On this episode of The Hearth, Deborah Lindsay joins us to decode the often misunderstood roles within a business operation. As an experienced fractional COO, she dissects the unique differences between fractional COOs, interim executives, consultants, and advisors, shedding light on how each contributes significantly to a company's growth and efficiency. Additionally, she unfolds the indispensable role of a fractional COO, especially in small to mid-sized companies embarking on a journey of growth and expansion.
Deborah's passion for sustainability is not just a personal preference; it's an integral part of her professional life. Her quest to make a positive impact led her to acquire an MBA focusing on supporting startups striving to resolve climate change, economic inequity, and social injustice. Listen to her compelling narrative on why smaller businesses, with their inherent nimbleness and the ability to establish core values early on, can significantly impact these pressing global issues.
In the final part of our conversation, Deborah shares riveting insights into creating a sustainable business, warning about the pitfalls of greenwashing, and emphasizing clear, realistic sustainability goals. Her hands-on experience in startups and active participation in the Green Business Network makes her an invaluable guide for businesses looking to embed sustainability as a core value.
Links mentioned:
B Corporation
Contact Deborah here.
If something you heard today brought a smile to your face or a spark to your heart, and you’d like to connect with me, here are a few ways you can do that.
One is my newsletter, it’s where I put most of my time and energy when I’m not working with clients or on this podcast. Sorry social media! It’s a mix of real life stories, tips and tricks and of course updates on what’s happening with the podcast. Whenever something is going on with me or in my business, it always comes out there first.
Another resource that I have for you is my Guide to Doing Work Differently. The guide takes you through four inquiries into how you can build a more sustainable and equitable work environment for yourself and your team. It's a great place to start.
Last, if you’ve got a burning question, a comment, or a situation you’d like my eyes on, you can email me at candice@fortressandflourish.com.
If you enjoyed this episode, hit subscribe to know when the next episodes come out, and if you’re feeling generous, leave a review. Reviews help other like-minded folks find their way to this resource.
Learn more about Candice and her work here.
On this episode of The Hearth, Deborah Lindsay joins us to decode the often misunderstood roles within a business operation. As an experienced fractional COO, she dissects the unique differences between fractional COOs, interim executives, consultants, and advisors, shedding light on how each contributes significantly to a company's growth and efficiency. Additionally, she unfolds the indispensable role of a fractional COO, especially in small to mid-sized companies embarking on a journey of growth and expansion.
Deborah's passion for sustainability is not just a personal preference; it's an integral part of her professional life. Her quest to make a positive impact led her to acquire an MBA focusing on supporting startups striving to resolve climate change, economic inequity, and social injustice. Listen to her compelling narrative on why smaller businesses, with their inherent nimbleness and the ability to establish core values early on, can significantly impact these pressing global issues.
In the final part of our conversation, Deborah shares riveting insights into creating a sustainable business, warning about the pitfalls of greenwashing, and emphasizing clear, realistic sustainability goals. Her hands-on experience in startups and active participation in the Green Business Network makes her an invaluable guide for businesses looking to embed sustainability as a core value.
Links mentioned:
B Corporation
Contact Deborah here.
If something you heard today brought a smile to your face or a spark to your heart, and you’d like to connect with me, here are a few ways you can do that.
One is my newsletter, it’s where I put most of my time and energy when I’m not working with clients or on this podcast. Sorry social media! It’s a mix of real life stories, tips and tricks and of course updates on what’s happening with the podcast. Whenever something is going on with me or in my business, it always comes out there first.
Another resource that I have for you is my Guide to Doing Work Differently. The guide takes you through four inquiries into how you can build a more sustainable and equitable work environment for yourself and your team. It's a great place to start.
Last, if you’ve got a burning question, a comment, or a situation you’d like my eyes on, you can email me at candice@fortressandflourish.com.
If you enjoyed this episode, hit subscribe to know when the next episodes come out, and if you’re feeling generous, leave a review. Reviews help other like-minded folks find their way to this resource.
Learn more about Candice and her work here.
