Career Coaching Secrets

The Unseen Value: Grant Cooper on Investing in Yourself for Coaching Success

• Davis Nguyen

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Rexhen Doda interviews Grant Cooper, an executive career coach and founder of Strategic Resumes, detailing his 30-year journey. Grant's business began with purchasing a resume company, then significantly scaled via a national contract with Kinko's. After this, he pivoted to a boutique model, focusing on six-figure earning executives.

A key innovation was his proprietary resume critique software launched in 2002. Grant's client base primarily comes from referrals, built on his client-first philosophy. He plans to transition his business in a few years, seeking a successor he can mentor and finance.

He emphasizes professional development (certifications, conferences) as his most valuable investment and advises coaches to charge healthy prices and delegate marketing/admin tasks to scale effectively.

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Grant Cooper:

now remember that it was a long time ago so it's going to look a little old-fashioned but this was it and you open up and there's the disk and then this is all the software and they would have a password you know encrypted password that they could get in and everything else and this is a long list right here of all the instructions for the software all i really like to do everything Welcome

Davis Nguyen:

to Career Coaching Secrets, the podcast where we talk with successful career coaches on how they built their success and the hard lessons they learned along the way. My name is Davis Nguyen, and I'm the founder of Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to seven and eight figures without burning out. Before Purple Circle, I started and scaled several seven- and eight-figure career coaching businesses myself and consulted with two career coaching businesses that are now doing over $100 million each. Whether you're an established coach or just building your practice for the first time, you'll discover the secrets to elevating your coaching business.

Rexhen Doda:

Hey, everyone. Welcome to another episode of Career Coaching Secrets Podcast. Today, my guest is Grant Cooper. Grant, welcome to the podcast.

Grant Cooper:

Thank you. I'm glad to be here.

Rexhen Doda:

Grant, tell me a little bit more about what inspired you to become an executive career coach.

Grant Cooper:

You know, that's a great question. My father was a psychotherapist and I always, like a lot of young people, I didn't want to follow in his footsteps. I thought, you know, I don't want to do that where I'm always helping people because he would always help people. And then, you know, what about his own family? He could Did he have enough time to help his whole family? So I didn't want to do that. But then as I, you know, had my career and I got into a position where I could give advice to others, I actually found myself doing the same thing as my father, helping other people. So, you know, and when you get older, you start realizing maybe your father was, you know, more wiser than you thought, you know, when you were a teenager, you know? So that's how I kind of got into it. And it was about 30 years ago that I was gonna open, I had already opened many different businesses, but I was gonna open a particular business and I was doing research and due diligence. And I met a woman at church who owned a resume company. And I didn't know there was even such a thing as a resume company. I knew there were career coaches, you know. So I shadowed her for a couple of weeks and I fell in love with it because I love the idea of taking someone's background and almost like an advertising agency, making them really shine and polish them and putting their best foot forward and getting them in the door to the best interviews. And so I fell in love with it and I made an offer to buy her company from her and she was moving to another state. And I started out, it was very low business level and I took it very high. Within one year, I landed a big national contract with a company called Kinko's. and they were a copy centers all over the United States, copy centers. And if you walked into a Kinko's in Seattle or San Francisco or Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, Dallas, Houston, Kansas City, Las Vegas, I had a whole part of the US. At the height of it, I had 350 locations that I was private label writing resumes for. So if you walked into those businesses, on one of the walls, it would say strategic resumes. And then there was a whole little kiosk and information area. And you could read about, you could see about it, all the signage. And then you would call the 800 number. So what it told you to do was you would pay at the counter for your order, get a receipt number, and then call the 800 number, and my office would answer. And I had a couple of dozen writers, and it just took off. So that was how I got into the business.

Rexhen Doda:

And Strategic Resumes was the business that you purchased. So this is the name that she originally had.

