How An Operations Expert Runs Her Consulting Business with Miriam Dicks
"Operations is much like the infrastructure behind the walls that we don’t get to see but we know we need. As pretty as the house could be, it would not be functional if we didn’t have the right infrastructure." - Miriam Dicks
How An Operations Expert Runs Her Consulting Business with Miriam Dicks
Today’s episode is a goldmine for anyone in the nonprofit space ready to shift from freelancer to bona fide business visionary. We sit down with the brilliant Miriam Dicks of 180 Management Group, who shares her evolution and the strategic pivot that transformed her consulting. She'll unravel the often misunderstood fabric of operations, revealing how it's the backbone of every successful organization—and yes, it can be as sexy as it is essential. You’ll learn about the real grind behind turning your skillset into a systematized powerhouse, the truth about balancing the roles of employee and entrepreneur and building a brand that resonates with your values and expertise. Prepare for an episode rich with insights, and don't forget to connect with us after the show to continue the conversation. Let's transform your drive into a thriving, operational engine.
Key Highlights:
Build Your Business Strong: Miriam started just like many of us, working gig to gig. But she had bigger dreams. She wanted a business that didn't just pay the bills but made a real difference. Like putting together a puzzle, she put systems in place that helped her business grow bigger than she ever imagined.
The Magic of Good Management: You might think talking about systems and operations is a snooze fest. But not for Miriam! She says that’s the secret sauce for keeping everything running smoothly. Let's remember that a good plan today is better than a perfect plan tomorrow.
Juggling Jobs and Dreams: It’s tough sometimes, isn’t it? Miriam gets real about the struggle of holding down a day job while building her dream. It’s like having two full-time jobs. She was tired, but guess what? She never gave up. And that’s a big lesson for all of us. 🎢
Business Partnerships and Collaboration: It examines the dynamic of business partnerships and collaboration with insights on how Miriam and her husband balance their roles in their church with their business responsibilities.
Navigating Career Transitions: Transition from healthcare operations to consulting and the pivot that took place due to shifts in the industry and market demands, especially during the pandemic.
Entrepreneurs need to recognize that personal development and strategic marketing are necessary for transitioning from a consultant role to that of a visionary business owner who impacts the local economy. Entrepreneurs should be ready to make mindset shifts, implement systems and hire staff to meet increasing demands while also finding the right balance between the freedom of consulting and the responsibilities of business ownership.
Find Us Online: https://www.confessionswithjessandcindy.com
Connect with Miriam Dicks:
180 Management Group (Website): https://www.180managementgroup.com/
Miriam Dicks (Linkedin): linkedin.com/in/miriampdicks
Connect with Cindy:
Cindy Wagman Coaching https://cindywagman.com
Fractional Fundraising Network https://www.fractionalfundraising.co/
LinkedIn: https://ca.linkedin.com/in/cindywagman
Connect with Jess:
Out In the Boons: https://www.outintheboons.me
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jess-campbell-outintheboons/
Transcript:
00:00:59 Cindy: Welcome to the Confessions podcast. I'm Cindy Wagman.
00:01:03 Jess: And I'm Jess Campbell. We're two former in-house nonprofit pros turned coaches and consultants to purpose-driven organizations.
00:01:11 Cindy: After years of building up our separate six-figure businesses from scratch, we've thrown a lot of spaghetti at the wall and lived to see what sticks.
00:01:19 Jess: We're on a mission to help other nonprofit coaches and consultants looking to start or scale their own businesses past the six-figure mark by pulling back the curtain.
00:01:30 Cindy: Whether you're still working inside a nonprofit and thinking of one day going out on your own, or you've been running your consulting business for years, you understand that working with nonprofits is just different. We're giving you access to the business leaders who serve nonprofits as their clients. You know, the people who truly get it.
00:01:51 Jess: No more gatekeeping, no more secrets. This podcast is going to give you an inside look at what running a successful nonprofit coaching and consulting business looks like. Basically, we're asking people how much money they make, how they get paid, and what has and hasn't worked in their businesses.
00:02:11 Cindy: Listen in as these leaders share their insights, their numbers, and the good, the bad, and the ugly when it comes to building a nonprofit coaching or consulting business. We're going to empower you to make the power moves that give you the income and freedom you set out to create from day one.