The hearth is for you if you're a business leader with a team. Here we have conversations about how to keep growing. When you feel you've reached your capacity, when what you're doing is working but you're starting to see the cracks, when there's a gap between where you're at now and where you want to be, here we find ways to transition through the struggle of survival toward creating a thriving business that supports you and your team as whole humans. Your host is me, candace Elliott. I'm a business strategist and mentor who specializes in working with business owners who are going through periods of growth. Especially when you're adding more people to your team, the practices and systems that worked when your team was smaller just don't seem to fit anymore, and when you're caught in stress and reaction, it's tough to reimagine the way that you created your world of work, both your own personal one and the one that you created for others. I help people align their values and business practices to build practical, sustainable, thriving work ecosystems and no, this isn't just some work utopia talk. To do this, I bring forward my decade-long professional background in human resources and organizational development, working with growing businesses across many sectors, and my decades-long search for meaning and wholeness, which includes researching the history of work and how it came to be what it is today, practicing a trauma-informed approach to business and integrating work, life and spirituality into a meaningful whole. Let's take this journey together.
Speaker 1:Welcome, brave souls, welcome back to the hearth. Today I'm bringing you a conversation that I had with a colleague named Deborah Lindsay. Deborah Lindsay is a fractional COO, so Chief Operating Officer, so kind of how I do fractional human resources work. She does fractional operations work and she has a lot of experience, especially in the tech space, which is really exciting to talk about and learn about, and so we had a conversation just about operations and what all that is, what it's kind of like to be a fractional consultant and what all that entails, and I'm excited to bring this to you. I am so excited to be welcoming Deborah Lindsay to the show today. Thank you, deborah, so much for being here.
Speaker 2:Thank you, candice, it's amazing to be here.
Speaker 1:I'm really excited for our conversation, so I'm just going to dive right in and ask you. So there are a lot of really unsustainable business practices and systems out there. What are some of the things a CEO or an executive director might be experiencing that would indicate that they need a Chief Operating Officer?
Speaker 2:It's such a great question and I'm thankful that you've brought it up. There are several reasons that a company and it could be a founder. It doesn't need to be a CEO. I mean, a founder is often the CEO, but it doesn't need to be. It could be an executive director. It could be a small business owner that they might need to bring on a fractional COO or a COO.
Speaker 2:I do want to mention what a fractional is. Can we stop and I come back to your question and just answer what a fractional is, because I think that some folks may not have heard that term and it is a part-time or full-time, but on contract basis COO or Chief Operations Officer for hire, and this can be different than, or it is different than, an interim COO or an interim anything. I mean fractional's now are really common. Most people have heard of them for a CFO or a Chief Financial Officer, but it can be a CMO, marketing Officer, cro as yourself you are a little bit of a fractional yourself, candace and they're typically, as I said, hired part-time by smaller, mid-sized companies that are not really ready to bring on someone full-time to provide this leadership. And the key is is that they're hands-on with the company and they're there to help grow or become more efficient, and we'll talk about that in a minute.
Speaker 2:An interim, on the other hand, is a temporary executive who's brought on to provide leadership during a transition period.
Speaker 2:This could be a company's restructuring or a COO has left and they're in the middle of a search for a new one, and they definitely have a specific timeframe and their idea is that they're really there just to stabilize the organization and ensure a smooth transition while they're doing this executive search.
Speaker 2:But consultants are brought in and they're there to provide specific strategic guidance and expertise on a project or an area of a company's operations, and they typically work on a project-by-project basis and may not have a long-term relationship with the company. And then an advisor is there to guide and provide mentorship to the executive team. They are not there on the day-to-day operations, but they're there to provide that high-level guidance so that a company can achieve its goals or long-term goals. So I hope that's clear. I know that sometimes they sound very, very similar, but fractionals just keep in mind that they're being hired as that role, but they're just really not there full-time or hired specifically. They still are a contractor in a way, but they're a little bit different. It's a fine line. I hope I haven't confused the audience more than me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I appreciate those distinctions between. So interim, I think, is often really full-time and they're doing the job for just a short amount of time.