Grant Cooper:

No, when I originally purchased it, it was Career Pro. And I came up with the name Strategic Resumes, and I trademarked it. as a matter of fact, with the United States Patent and Trademark Office. And so when Kinko's was bought out by a company called FedEx, and everybody's heard of FedEx, right? So FedEx bought Kinko's, and then they got rid of all the vendors who were under $10 million. And I was under $10 million. So they got rid of... me and many others and so the intellectual property of strategic resumes remained with me so i had to change my business model because i no longer had 350 locations and i changed over to a boutique model that was focusing on executives

Rexhen Doda:

and how how does a journey look like uh from the moment that you bought this So you talked a little bit about this, but how is that growth journey? So apart from when you started it, 30 years into the future till today, how does that look like?

Grant Cooper:

Well, it's been a wonderful journey. Many years ago, in fact, it was a couple of decades ago, I was at a big conference where they wanted resume professionals like me, a few of us there, to help the people at the conference with their career. So we were sitting at tables, and my colleagues, there were a few of them and me, and they were just, you know, people would come up in a long line with their resume and give it, and the resume professional would look at it, and write on it the same way that a professor or a teacher would make notes on your thing and say, oh, mistake, here you could change this. But I had developed my own system already. I developed using macros in Microsoft Word where I could look at it and just press a button on my keyboard and it would give a whole paragraph about why that part of the resume needed to be enhanced or changed. And for everything, like it's too lengthy, it's too short, it needs better job descriptions, it needs more achievements, it has a typo, whatever the reasons, right? So I could just hit a few keys and then say print, and it would print the thing and I would staple it and give it to the person. And so... The head of the conference came by and said, you're the only one that's doing it like that. The others are just writing on something. Yours is better, and you should make it into software. So I did. I found a software full-stack developer who could make it and put it into a program, an application. And back then, we used CDs, you know, CD disc, you know. And so I sold those all over the United States. I sold them to universities. career offices. I sold it to the military placement offices. I sold it to other resume writers and career coaches. And I sold many, many copies. And that, along with other things, allowed me to help put my kids through college and increase my

Rexhen Doda:

business. And what was the program called? Is it still running right now?

Grant Cooper:

No. Is it okay if I grab from that real quick the other room and show it to you? Give me one second. Now, remember that it was a long time ago, so it's going to look a little old-fashioned. But this was it. And you open up, and there's the disk. And then this is all the software, and they would have a password, you know, encrypted password that they could get in and everything else. And this is a long list right here of all the– instructions for the software all i really like to do everything frequently asked questions everything you know so i wrote all that and that comes with it so i sold a lot of them

Rexhen Doda:

and back at the time you would just sell them it would be a one-time payment for the software

Grant Cooper:

yeah yeah i mean if i if you could look back you could say you could get them on a monthly subscription or something you know but but i did well with it and i would go to conferences just like You know, Davis is coming to our conference, you know, coming up in the fall in Phoenix. And I would use it as a door prize at the conference. And then everybody at the conference would see it and then they would want to buy it. So I could sell it at the conference, you know.

Rexhen Doda:

Lovely, lovely to have a tool like that, especially like early on when. Things like these were not very common or even like being able to use shortcuts like macros because right now we can talk about automation and AI because it's just gotten easier. Back then, it would take a very creative mind to come up with that. So, yeah, thanks for sharing that.

Grant Cooper:

Yeah. And as a matter of fact, you know, I said I had a software developer who did all the programming for me. I got that done for free because what I did was I was in touch with a lot of students and there was a student who had graduated in computer science and his older brother worked for Microsoft and he had just graduated. He was working at a pizza place and I told him, you know, look, if you program this for me, I will do a free resume. I'll do free cover letter. This was before LinkedIn came out. And I will help you in every way by career coaching. And his older brother worked at Microsoft and his older brother agreed and told him, yes, we'll do it together. So I really got a Microsoft programmer, you know, because it was compatible with Microsoft Word and everything, you know, and Windows. I ended up getting it done for free. And he ended up getting hired by Microsoft because by doing this for me, it was like a feather in his cap that, you know, a reason for them to hire him.

Rexhen Doda:

Yeah. And it turned out to be a very big tool. So, yeah.

Grant Cooper:

And it was the first one. There was no other resume critique software when I came out with this. I came out with it in 2002. There was no other program in 2002 at all.