00:02:28 Jess: You, ready? Let's go!
00:02:31 Cindy: Hey, Jess!
00:02:32 Jess: Hello!
00:02:34 Cindy: Welcome back! Listeners, we just hit record, but I feel like we could have just had a conversation with today's guest for an hour before even hitting the record button. So.
00:02:48 Jess: I know. I think you were like, let's just hit record so this gets captured.
00:02:50 Cindy: Wait, wait, wait. I know it's going to be such a good conversation. So I'm not going to delay. I'm so excited to welcome Miriam Dicks to the podcast. Miriam from 180 Degree Management Group. Is that right?
00:03:05 Miriam: 180 Management Group. That's correct.
00:03:07 Cindy: 180 Management Group. Welcome to the podcast. We're so happy to have you here.
00:03:12 Miriam: Well, thank you so much. It's so good to be here. And yes, I feel like we're already connected. Like so many things that we could be talking about right now. So, so excited for this podcast today.
00:03:20 Cindy: I feel like this is one of those podcasts that's going to go in a lot of different directions, which is totally fine. But before we dive into all those directions, tell us a little bit about your business. What do you do?
00;03:32 Miriam: So 180 Management Group is a consulting firm, management consulting firm. We specialize in operations management, which is really about systems and structures and efficiencies within organizations. So we typically see organizations that are struggling with turnover or they have a lot of projects, but they can't seem to get traction and trying to figure out why is it that they don't see momentum in the organization. We identify what those issues may be operationally to help them improve their culture so that they can be more efficient.
00:04:01 Miriam: And we are actually turning 10 years old in March. So I'm excited about that. And we also offer leadership coaching and consulting because sometimes you can build a system that leaders need to learn how to manage, right? So we offer the leadership consulting and coaching just to make sure everyone's prepared to move in a new direction. And then we also offer what we call fractional services or contract services where folks can use our team to help them fill the void of staff that they don't have or may not need a full-time employee for. So that's what we do at 180 Management Group and we're excited to do it.
00:04:40 Cindy: I love that. And it seems super, like comprehensive, but one of the first things I like, channel people in my network who are in operations, like one of the things that people always say or that feels like a barrier to them is like, you know, operations is not sexy. We're not bringing in money. We're not doing these things, but you've been doing this for 10 years and you're going strong. So make it sexy for us. Tell us a little bit about the, yeah, how you've been able to sustain knowing that people are always, like but it's not a revenue generator and stuff like that.
00:05:23 Miriam: Well, I'll tell you what happens in how we end up getting more contracts is that people, well, organizations will have some symptoms that are operational in nature. And we identify those symptoms which have implications on their revenue. If you have, let's say you have an environment, a culture that is kind of toxic where you don't necessarily have systems in place for promotions, you don't have job descriptions or processes to get work done. People feel like they're flailing, like no one knows who's on first. They get the work done, but it's never the same way every time.
00:06:06 Miriam: So you've got quality issues, you may have turnover issues, you have all these things that are going on that create sort of this toxic work environment and staff turnover is not cheap. So when people leave the organization and they take institutional knowledge with them, you're losing money. And then you're gonna have to spend more money to overcome the deficit. So, you'd rather have a really strong operational structure that will be proactive, right? That's proactive in making sure that you are keeping the money that you're making and it's not leaking out of the organization.
00:06:44 Miriam: And so it's more like, and I say this all the time, I'm into HGTV, right? I used to watch all the shows, all the renovation shows and all that. And you have these folks who are like, you know, oh, I want my kitchen to look like this and I want my den to look like this and I want to be able to so and so. And it's all aesthetic. And then they say, oh, but your pipes are bad. And you're like, what? I have to spend $50,000 on pipes. I wanted the fireplace. It's like, but do you want to have water? Right? Do you want to have water?
00:07:15 Miriam: And so operations is much like the infrastructure behind the walls that we don't get to see, but we know we need. And as pretty as the house could be, it would not be functional if we didn't have the right infrastructure, right? So it'd be pretty for a minute until you look behind the walls or until the walls start falling down. And then you're like, oh my gosh, we have a mess. So operations is just like that. Is it sexy? Absolutely not. Well, for me it is, I love it. But for others, it may not be. But do you need it? Absolutely. And that's how we get there.