Speaker 2:Right, they're not planning on keeping that person. I mean that person could be getting hired, but they're there while there's a transition time happening. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then in the fractional chief operating officer position, you're doing the work of a chief operating officer, but with a company that is smaller, that doesn't have the need for a full-time person in that role yet, and so it could become that eventually. But in the beginning it sounds like you know, like there are more, at least in my experience. There are these more kind of strategic, like high-level problem-solving, systems-related issues that people are trying to figure out and they need someone to be a thought partner to help with that.
Speaker 2:Totally yes, yeah, and and I'll go into the reasons that they. You know when is a good time to bring them on, but what you hit on the head is that it's generally small companies that are not quite ready to have the mean. Frankly, c O O's are expensive. It's hard to bring one on when you're in the early stages or you just don't have that financial capacity to bring them on full time. And yet you still need somebody who has experience, executive experience, and can provide you with that that management, so that you can become the company that you want to become. So that's what a fractional is all about. So let's go to like all the reasons why a company might bring on a fractional C O O and you you hit it on the head when your company is experiencing growth or expansion. So there's a business growth moment happening and they want to bring somebody on to help manage all of the operations effectively. So you know business growth number one.
Speaker 2:Reason number two is often operational complexity. So you know there's so much that's complex in a company and there's only so much that the existing team might be able to do, especially if they're Opening up new departments or creating new teams or having new locations or something, and they need somebody who can come in and really oversee all that development from an operational perspective. That's a good time and you know that could be what you're, you know, akin to business growth. But sometimes those are separate and I, you know, pull them out like that, there could be like a strategic focus. Maybe the founder of the CEO is spending too much time Day to day on operational tasks and finding it difficult to focus on what they need to focus on, which is strategic initiatives and visioning and long term planning, those things, you know, that's what the CEO is supposed to be focusing on in their job, and so it's time to bring an operations support person, generally a CEO, to help them when they get to that place. And then the another reason is experience gap. It could be that the CEO or somebody you know, the leadership team that it's, as it's set up, just doesn't have the skills that they need in I don't know supply chain management or logistics or you know process optimization. It could be that they, they, the team is just lacking that experience and they need to bring somebody to that place and they bring him in as a CEO. And then there's two more times that I've seen it. There's probably more times than what I've.
Speaker 2:You know what I'm mentioning to you as well, but decision making burden. So when there's so much decision, there's so much complexity that's going on in a company and they're not making the decisions that they need to make because the team is overwhelmed, they could bring in a fractional CEO at that point to sort of help lighten that decision making burden. It's not quite as common that I've seen that piece specifically. It's generally you know all of these things as well as that, but you know that's just an example. And then sometimes it's the board. You know the board is like or the investors are telling the company listen, you need to bring in another layer of leadership to make sure that the business is being managed well and from an operations standpoint. So those are the you know kind of the most common reasons why you would bring on a CEO and a fractional CEO.
Speaker 1:So there are so many threads that you just brought up through that and I think one of the things that kind of unites at all is this idea of operations right, and so I'm curious with it, because operations is, it can be like an octopus, but what are the problems that you find yourself solving commonly in the world of operations, like what are the things that come up the most for you?
Speaker 2:It's a really good question. So there is a great book out. It's called how to be a chief operations officer. It's written by a woman named Jennifer Geary and she identifies 16 disciplines that a C O O has to have.
Speaker 1:So many.
Speaker 2:I know, and I actually add another one in there. I read it and I was like wait, she doesn't have customer success but it, you know, and I don't know why, I'm sure it was not an oversight because she's really super smart, but it's finance and legal and H R compliance and risk management, and you know, anyway, the list goes on. So the I think that C O O's tend to have a broad knowledge. They're like, see, they're like H R professionals, generalists, right, you need to have Information about all of those things to be able to get you to the next step. You know you can't sort of blank out when it becomes. You know that topic. You have to have at least a working knowledge in these things and I would say that my specialty it lies in sustainability, in H R, in finance even though I'm not a C F O but I can dance myself around of you know financials really well, risk compliant process development, and those are the things I actually really like to do investor management, board management.
