PICA Member Spotlights

Q&A with independent consultants who successfully “made the leap” and created the consulting career of their dreams

 

Q: What is the name of your business and your consulting specialty?

A: I am the founder and Chief People Strategist of HR Leaders Coach, a management consulting firm that provides integrative leadership coaching and advises small- to mid-size organizations in the design and development of a cohesive people strategy that fits their current stage of maturity and projected growth.

The three main ways I work with clients to integrate HR as a strategic partner are:

  1. DIAGNOSTIC CONSULTING: Identify the Opportunities & Start the Foundation. I help clients assess internal operations that span the entire employee lifecycle, such as recruiting, onboarding, employee compensation, benefits, company-wide communications, talent management and development, employee resources, and provide strategic recommendations to integrate customized HR solutions that positively impact the employee experience.

  2. FRACTIONAL HR & HR READINESS COACHING: Flexibility to Align Budget & Growth. Depending on the organization's readiness to bring on full-time HR support, I can operate as a project-based HR advisor to help clients streamline their hiring and onboarding processes, upskill their current HR talent (if any), and/or support them in developing a high-functioning People strategy. When they’re ready for a full-time HR partner, we can co-develop an action plan to attract, recruit, onboard and develop their next top People Leader AND successfully position them as the next strategic partner in the organization.

  3. ONGOING HR LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT: Professional 1:1 HR Coaching & Peer-to-Peer Community.

Q: Why did you decide to make the leap to independent consulting?

A: Eleven years ago I was just starting my family and had a two-year-old. Frankly, the 50-plus hour work weeks and traveling the globe just wasn't working for me and my family anymore so I made the leap directly from corporate to independent. I needed more control over my work and my life overall. I was really starting to burn out, and I knew that I needed a change. I worked with a coach for about nine months while I was still at my job, and then I finally made the leap to leave my full-time job. We really dug deep into the feelings I was having to understand what it was that I really wanted. Through that reflection, I realized that I needed to work fewer hours, and really it was part-time work that I was desiring. It wasn't that I didn't enjoy the work that I was doing, I simply needed better balance between my work and home. I quickly realized the nature of the work I was doing as an HR business partner really didn't lend itself to part-time work in the corporate environment.

I knew a few people who were doing consulting, and I was introduced to you [PICA’s Chief Advocate] and I picked your brain about how to step into this, and I thought, "What the heck, let's go for it." I left my corporate job and I put my name out there. I called my network to let people know what I was up to, got a great response, and found my first few gigs just through my network.  While they weren't the most engaging assignments, they did meet my need for part-time, which was most important to me at that point in time.

Q: A lot of people are scared to do “business development” or reach out to their network. How did you approach that or get over that initial uncertainty?

A: For me, in the beginning, it was really not hard because it was a simple email just to say, "Hi, hope you're well, just wanted to let you know what I'm up to." It wasn't salesy at all. It wasn't like, "Hey, I'm looking for work." It was, "Hey, just wanted you to know that I've left my corporate job and here's why I'm doing it." It really was a reach-out email. A lot of people responded with congratulations as if I was starting a new job and were very supportive of the change I was making.  From that initial email, several people reached out, not necessarily with jobs or opportunities for consulting, but offering, "I'll keep you in mind if I hear of anything." Then, sure enough, within a couple of weeks, a few of my contacts got back to me with, "Hey, there's this opportunity over here, or have you talked to so-and-so? I think they might have something you may be interested in...".

Since then I try to keep in touch with my contacts much more regularly than I ever did when I was working in my corporate job. I make a point to keep in touch with people, especially during quieter times. For example, the last few weeks have been slowing down a little bit over the summer months and it's a nice time to reach out to people. Business development is definitely an area that didn't – and still doesn't – come naturally to me. If I do it with the mindset of reaching out to contacts that I know and I'm not really looking for business, just looking to connect and say, "Hi, how are you, what's going on in your world?" it’s less intimidating for me.

Q:  If you could go back eleven years and tell the younger Susan Nelson maybe one or two tips, knowing what you know now, what would you tell her?

A: I underestimated how much work it is to run your own business. I'm still learning and trying to be disciplined around this. When I first started my consulting business, my initial focus was to leverage my passion & experience to keep me sharp and busy while I stepped away from my corporate job. Part of me thought I’d probably end up back in another corporate job once the job leads from my network ran out or I needed more financial security again. However, the longer I stayed out, the more I cringed at the possibility of going back to the corporate world. 

Over the past eleven years, what started as a “side-hustle” has evolved into a legitimate business. I've invested time and resources to formalize my business operations and developed a clearer focus on my niche and offerings. Running and managing a coaching and consulting combo business pushes me to do more marketing, which requires more regular communications and a social media presence, even though these aren’t my strengths. My advice would be to identify and let go of the work involved in running a business that isn't core to my business or my strengths; to outsource those to experts who can do that work on my behalf far better and more efficiently than I ever could.

There's a fine line that I still struggle with a bit today, which is that I tend to think, "Until I have the revenue coming in, I'm not going to spend a lot of money on outsourcing work. I don't want to get ahead of myself." At the same time, I've come to realize that this thinking holds you back if you don't invest ahead of the curve. Turns out every time I’ve invested in technology or outsourcing non-core (& non-billable) work, I’ve been able to expand my reach and do more of the work I love without adding more hours to my week. I try to be very conscious of billable and non-billable hours and budget my time to minimize the time I spend on non-billable work.

Q: What types of things have you gotten help with or outsourced?

A: I have utilized various virtual assistants over the years and they have helped me with everything from helping me set up my back-end CRM system, to automating repeatable processes like enrolling clients and email marketing, to helping me with ongoing marketing efforts like my newsletters and social posts.

A few years back, as I was looking to add leadership coaching into my offerings, I hired a Marketing coach to help me define it and incorporate that into my branding, website design and copy. Because I needed to spend more time in my business and doing the work, I also hired a web designer to redesign my website  for me and incorporate this new rebranding look and feel. Because marketing is not my strength, I have an ongoing working relationship with a branding/messaging expert as I continue to evolve my business.

Q: It's been fun to watch your business go from nothing to thriving these last 11 years. What's the next chapter for Susan Nelson and HR Leaders Coach?

A: I've been thinking about that a lot this year, as I've spent a lot of time building the coaching side of my business and running my group program over the past few years. I have discovered the sad reality that HR leaders are very hesitant to invest in themselves and/or request budget for their own development, even though this investment has a tremendous ripple effect across the organizations they serve.  So, I have decided to attack the need from the top. 

I’m currently working on raising awareness with CEOs and startup founders (through speaking engagements) about the strong ROI they can experience when they appropriately invest in their people agenda (and their HR leaders) early on. Companies that want to stay competitive need to be able to attract and retain their top talent, which hinges on building a strong, people-first company culture. This is done by investing in a strategic HR mindset from the earliest stages of their business development.

To support this, I’m building a comprehensive assessment tool that can help an organization’s leaders identify their org’s strengths and any gaps that can be positively impacted by implementing a cohesive people strategy that is optimized for their size, maturity and projected growth.  And, of course, I’m here to help them build and execute on that strategy, as needed.

I also continue to collaborate with consulting and coaching colleagues on projects, as I love to learn and gain the perspective of others, all the while expanding my reach in the process.

Q: If somebody wants to connect with you about that idea, or just to find out more about your coaching or consulting business, what's the best way to reach you?

A: They can email me, go to my website, and connect with me on LinkedIn. I also have a professional page on LinkedIn for HR Leaders Coach they can follow for regular updates on my latest blog posts, programs, and offerings.

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