Rexhen Doda:

Yeah, so that is very inspiring to listen to. And today's world, of course, has gotten more competitive to come up with something like that because there's so many of those. But I really like thinking outside the box in a time like that. And yeah, it just shows the value of coaching. So being able to get that without having to pay because The value of coaching is there. And yeah, thanks so much for sharing that. Is there a specific group of clients that you work with, like a specific client avatar or ICP or your ideal client persona? Is there a specific group that you like to service?

Grant Cooper:

Yeah, I would call them six-figure earners. Almost all of my clients make six figures. And a lot of them make high six figures. And I also get a lot of clients who are business people. They need a resume because they're going into a business project and they all are investing and they all have to put in their resume. And even some of my NFL and sports people, and I've had people, NFL, NBA, soccer, and so forth, and they need resumes when they're doing business deals. And then A lot of them will ask me also to write business plans. So that's another aspect of my business. And at national conferences, I have trained, I've done workshops where I train other resume writers on how to write business plans. And it's really the same skill set of how to take in information, research, and create and wordsmith it and turn it into a good business plan. I just finished a business plan a couple of days ago for a group, and I had done two previous business plans for them, and they both got funded. And now they need a business plan because they want to buy a helicopter, they want to buy 18-wheeler trucks to transport things, and they want to expand and get a new facility. And that particular company, I have a grandson who's graduating from high school, and he's a real go-getter. He's very mechanically inclined. He gets A's and B's in school. He's on the wrestling team at school, and he's going to work for them. It was kind of a favor to me because I wrote their business plan. He's going to work for them in the summer as a summer intern. And if he likes it, he can stay with them. And they're in a growth phase. He could end up being like a high-level manager with them at some point. This is a ground floor. As you know, if you get with a company when it's fairly new, you can go places. I just did a project. In fact, I'm still doing some aspects of it. for a client and he had a big investor, right? And he and his father both invested a few million because they have some money, you know? But then about 25 million came from Silicon Valley. And it was a guy who was, I'm not going to say which number because then you could look it up and you know his name, on less than 10, okay? He was Facebook. He was under 10, I'll say that, Facebook employee. And so... He was one of the investors in that project.

Rexhen Doda:

Thank you for sharing that. And I'm already guessing who that person is, but yeah, I'm not going to.

Grant Cooper:

Offline, I don't want to tell the world, but offline you call me and I can tell you who it is. Okay. Can I tell a quick, quick story that happened in my business? Okay. A young, well, I wouldn't say young. He was actually kind of, getting near middle-aged guy came into my office okay years ago and he moved to new orleans because his wife was an artist and she was showing a gallery she loved new orleans so they moved here he was having me do his resume he was in the health care industry and he told me he said grant i once did something that was the stupidest thing anybody's ever done and i said no come on you're being too hard on yourself like everybody does stupid things i've done stupid things he says no no listen to me and then you decide and after he told me i agreed it was the stupidest thing he said i come from a city called palo alto california and he was had moved here from california so have you heard of palo alto california So he said, I worked at a restaurant when I was in high school and I did a very good job and they made me assistant manager when I was a senior in high school and I was doing great. I made all my budgetary, everything, you know, they loved me. So the general manager left and they needed a general manager. When I graduated, they offered me the job. He says, and I took it. He said, now I later went back and got my, he later went back and got his college degree. But at this time, he said they were offering a big salary and I knew I could save up money to go to college. So I took the job. So about a couple of years after he took that job, he had a little brother who was then a senior in high school. And his little brother came to him one day with a friend. And he said, listen, my friend here is working on this thing in his garage, this computer. People he knows at Stanford University all think it's a good idea they don't have the cash to invest he said all he needs is 25 000 to build a prototype and he wants to take it up to this show and then build the prototype and show it at this show and then start to get other investors he said he is offering 25 he's offering 25 of his company if you could put up the 25 000 he says i told him my big brother You know, as general manager of a restaurant, he saved money. He's got $25,000. And he says, I had about $50,000 in a bank right then, and I could have easily done it. But I thought these kids, I thought my little brother was stupid. They wanted to call their company. The name of it was Apple. And the guy's name was Steve Wozniak. And he was offering 25% of the company for $25,000. He says, do you know how many times I've gone onto the online computer and what my share would be. At the time he came to see me, his share would have been like 900 million of his share, even though they split the stock many times or whatever. He says, Grant, I said, yeah, you're right. I said, what you should have done was call up a couple of the professors at Stanford and get them to corroborate, yes, This is a good thing. And so then put in your $25,000. Don't just take their word for it, but talk to the professors at Stanford who agree, you know, and then make a decision. Don't just kick him out right away because he's your little brother. So, yes, that was something that happened.