Speaker 2:I wouldn't be brought on to a company that was really large. That's not been my wheelhouse. So I generally work with tech startups, non profits and small businesses, because that's where I spent my career. I mean I started my career, you know, several years ago and in large, putting on large scale musical events. Now, I wasn't a C-O-O at that point, but I was definitely in operations and so I put on large scale musical events. And then I went into co-founding a digital media company with my partner at the time and I had a lot of different experiences there and then went into tech recently more recently in the last 10 years in operations or HR and in sustainability as well, and so those are kind of where I'm most comfortable. That's why I stick with those. I think I have a lot of value and I've added a value in those spots. And then I've added the mission driven piece because of my background in sustainability Super important to me.
Speaker 1:I have a similar background. In starting more on the operations side, I ran a summer camp and then was brought on as the HR manager for a restaurant group but ultimately ended up overseeing operations for the whole thing with the owners, and there's just so much crossover between operations and really every single function of the organization and then yeah. So thanks for sharing a little bit about how you got to where you are today, because it takes a while, I think, to get the skill set in all these different areas and to see how they overlap with one another.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and exactly, you don't necessarily realize that you're in operations until years later and you're like, oh my gosh, I've been doing that my whole life, you know. So, yeah, and it does take somebody who can be a multitasker and who can really think deeply about different processes. And I enjoy, really enjoy, actually going through process optimization when I did and I learned how to do that when I was putting on large scale musical events, because it's very much the same when you're thinking, say, about a customer's success journey and you're going like, where's the first touch that a customer has with the company and what's the last touch? It's exactly the same thing, even if it's virtual to when is a customer entering, going to an event and they're gonna hear about it, they're going to sign up, they're going to go to the registration and they're gonna enter the building and then they're gonna go to all the things and then they're gonna have lunch and then they're gonna leave and they're gonna have a packet. It's the same.
Speaker 2:If you are building a process within a SaaS platform, like a startup that I was with Stylehound, we were doing exactly the same thing. How is the customer first hearing about us? What is the first experience with the app. Where are they getting their quality and assurance when they're using the app? Cause it was a little bit of a SaaS and pass platform and you have to draw it out. You do the whole thing and then their last touch is here, and here's all the points. They're gonna be talking to somebody and here's all the points that something could go wrong, and here's all the points where we need to make sure that something's being confirmed, that it's good and it's right, and how long is it taking from this point to that point? And what's the letter that we're writing to the person when they receive their thing? Anyway, that's all operations and I love it. I actually really love it.
Speaker 1:So you brought up a little bit just a little bit ago about working with mission driven businesses and I'm wondering what is unique about giving operational support that supports a business's purpose and values, versus maybe operational support that's totally profit focused.
Speaker 2:I've always, always been somebody who was really thinking about the planet and nature. When I was a little kid I grew up in Canada I had a lot of time and nature, unfocused time. So you learn when you have unfocused time and nature, you learn to be curious about it. And that's one of the things that they've determined is important in being a steward for the planet is having curiosity about it. And so when I was growing up and becoming a person in the world and people will tell you that I was that person that was like we've got to save the tree over here and we've got to save the whale over there and we've got to like. I always had some petition that I was trying to get people to sign and some passion project. That's just been who I am. And when I went to undergrad, I actually took a long time to finish my bachelor's because I had children in between and I went to a program and I got undergrad in culture, ecology and sustainable communities and I really was a community developer or community organizer, like Obama. I was happy to say we shared that background and I left there.
Speaker 2:I started in nonprofit. It's still going co-founded. It was called Sustainable Monterey County. Now it's called Communities for Sustainable Monterey County. That was my brainchild, along with my co-founder, and I just wanted to save everything. I wanted to make sure that people had the capacity to optimize their actions. So Sustainable Monterey County is built on this idea that people, when they join together, when they join forces together, they're stronger when their voices are heard as a collective than individually. So it's really set up as a way to elevate citizens' voices at the local election and a local politics level. So, rather than like five people showing up to say let's do a plastic bag ban, you can go to the hub, the organization itself, sustainable Monterey County, and have 50 people show up to a city council meeting and have action taken. And it's very effective. It's working really well. The organization is close to being 20 years old, so that's great that it's still going.