00:07:51 Jess: This is gonna be, like Cindy said, I think in, like a lot of directions, but like you just said, so many important nuggets. And so I'm trying to organize my thoughts. I have a first question because there's a lot of people listening to this podcast who are in that more operational space or maybe they're in finance, accounting, just systems space. And I'm wondering how you, like that explanation, was really helpful for me, especially someone who's like, more of a creative and I need a story to grasp the information. But how do you simply say that like in a tagline or on LinkedIn or like on your website?
00:08:38 Miriam: Let me tell you, that is the hardest thing to do. Right. And we're talking about being transparent as an entrepreneur. I really struggled with, how do you craft a one-liner as it relates to operations in a way that the average person, I think Donald Miller with the StoryBrand folks, they would say it needs to be easy or as simple as a caveman or something along those lines. Like it needs to be so simple that a caveman can understand it. And so it's been extremely hard to put that into a one sentence structure.
00:09:18 Miriam: So what I typically say is that we provide the solutions and support that the administrators, business owners need to help them run an efficient organization at the end of the day. Because that could look different depending on the organization. And that's how specific and an operation strategy is to an organization. Every organization runs so differently. The best we can say is that we're here to support you so that it can run efficiently. And what that means to each organization is gonna be something different.
00:09:54 Miriam: So I will tell you that what we do then is we start talking about symptoms. Because the pain point is what people connect with. So you say something like, it feels like you got so many projects, but you're always focused on problems. You can't get the projects off the ground. Or you have, like we talked about the staff turnover issues, or you have a lot of burnout. You feel like you're just a hamster on a wheel, just keep working, working, working harder, and you can't find ways to work smarter.
00:10:25 Miriam: So you just, you start to really identify the pain points and people are like, oh yeah, that's exactly. And many times when we work with organizations, we do an assessment and the light bulb goes off. They couldn't connect the issues they were having to it being sort of operational in nature.
00:10:42 Cindy: Ooh, that is so powerful because I think that's very true for a lot of people. It’s like we know what it feels like when things aren't working, but we can't point to why they're not working. And so building that trust and having that conversation and be like, yeah, I can tell you why they're not working, I think is such a gift to the organization and positions you as, I mean, since we are talking about Donald Miller and StoryBrand, cause you know, any opportunity to talk about StoryBrand. But like you become the guide, right? You become the person who's like, I can diagnose this for you and we can help fix it.
00:11:24 Cindy: So that's so, so powerful. Okay, Jess has a question. So I'm gonna let her go. I just wanted to type in about the messaging piece and the problem, like the articulation of the problem, because I think sometimes in our sector, people like, wanna focus on the positive, but people need to feel pain before they're gonna take action. So I'll let Jess ask her question.
00:11:48 Miriam: Absolutely, absolutely.
00:11:52 Jess: Okay, so my question is, so for example, I'm a marketer, and so marketing my business comes very natural to me. And I'm wondering if the same applies to someone who's like systems and operations. Like, is that a gap in your business? I know you have a business partner, so maybe you guys, divided, you know, split the rules and responsibilities. But I'm just curious for someone who maybe doesn't see themselves or maybe you do, as a marketer, how much of your time is split doing the work versus marketing the work? And what do you do to maybe, perhaps either fill the gap or maybe don't have to, I'm just really curious when, like for example, systems and operations are not my thing. And so I have to outsource that. It doesn't come naturally to me. I'm just curious how that works in your business since it's like the 180 of mine.
00:12:58 Miriam: Well, let me just say that it started out very painfully for me and I'm going to reframe the question, well, reframe it, the answer to your question a little bit. So when I first started 180 Management Group, I was already a professional consultant. I had worked in the consulting space for, in the corporate side of things, right? So consulting came easy to me because I was already doing that. When I started 180 Management Group, I wanted to have a consulting company. I did not want to promote myself. The name is 180 Management Group. It's not Miriam Dicks and Co. You know, it's not Miriam Dicks Consulting Firm or it has nothing to do with my name. I never wanted it to be about me.
00:13:53 Miriam: But what I had to learn early in is that one, when it is just you, your micro business, you're just starting, you are the business and people need to know you before they invest in the services. So I had to quickly kind of get over that, but it wasn't quick. It took about five or six years for me to really come out of that shell because again, I just wanted to do the work. And I had this conversation maybe two weeks ago with a young lady, but I said, listen, do you wanna be a consultant or do you wanna be a business owner? ‘Cause those are two totally different things.
