, because Al and I are customer service freaks A hundred percent. What's a customer service pet peeve of yours when you're out there and you're the customer?
Speaker 3Unsolicited text messages.
Speaker 1I tell you what dude? I'm getting a lot of those. In fact, I hate them. We have a mortgage in the house up in athens and I had to go out there and do some updating because you know austin's primary but I'm, you know, doing all the whatever's behind it and, uh, I signed up on their website and I just could. They just kept pounding me and I was thinking, oh my god, I'm late on a mortgage payment or something because you know I haven't had one for a little bit. Thank you. But I was like what the hell? Right, and then you get those. And then, well, forget about political who.
Speaker 1Those are the worst yeah, yes yeah, that's a good one, but I tell you what I think it's coming more and more. You know, in canada you have to do a two-factor opt-in, and as an employee, as a as a person sending them. It's really strict in canada. Here, here in the us, it is kind of strict because I have to do this.
Speaker 2Well, it's supposed to be, but there's no enforcement. In Canada, I think there is enforcement.
Speaker 1Yeah, double opt-in. We do have to sign up on the 10LDC to do what we do, but we are not obnoxious with our text messaging, says Chris.
Speaker 3No, he's really not. I don't do it.
Speaker 1Our text messaging says chris, no, he's really not. I don't do it, kind of all right. So back to our another thing. All right, let's go. All right, here we go, give us a diy nightmare story, and we like fire, we like impaling, loss of limbs emergency services yeah water flood I'd like to tweak the question a little bit to my worst contractor story, or best contractor story. Okay, I'm going to have to tune out. It has to be twice as bad, twice as bad.
Final Thoughts and Cat-in-Wall Story
Speaker 3It's because I wasn't going to. I wanted to add a walk-in closet in my house, but at this point I was a single mom and I wasn't going to try to do it myself. So a friend referred a contractor and he was from out of town so he was going to literally come into this when I lived in San Francisco. He's coming into town, he and his buddy, they're going to redo my closet. It's going to take two days but they're going to be long days 10, 12 hour days so that they could go home. Great After late the first night I couldn't find the cats. It was probably around 10 o'clock and I went outside, called the cats I could hear the mewing, found one but not the other and I came inside could still kind of hear the mewing the contractor had sealed a hole in the wall and put the cat in the wall.
Speaker 1Dig it, mic drop wow story, liz, that one rocks it. I mean, I'm sorry if you're a cat, um, intentionally no, they had no clue. No, the cats are quiet, dude, you had no clue.
Speaker 3He was in there. This story is awesome.
Speaker 1It's really good.
Speaker 3Yeah, well, the guys had gone out to lunch and they came back with their boots, whatever, and the cat had been in the room and got scared or spooked and went into the dark place to be safe.
Speaker 2So did you have to kick a hole in the wall?
Speaker 3I had called the contractor. It was like by this time, 10, 15, 10, 30. I'm like Mark, dude, you got to come back. The cat's in the wall. He's like oh, liz, don't pull my leg, come on, I'm exhausted. I said I am 100% certain the cat is in the wall.
Speaker 1You have to come back and open the wall. I've had in 17 years of doing this. I've had re-dos and we've had callbacks and we've had people call with quote-unquote emergency situations. I've never had that. That one actually tops it. Well done, liz. She's in the top 10. Well done, hey. Everybody, I hope you enjoyed this episode. Stick with us, stay until the end. Don't forget to like this thing. Hey, share this thing. Hey. If you don't like this thing, don't tell anybody. But if you like this thing, start telling some people. Man, because we're getting up there. Man, we're going after smartlets, we're taking them all out. Joe Rogan, don't got nothing on me. Mike Rowe, he doesn't like that. We're that cool. No, he does actually. Um, we've been talking.
Speaker 2Good chance have you. Oh, I have something what tease everybody?
Speaker 1hey, everybody make it a great week. Get out of here, go make some money cheers everybody, thank you for listening to this episode of the small business safari. Remember your positive attitude will help you achieve that higher altitude you're looking for in the wild world of small business ownership. And until next time, make it a great day.
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