Speaker 2:But I realized through a series of other things that I did that for me. I wanted to get into the corporate space because I think that that's where so much is happening that can be managed from the get-go or at the highest levels within a company, and I said, okay, I'm gonna move out of being a community organizer and I'm gonna go back and get my MBA and become like a corporate person and be able to work with companies to make a change. But when I was in grad school, I realized that as we were getting coached during class where do you wanna be, what companies do you wanna work with? And I would be sitting there and I'd be thinking I don't think the companies that I wanna work with exist yet. I think that the companies are, they're gonna be launching as I get out of grad school, that there's people who are creating solutions for today, for a better world tomorrow, and I use that. That was the tagline of my radio show when I had a radio show, but I still say it because it applies. There are companies that are working on things right now that are problems right now that we don't even know about yet, and it's those companies that I wanna work with.
Speaker 2:I was never able to say I wanna go work for a Patagonia or I wanna go work for some company, walmart or someplace and I say Walmart even though I don't.
Speaker 2:There's some issues with the company, but they actually have a really strong sustainability program that just does target and there's a lot of big companies that do, but I knew that I wasn't gonna be in the big company arena.
Speaker 2:That just wasn't where I was gonna be, that it was gonna be a startup, that it was gonna be that initial idea that somebody was having I know what. And I'll give you an example. Because there's a guy that I know right now who's developing a product to help save or make queen bees in the hive safer. And I'm like, oh my God, that guy, that guy right there, he's got a brilliant idea. He probably doesn't know how to get his company launched. I wanna help that guy. Now, on the practical level, he probably can't afford me. So it does need to be a company that's a little bit more developed than that. But I'm just giving an example that I am driven to find companies that are solving these issues of climate change and economic inequity and social inequity and dealing with political unrest and all that, because it's like in my DNA, like it just is in my body. I have no other choice. I have to do this, so that's why I work with them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think just going because I have done a lot of work in local government and I see this intersection between working on these issues. Working on these issues at the local government level Like you're talking about showing up at a city council meeting with 50 people on a particular issue when there's gonna be a vote, right, which is so important to have people tell their stories and then also, on the other side, to be in that for-profit sector, or even nonprofit sector also, where there is such a a possibility to affect change within the scope of what will happen with that business. That's why I love working with smaller businesses too. It's because I feel like when you come in on that ground level, you have the ability of establishing and naming values early on and building systems around those values so that you create, when the company is bigger, something that already is functioning in that way. So instead of having to do a huge course correct, slowing the ship way down and turning, it's a lot more agile when it's smaller. It's interesting to work in that space.
Speaker 2:Right. I mean in startups who have to go and find investor support. They want to align, they want their investors to align with their mission. They want to have a board that does. They want to build in their initiatives with the board and codify them in the meeting notes so that in the future those things aren't going to get lost, that the impulses of the founder to do right and to do good and to build a product that really is going to solve things when push comes to shove it's not going to get put aside because it wasn't built into the infrastructure of the company.
Speaker 2:So it is important to get there right in the beginning, all the way around. And plus, you want to make sure that your board is diverse from the get-go, because you want the diversity of thought and you want to make sure that your systems that you're setting up in HR are inclusive and fair and people are going to get paid properly, I mean. And so the COO is the one who's holding the line for all of that? I mean it is important for the CEO, of course, to have that inclination as well, but I think it's the COO who is the one who's making sure that that work is done, because the CEO should be focused outward, and I mean there's a lot of ways that the CEO and the CEO can work together, but often it's the CEO is outward facing strategy investors out there. Coo is inward facing, dealing with what's going on in the company.