00:14:28 Miriam: I had to eventually learn that if I wanted to own a business and I wanted to hire people and I wanted to have it to flourish, that I couldn't be a consultant. I can still consult, but I have to be a business owner. And when I took that turn, then I recognized what I needed to put in place for the business to grow beyond just me and my identity and my personality. And making that switch did mean that I had to maybe go and get more educated on it. So we talked about StoryBrands. My husband was a StoryBrand Certified Guide for a couple of years. He has a background in digital marketing and he's had some marketing stuff in the past.
00:15:13 Miriam: So I was immersed in a lot of that, that world, and it did help significantly in marketing the business. But even now, yes, I still continue to go to different things for professional development. We implement those within our organization. We have someone on staff. You guys may have met Jamie. I don't know if you met Jamie, who does a lot of our sourcing for podcasts. And we have a whole business development process policy and procedure guide, cause you know how we are operators. And she is, you know, we have a strategy for it. She is implementing that along with… we now have another part-time person helping with that.
00:15:56 Miriam: So, marketing is not something that's native to me, but I recognized that it was a part of being a business owner. And if I wanted to own a business, I had to do it regardless of how I felt about it. And like you said, if you don't have the skillset, find it or buy it. That's the only options you have, you're gonna find it.
00:16:13 Jess: [Put it down] in a coffee mug. I mean, my goodness. Okay, I would love for you to talk us through the decisions you made when you were at that kind of crossroads. Am I a consultant? Am I a business owner? I think that both are amazing routes. And a lot of people can, we've been talking about the word should all day long. And it's like in Sex and the City when they're like, I was shoulding all over the place. People think they should be a business owner when really like a lot of the things you were just talking about that are required to be a business owner are not really what they wanna do. They just wanted to do the work. So what were some of, kind of, the yes, no, left, right, up, down decisions you had to evaluate to sit in? No, I want to be a business owner. And then you took all those steps to get there.
00:17:10 Miriam: So there is a book called, and it's old, like it's not a new book by any stretch of the imagination. It's called The E-Myth. Have you guys heard of that? The E-Myth by Michael, I think it's Gerber. Yeah, Michael Gerber. I read that book when I first launched my business because it really is a vision sort of exercise, right? Some people go into business ownership or entrepreneurship to be an independent contractor. They just want to get the gigs. It's not about bringing on staff, growing it to a larger entity that requires you to employ others. It really is about getting the gigs, enough of them to live the life you want. That is a way of being an entrepreneur. There's nothing wrong with that.
00:18:04 Miriam: But in that book, E-Myth, it talks about if you're going to grow your business beyond an independent contractor type model, there are certain systems that you have to put in place for growth to take place. And part of that is systematically designing your work so that others can do it. Because at the end of the day, if you want to, and I think the example he gives in the book is someone who bakes pies. They really love baking pies. But they realize that when the demand is there, they can't just bake the pies. It's not that one person can't bake 500 pies a day for all the demand that's there.
00:18:41 Miriam: So eventually they're gonna have to put some systems in place where someone else can bake the pies just like they would bake the pies. And have people who could sell the pies and people who can take care of the money and the backside of when we get the pie sold, right? Making sure the equipment's there. So it becomes more of a business, a larger scaled business as the demand grows. But if you don't put those types of systems in place, the business will never grow beyond what your own two hands are capable of handling.
00:19:16 Miriam: And so I read that book in the very beginning, because again, I didn't name it for myself because I had a vision for this to be an organization or a company that employed others. I wanted to make a difference in the economy of my local area that I live in. And so if that's the vision, then you will have to figure out what it takes to get there. And for me, it was, yes, this is painful because I really like consulting.
00:19:47 Miriam: But do I like consulting more than I want to own a business or do I want to own this business more than I like consulting? Because truth be told, I'm the business owner. I can consult when I want to. But I have to do more than that, right? And so that to me is a vision issue and a vision question. What is your vision for your organization, for your business, for your journey in entrepreneurship?