Rexhen Doda:

Yeah, really interesting. Wow. Wow, that was quite a story. I was expecting any company but Apple. It was Apple. 25%. That is something. I don't want to say stupid, but that is something. Thanks for sharing that story. And when it comes to you finding your clients, you shared a little bit about this in the beginning, but right now, how does it work for you right now? Is it mostly referrals? How do people find you in the modern day?

Grant Cooper:

Most of my... Clients come from referrals now because I've been doing this so long. And in fact, so many of them come to me, Grant, my daughter just graduated from college. Can you do her resume? Grant, my wife decided to go back to work, you know, and now can you do her resume? She's got a college degree, but she helped to raise our children. And now she wants to go back to work. Or Grant, I just got a buyout offer, you know, severance from my job. And now I have to get a new job. So can you do my resume again or whatever? So I get a lot of that, you know, and people recommend me because they know other people that I've done work for. And, you know, when I go to conferences, sometimes my colleagues will complain about difficult clients. You know, this client, you know, was difficult and they expected and they were upset or something. I don't know. I don't get that. And I think it's old-fashioned that I believe every client who comes to me, I don't see them as just another order. I see them as if my best friend or my family member recommended them, even if they didn't. I do the best I can for them, and I bend over backwards. You have to take the good with the bad. There are a few clients who expect so much, and they, you know... so many that are so easy too, you know, they're just like, Grant, this is, I don't need anything changed, this is perfect, thank you, okay, you sure, did you even read it, you know, like that fast, yeah, yeah, Grant, it's fine, you know, so you have to take the difficult with the easy ones, you know.

Rexhen Doda:

And right now, how does it, what are some goals that you're looking towards for the next one to three years? Is there anything specific that you're looking forward to?

Grant Cooper:

Very specific. In about two years, my wife is going to retire. She works for a university. She's an executive. She works with their board of directors. And she's going to spend about 10 hours a week helping my back office because I used to have a back office person. She had to leave during COVID because she her husband's business needed more help and they couldn't get who they need. So I had that woman had worked for me for almost eight years. Then I hired another person who was from another country and her English sounded very good. And she'd worked as a translator, but English was not to do my back office really. And she had, you know, master's degree, you know, she had worked as translator. She knew several different languages. She was from Poland. She worked for me for a year, and I paid her very well. But at the end of the year, I had to admit that she could not really do what I needed. In fact, I don't really know much about foreign languages, but I think maybe her alphabet had been in Cyrillic, her first language. I would find my files were not alphabetized right. She didn't mean it, but she was making too many mistakes. And so I had to let her go. So since then, I've been just myself for about a year. In a couple of years, my wife will come with me. So that will help. And then I'll be on the final trajectory. It'd be like an airplane. Earlier in my career, the airplane took off. Then I got to 30,000 feet or however many feet I'm gliding. Then I'm coming lower and lower, and now I'm getting ready to land. So in a few years, I'll be landing the aircraft, okay? And I need to find a young person to take over. And I'm a very much a win-win person. I don't want them to have to pay me a lot so that they don't make a lot. But on the other hand, you know, I do have some equity in it. but I will help them. So that's what I'm looking at. I need to transition and basically get my business to someone else.

Rexhen Doda:

So you're not looking to fully sell the business?