Speaker 1:So what are some of the ways that you incorporate sustainability into your work as a COO with a company?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean there's a lot of amazing resources out there. There's companies like B Corp Lab it's a B Corp certification. I mean they're amazing, it's one of the best resources. I don't know why I can't think of 100% their name right now, but it's one of the best resources for businesses, businesses of all sizes. A small business often can't afford to necessarily go that route because it can be kind of expensive to get that certification. But they have so many resources that you can just be like okay, I'm going to kind of follow this guideline and maybe I won't become certified, but at least I will be building the company right from the get-go. And then the other thing is that, gosh, we have so many like the Green Business Network. I mean it's a really good system and you can work with local people and, depending on what kind of company you've got I mean you can have a restaurant or a laundromat or a mechanics company, and I have greened a bookstore, a radio station, a tech startup, a school so there's a lot of ways that you can bring in tools. You don't have to invent it yourself, my gosh. You could probably even go to chat GPT and just say I want to green my business. What are some of the things I could do? And it's going to give you a great list, and then it's just a matter of finding the people in the company who are going to be the champions of that and making sure that there's some metrics in place so that you can track how well you're doing. You want to be able to say this is where we're starting and this is where we're going to go to. You know, like developing an objective and a key result of like we want to be here and how are we going to know that we've succeeded? And so that then you can communicate that out and you want to tell people of the successes that you've had. So those are some of the ways that I do it. I do find that because startups are just trying to keep their head above water, it's often very hard to stay focused on how the priority of being sustainable, but as long as you're making like little consistent drips at it while you're going, then you know it's going to be easier down the line.
Speaker 2:Again, when I was with Cell Hound, one of the products the service that was a platform as well was that we were helping people reduce or keep items out of landfills, clothing items and household items out of the landfill by helping them create a listing for eBay, particularly to help them sell their item and make more money. And you know you're going. Well, how do you measure something like that? How are you going to say you know, we've had this big impact? And it's very difficult because you don't know in the end whether or not that person actually did sell that thing or what actually did happen to the thing, that you were helping them. But we came up with some, like you know, pretty reasonable metrics to say that you know we were helping to divert this thing and you know, if a pair of pants, on average, where it weighs three to pounds, then we could say, all right, well, on average, the clothes that we're keeping out of or that we're supporting to keep out of the landfill is X and you know. So it's just. It's how do you frame it? How do you make sure that you're not greenwashing something, because you don't want to be making a claim that you can't support? That's terrible, and yet you also don't want to not communicate that you're doing something.
Speaker 2:Like there's people who are, there's companies that are doing really well and being green and they don't even talk about it because they don't want to, I don't know, have their product, appear to be too complex for their audience?
Speaker 2:I mean, you know, like I've been to lectures where they've talked about, well, how are we going to talk about sustainability or being green or eco or regenerative, or, you know, how are we going to bring this up? And they're like we're just not going to bring it up, we're just going to do our thing, we're not going to talk about it, because if we do, our clients are going to think that our product's more expensive or that we are, you know, somehow changing the values that they have long held as important. You know, whatever those are, but you know being able to say like, here's what we're doing, it's legitimate, and this is how I can back it up. Make sure that you talk to experts and say is this reasonable? So that you can get metrics around what you're doing. And so those are the ways. I know I just kind of went all over the place, but that's some ways that I help bring in sustainability into a company.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the restaurant group that I worked for had sustainability as a value, and my company also does. The way that it worked kind of operationally was it was a lens through which we looked at all of our decisions. So, if we were sourcing food, we were sourcing from local farmers. If we were sourcing paper products, we were trying to find recycled products, if it was possible to do that, and non-plastic products and we were purchasing them from a local vendor, from Coast Paper. And then also, because it was a value that we talked about, it would come up in conversations, especially with our staff, where if things were not being done sustainably, it would come up and then we would be able to address it. And so it's interesting to see how naming something like sustainability as a value of the organization guides decision making and then also, if you have open communication with your team, they can help you to kind of refine and revise and come to better systems over time.
Speaker 2:Totally so. Our teams actually will really appreciate if a company is going green or has that value. They're finding that retention is much higher, as you would know, for companies that have that as a value, it's imperative it is. There is some discussion in the science world that maybe we have clipped off the upper part of our temperature increase. They're thinking that maybe we're not going to hit 5% or 5 degrees of increase in temperature because of efforts that have been done already, which is amazing.