00:20:13 Cindy: So good. And I see so many people struggle with that. And what I love is, you know, coming from how this conversation sort of evolved in terms of so often we make those decisions based on vanity metrics or like what we think things should, again, the shoulds, like what it should look like. Whereas you had a very clear vision of your why. Why is this important for me to be a business owner as opposed to a freelancing consultant? And I think that that is a step that a lot of people miss. So read that book.
00:20:54 Cindy: I wanna ask you about what, knowing that you had that vision, knowing that you were like, okay, I'm building a business. What are the things, I mean, I think the obvious is like your SOPs, your standard operating procedures, like teaching people how to bake the pie. But how did you drum up the business? What was your strategy in terms of growth to fuel that vision? Because you need the customers, right? So what shifted for you in terms of your business development?
00:21:29 Miriam: Well, so some of it was just trial and error. A lot of it was baptism by fire and all of it was painful. So, when I set out to have this consulting business, I was working in the healthcare space. So my background is healthcare operations, and which is one of the most convoluted business models out there with payment structures and all that sort of thing. It's just not easy. And so I set out to be a healthcare consultant. I thought I was gonna be working with physicians at the time. Ten years ago, there was a lot of rock… Well, 12, almost 12 years ago, there was a lot of shifting going on in the healthcare admin space. Hospitals buying a hospital, physician offices getting bought out by hospitals, just a lot of transition.
00:22:21 Miriam: And I was in that space and I heard a lot of physicians that were not happy with it. And I thought, well, they want to leave, I'll help them start their own practices because I was doing a lot of merchant acquisition work for hospitals. I was like, well, I know what it takes. I'll help you start your practice. And I realized that one, that was, they were fickle because they were like, yeah, we want to leave, but we like the money. So we're not leaving. And then I felt like there wasn't enough business for a small, enough client, clientele for a small startup business like me to really make a living.
00:22:52 Miriam: And so then I started working on, you know, ancillary healthcare, with ancillary healthcare operations, you know, with maybe other types like healthcare, what do you call it, home health or the nursing practice side of that, case management services, things like that, just because it wasn't enough physician practice work to do. And eventually the brook dried up. Like five years in of trying to just figure out how to make this work, giving my skill set, the brook dried up. I went to zero, crashed, burned, things just died. And this was around 2019, right?
00:23:33 Miriam: So this was right before the pandemic. So when the pandemic hit, I was like, yes, I need a break. I'm not the only one at home now. I need to regroup and then now things have slowed down. Not that I was, you know, obviously that was, very serious time and you know, people died and it was really hard on a lot of us, but it did give me a chance to really reset. And I think a lot of people took that time to reset. And when I reset during that time, I started thinking, now what is my transferable skill set? Because at the end of the day, you have to be able to be a little nimble when it comes to providing the right product at the right time. And I had a product, it just needed to be tweaked and it definitely wasn't the right time.
00:24:22 Miriam: But after the pandemic, doors opened because many organizations, especially nonprofits, which is why I ended up working with a lot of nonprofits, were not structured appropriately to handle the type of work that needed to be done remotely or in just a different way, hybrid workplaces, models, they weren't equipped to do that work. And so I was able to reposition the type of work that we do, tweak the product and service offering a little and it was exactly what the market needed at the right time. So what I think, you know, we don't talk about enough is that you could have a service and a product and it's just not time for it. So you don't get the traction. Or the product and the service that you are offering is not quite ready. Like you need to tweak it.
00:25:16 Miriam: So there is not always, there isn't always a straight path to success. Sometimes it is, you know, trying something new, marketing it, marketing it, and realizing that the market doesn't want it or it's not ready for it. Going back to the drawing board to see what your core is that you can offer. What is your real skill set here? What do people really need repackaging it and then putting it back out there? That takes guts and it takes patience. And, you know, when you hit that stride, then you are able to grow it from there, scale it from there. You can't scale anything that people don't want.
00:25:55 Miriam: So, you have to really hit in on or hone in on what product and service offering, do you have that the market is ready for, the market needs and wants, and how do you scale it? And I think that's how you get to the growth. And once I got to the product and service piece, then I put a growth strategy in plan. I had a whole growth strategy for a year, and we measured and monitored metrics to see what was working and what didn't. So that when we were ready to plan for the next year, we could build off of that. And that has been working for us really, really well.
00:26:32 Jess: I would expect nothing less than from a number of [agents person]. Oh, I wish that was just more in my DNA.