Grant Cooper:

No, I mean, I'm looking just to help someone and then they can, I will finance for them. They can just pay me a small amount per month, not much, but I want them to be successful because really I care about my customers because I Even if I found someone and they gave me a great price, if they're not the right person and they're having difficulty and they're not making enough money, then they would not give as good a service to the customers and that would reflect on me. I feel like my customers are like my family. I want them to be treated very well.

Rexhen Doda:

yeah i agree when it comes to investments uh grant uh what resources or support has been most valuable and one of them you just mentioned right you invested into making your own uh program your own uh application is there any that has been valuable for you to grow your coaching business to take off

Grant Cooper:

yes the most important investment and it's something that's not

Rexhen Doda:

even

Grant Cooper:

required is joining professional associations getting certified which costs money and you have to study and take tests going to conferences every year and learning like from they bring in speakers from new york from united kingdom from california san francisco from seattle they bring in top speakers like davis norton who's going to be a speaker And I learned from them. I mean, I learned so much. If I knew everything that I learned at conferences 20 years ago, I would be three times richer than I am because it was great knowledge. Knowledge is the most important investment you can make, whether it's college or professional, either one.

Rexhen Doda:

Yeah, absolutely. Is there... like something, and it doesn't seem like so, but is there something that you wish you had known when you first started scaling your coaching business, like an unexpected lesson learned?

Grant Cooper:

Yes. The biggest thing that I didn't know was that you really need to have healthy, I won't say high, but healthy price structure. If you're working hard for people and doing a good job, whatever it could be, coaching, resumes, whatever you're delivering, to people. If they're not paying top dollar, they don't value it as much. And you're not valuing yourself as much. And if you're not making really good money, you're not gonna do as good a job. You should be making really good money, and then you don't worry about anything except your customer. You don't have to worry about, oh, my kid, you know, They want to go to a college that's expensive. Oh, my kid needs to buy a house and I want to help them. You can just do it and you'll have the resources. But if you think, oh, I can't charge too much because then I won't have as much business or you know, it's too, you know, it'll be too expensive for people. No. Having, like, my first 10 years, I didn't charge enough. It's not even close. And if I knew that back then, it would have helped me more.

Rexhen Doda:

Yeah, absolutely. And it also would help, like, when it comes to investments as well. You'd feel more confident about even going to these paid conferences or even doing, like, the certification. So sometimes they can cost, too. Thanks so much for sharing that, too. Another question I wanted to ask you is how do you handle the balance, and you've done this very well throughout the years, between delivering great client results and managing business growth on the other side?

Grant Cooper:

Well, I wish I could say that I've done a great job. I did a great job when I started the business because I was younger. But I have found that as I got older, you know, I don't want to work. 12 hours a day anymore. I usually come in at about eight in the morning and I leave at about 2.30. That's six and a half hours because I'm older. But when I was younger, I would be working more hours and do more marketing. Unfortunately, I don't do enough marketing, which would help a lot if I did. Yeah.

Rexhen Doda:

And is there any advice you'd like to share to other career coaches who are going to look at this, that want to scale their impact? Same to how you have done it, being creative in a non-model world?

Grant Cooper:

Yeah. I mean, my advice would be to probably find people like Davis and learn what they can do for you. You know, find out if it's a good fit for your business model and get help because you You can't do everything yourself. You cannot coach and market and keep track of everything and administrate everything. You cannot do it all yourself. You need, just like corporations outsource things, you need to outsource some things.

Rexhen Doda:

Yeah. Thanks so much, Grant. For anyone who wants to connect with you, they can find you on your LinkedIn, Grant Cooper on LinkedIn. And there's also the website, strategicresumes.com. And that could be not just for resumes as we talked, guys. So it could be also a business plan. So Anyone who's like our coaches are also businessmen, so might come to you. Thank you so much, Grant. It's been a lovely episode. Thank you.

Davis Nguyen:

That's it for this episode of Career Coaching Secrets. If you enjoyed this conversation, you can subscribe to YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening to this episode to catch future episodes. This conversation was brought to you by Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to seven and eight figures without burning out. To learn more about Purple Circle, our community, and how we can help you grow your business, visit joinpurplecircle.com.