Speaker 2:It's not anything to really write home about, but it is something to at least acknowledge that we're able to make change and that we're able to make an impact. And so if anybody says, well, whatever I do, it doesn't really matter, it's just a big mess and I can't do anything, it's like, no, we've actually already done a thing. We've actually already been able to maybe keep this from being the worst scenario on the whole scale of scenarios. Maybe we've been able to creep that down to like, okay, it's really really, really bad. There's maybe four reallys rather than five reallys, and so that's important, and I think that every single person, in every single way, that they can need to take action. And so this is just how I do it.
Speaker 1:I think, in thinking about climate change. A couple of weeks ago, for some reason, I was looking at sea level rise at 2,100 and what's going to be left of our town and these different scenarios, and it was right before I went to bed and that was not like I didn't sleep at all that night and it can feel hopeless, but recognizing that work has been done, there's some achievement that's going in the right direction and that also we each need to do what we can toward that end of sustainability. And also, if we're in the position of running an organization, of having connections within our local government or state government, nationally, internationally, with large corporations, then it is, I feel, a responsibility to work on sustainability in those arenas, because that's really where the systems have been created that have made the issues that we're dealing with today.
Speaker 2:Totally, and the business world is actually on board with this. It's funny. There's a term that's being used right now and to me it's like how do you say climate change without saying climate change and what you say is VUCA? I don't know whether you've ever heard of this term, but VUCA V-U-C-A is a term that's being used in business now and it stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, and I think that every business needs to and every person needs to understand that the concept of VUCA because it is really forcing companies and people to think about how can you be agile? And there's not a business that is not thinking about VUCA right now. They need to. Companies need to be quick to adapt, they need to changing circumstances and they need to be able to pivot strategies and seize opportunities based on what may arise. That has a focus on flexibility and speed and resilience. They need to be very innovative.
Speaker 2:To thrive in a VUCA world, Collaboration, like we've been talking about, is really needed and working together with other stakeholders right, Because businesses can leverage their collective strengths and resources, Because businesses that help build resiliency and adaptability together are actually going to do better in this whole thing. Community and inclusion is huge and essential in a thriving VUCA world, because how different people think about things and their background and their perspectives, that's what's going to foster innovation and better understand the needs of customers and just the community as a whole. And so when we think about how are we going to embrace the uncertainty of climate change and be adaptable and definitely if we want to achieve long-term success then we have to start understanding that nothing is going to be back to where it was. We are already experiencing climate change. I mean, just look at New York last week. Those are climate change issues.
Speaker 1:Just throwing in here at the time of recording this last week, new York was covered in smoke. We're recording in June, so this June of 2023.
Speaker 2:Yep, and I mean worst atmosphere in New York ever, I think, and recorded knowledge, and so you know like it's opportunities are there right here. I am on the cusp of an opportunity as a fractional who's focused on mission-driven businesses Bam, opportunity right there. And anybody who's not thinking about these issues, then they're going to be, I think, left in the dust. So you know that's kind of how we're going to operate with all of things that are going on climate change-wise.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean I was going to ask you about financial instability, but I think FUKA just kind of covers all of it, because financial instability is a part of that and it's reminding me of, like, the beginning of COVID, and we just all were thrown into this wild time and nobody knew what was going to happen or what the rules were. And I feel like the organizations that I worked with that navigated well were ones that they made short-term plans, they dealt with what was happening at the moment, left kind of the future flexible, tried to have lots of different options of different ways to go, and really tried to care for themselves and their teams in a way, so that they were helping to manage the stress that was going on, because these intense moments will just keep happening, right, and so we got to. If we're all going to keep going, we've got to find a way to get through them together.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you've hit it on the head. So, in terms of like, what a company can do if they're like struggling financially, I mean there's always the clear like got to cut back on your expenses and try to make more money, like those are the classic like, what do you do? It's the same as if you're trying to diet you got to exercise more, eat less, whatever. But the point is is that there are so many different challenges that are going to be coming our way, and so financial stability is going to be predicated on have you got a good store of supplies in your business?