00:26:46 Jess: Okay, Miriam, we do rapid fire questions every episode. You, ready to play?
00:26:52 Miriam: I think so. Let's go.
00:26:58 Jess: What is your zodiac sign and does that fit with your personality?
00:27:05 Miriam: My zodiac sign is Virgo. And I really–
00:27:08 Jess: Yes, as a systems and ops person, like couldn't be more perfect. That's amazing.
00:27:15 Miriam: Well, there you go.
00:27:16 Jess: Okay, well, to counter that, confession number two, what's one area you are messy? Personally, professionally? There's gotta be one. Please tell me there's one.
00:27:30 Miriam: Oh, my gosh. I don't know. I'm struggling with that because I don't even like clutter. So... So, I... My car, I don't like, a dirty car. I'm like, so I'm really struggling with that one. I don't like laundry not being done.
00:27:45 Jess: Oh my God, he would be horrified in my space.
00:27:48 Miriam: Which is why I could move. I moved in like four days and every box was unpacked. Like I'm just, I just like the system to do things.
00:27:57 Jess: Even your inbox? Even your text messages?
00:28:01 Miriam: I organize my inbox so that unread messages are first.
00:28:06 Jess: You don't even have, like a junk drawer?
00:28:08 Miriam: Yes, I have a junk drawer. In the kitchen.
00:28:10 Jess: Is it organized?
00:28:11 Miriam: No, it's just full of random things.
00:28:15 Jess: Ladies and gentlemen, she's human. Thank you.
00:28:17 Miriam: Yes, I have a junk drawer. Yep.
00:28:21 Jess: Okay, good.
00:28:22 Miriam: And that's mostly for my family because they won't put things where I want them to.
00:28:27 Jess: Okay, last question. Who do you go to or where do you go for, for professional development?
00:28:34 Miriam: All of the things, all the things. So when I'm in my really good workout routines, I can do a podcast, right? So, you know, okay, maybe that's a messy area. I can't stick to a plan for my own health and wellness.
00:28:53 Jess: What podcast do you like to listen to?
00:28:55 Miriam: There's one by Joan Garry called Nonprofits are Messy. I used to listen to that one a lot. Do you read books? The last two books that I read, one was the, it was Executive Presence. And I can't think of the name of the author for Executive Presence. But the other was, oh, it's Sylvia Ann Hewlett, I think is her name. And the second book that I read was Atomic Habits by James Clear. And so I will read, I will enroll in something like a John Maxwell service, consulting kind of professional development. I actually enrolled in school last year because I have a… My graduate degree is a master's in healthcare administration. And I didn't want to be pigeonholed where folks think I only work in healthcare, even though my transferable skill set is in, you know, operations just in general.
00:29:50 Miriam: And so I thought, I will go back to school and work on accounting because that's sort of in that finance sphere. And I know that many nonprofits are struggling with filling those roles. I'll go back to school and provide that service. And I was like, you know, a semester in, that's not it. Because it was so narrowly focused. I was like, no, I'm a generalist. I need to have a little more variety in my life. And so now I'm working on a doctorate in business administration specializing in strategic management. So that is my professional development for the next three to four years.
00:30:26 Jess: Yeah, wow. Oh my gosh.
00:30:29 Miriam: So that's enough. That's enough. I'll take one class a semester or a term or however it goes. And I'm sure I'll be writing. You'll give me great content, right? As we can continue to produce content for, you know, shows or for different trainings and things like that, right, [white] papers. All sorts of things. So that will give me a lot of content over the next three or four years. And I want the end result to be a book on operations and culture in the marketplace. So.
00:31:01 Jess: Love it. Cool. Thanks for playing.
00:31:05 Miriam: Is that it? I probably took too long answering questions.
00:31:07 Jess: You're good. Absolutely good.
00:31:09 Miriam: Thank you so much. It's been great and fun.
00:31:17 Jess: At the time of this recording, Cindy and I have just come back from a peer mastermind. We do it twice a year. And one of the themes that came up constantly with all six members of our group was this idea around like, kill your darlings, kill the darlings. And in coming back from that week together, I realized that we can only say that to one another because of the trust and the context and the history we have with one another. And as you were just talking about kind of that evolution around getting the timing right, getting the product right, testing, I was thinking to myself, like, who are you workshopping this with?