Speaker 2:I mean, I think that the philosophy of having no supplies in your stock and just sort of meeting need, as it happens, that whole philosophy that most companies have been operating under, I think that that's going to go away. You need to be able to keep supplies on hand. Of course, that depends on your financial abilities, because it locks up cash when you're there. So it's just going to be like tactics like that that are going to help during different financial times, and we can go into that further. People can reach out to me if they want to talk about that more Depending on their own needs.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And getting rid of buildings that you're not using any longer, consolidating operations. It just depends on what you're doing, what you're trying to achieve. It's hard to give an overall.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it kind of depends on what's going on and what the industry is.
Speaker 2:But Reassessing your supply chains, making different relationships with people, and, of course, that all has to do with sustainability too. Sometimes people equate going sustainable is more expensive and it's often the other way around. Because you learn how to maximize your ROI, you just like you're off to. You just want to make sure that supply chains are shorter, that you're making the direct connections, that anywhere that there's a lag, you're taking that out. Maybe things might cost a little bit more upfront, but over the long term they're going to pay out.
Speaker 1:So yeah, and it can be like you have a lane that you're in and you shrink it so that you're in a smaller part of the lane, or it could be that you decide to pivot and go down another road because of the different situations that are going on. So that's why working with Deborah is great, if something like that's going on. So what's going on for you and your business right now?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, like I said, I've been in the business for a long time, but I haven't had my own business for a long time. This is a new. Becoming a fractional and putting my little sign on my door is pretty new and so, yeah, going. So I'm learning a lot about marketing and learning a lot about sales Operations. People are not always the best salespeople. I think I've come to know that because they we're like to be like telling everybody what to do and like okay, that's, take that line out, because we know, you know we take that line out, it's like. But we tend to be sort of Well, we're not tend to be. We are kind of like what's everybody up to? What are we all doing, versus just a single Like I'm in a sales process with you and we're figuring it out, and that kind of thing. So I'm just upskilling myself.
Speaker 2:I've been learning a lot about AI and how to use that within a company, listening to how people and I belong to a lot of different global operations networks and so attending quite a few lectures on how our operations, people using AI, how trying to learn it. How am I doing it? I've written a book with a chat GPT 14 chapter book with chat, gpt and illustrations yeah, in an afternoon on sustainability. It's never gonna be published but it's just my own fun, like how am I, what am I doing with this, what is it capable of? And so, yeah, so there's a lot of learning.
Speaker 2:I actually also do executive mentoring and so, working with people and even small companies who can't bring me on full time but they wanna have somebody in their back pocket, they can hire me for a short series of times that I'll just come in and sort of drop in and say, well, you know, you could do this and you could do that and you could do this, or actually like serious career mentoring and, believe it or not, I actually also marry people, so I'm an efficient and I help people through that and not through women, and so summertime is a big moment for weddings and yeah, so I'm a busy person and it's fun that's one way.
Speaker 1:What's the best way for people to get into contact with you?
Speaker 2:Well, it's always best to go to my website, which is demralindsycom, and you can download, actually, a booklet on the five operational tips for saving you money. It's in there and we bring up like how do you do a process map and other ways to save money, but there's also in there a link to booking a 15 minute call with me, a chit chat with me, and so I think that that's kind of the best way to reach out to me, and LinkedIn, of course, is always a really good way. I love connecting with people on LinkedIn. So, if you are listening to this, just go and find me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we'll add all of those links in the notes and thank you so much for joining me today, Deborah. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Oh, Candice, it's been amazing. Thank you so much for having me, and I hope that people who are out there really understand that I don't want people to be afraid of climate change and sort of all the uncertainty, the VUCA world we were talking about. I think that when we're knowledgeable and when we're working together, we can actually solve a lot of these things. So just, it's okay, I didn't. I realized that sometimes that can get kind of heavy and I just want people to feel like there's stuff to do.
Speaker 1:There's stuff to do, there's still hope. Yes, thank you.
Speaker 2:You're welcome.
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Speaker 1:Another resource that I have for you is my guide to doing work differently. This guide takes you through four inquiries into how you can build a more sustainable and equitable work environment for yourself and your team. It's a great place if you're looking for somewhere to get started. Last, if you've got a burning question, a comment or a situation you'd like my eyes on, you can email me. All those links are in the show notes. Take care, brave soul. Catch you next time.