00:32:00 Jess: And then I remembered that you have a co-pilot in this business. And then that made me think, how we've interviewed a couple people on this podcast that are in partnership, and how much from my seat, like faster, quicker, easier, it seems to be when you're in partnership with someone in your business. And so I'm just curious about if you would be willing to just talk to us a little bit about that and how maybe you and your husband work as partners in the business and your strengths and weaknesses and how they kind of work together and how you can say to one another, kill your darlings, even though it's like the most precious thing to you. And you take that advice and just, how I guess I'm just feeling like that's so important and yet so hard to have in your business.
00:32:53 Miriam: Well, so my husband is a recent addition. So when I started 180, 10 years ago, it was just me. We feed off each other though, because we also have responsibilities in church, whereas he's the senior pastor, I'm executive pastor. So whereas he is senior most leader in church, I'm senior most leader at 180. And at church, executive pastor is more like a COO role. Right? So I am responsible for all of these systems, administration and all that sort of thing behind the scenes at church. Whereas he is more forward-facing, front-facing, he's never had a problem being on a platform, in a pulpit, on a stage speaking anywhere. Okay?
00:33:40 Miriam: And so, he would push me to, he said this to me, very frankly, you know, just as my husband, not necessarily as someone who's working with me in the business, he was like, you don't promote yourself and the business is going to struggle if you don't. Like you need to get out there, you need to have conversations with people, you need to, you know, develop those relationships. And I thought I was doing okay, but you know, that was me. So I did.
00:34:07 Jess: But that's so hard to hear. I mean, I struggle with that big time and it's so hard to hear. So why?
00:34:14 Miriam: It is, it is. Mm-hmm. And I mean, I was like, I thought I was doing okay, but I guess not. And so let me try to figure out what that looks like for me because I can't be him. I had to figure out what that looked like for me. And I will tell you that part of my journey is that I joined, John Maxwell team, our leadership team and trainers. They have, and I joined it because I try to find some professional development activity to do every year. And that year I was like, I need to be a better public speaker. And they had a speaking track. You can join their team, become a consultant in their space, and you can go on the track of speaking and training.
00:34:56 Miriam: And so I joined that group for that reason, but came out with more business strategy than I did speaking. But it did give me the confidence that I needed to be more visible than I was before. Yes, I do teach and preach at church and I am out there to a certain extent, but it's not my first love to be in front of people. I'd much rather do, small group. I'd much rather have intimate settings, you know what I mean? And so can I, yes, being comfortable, it was something I had to learn. And so that was one of the things that I did early, in was to identify that weakness and try to build on it over time.
00:35:43 Miriam: So I do, my husband has a very strategic mind. And so when there's some strategy, I'm thinking, you know, because I can get caught in the weeds. That's what operations folks do, right? We're down in the weeds. We're down there fixing things and trying to get it to work right. And I need to come up for air and look at things at a 50,000 foot level and I can bounce off of them and say, listen, I'm thinking about doing this, what do you think? And he'll give me a whole perspective that I'd never thought about. And I'm like, yeah, that would be good.
00:36:13 Miriam: And so, you know, that's been how we've worked together. Whereas on the other side, he's very strategic, but he's like, now how do I get this to work? Like I have this big idea, but how do I implement it? And that's how we work together. And so it has been, he joined 180 as a leadership consultant three years ago. And he is a part of our… we have a Monday business development team meeting. He's a part of that team and because of his marketing background and all those things, he's helping to come up with solutions and strategies. So I'm not doing this by myself. It is a team effort. And I think that team effort is really what has given us this. We've been taking off lately because of that.
00:36:55 Cindy: Amazing. And I was actually, like through this conversation, I feel like you have a presence of a speaker, like a professional speaker and your cadence, especially the way you sort of pace yourself. So it's paid off.
00:37:18 Miriam: Thank you.
00:37:19 Cindy: How was that transition bringing him into the business? How much time does he spend working with you? It sounds like you both still have your other roles which I'm sure is healthy although those are also connected, right? So how does that work?
00:37:35 Miriam: We spend so much time together. I have to love him. So I do, I do. I'd say that his role to be very transparent is, independent contractor. So he has his own business, Transformation Network, is his business. And he does a lot of the coaching and training with churches, outside of the 180 work for his business. So in 180, he's doing something similar, but he's doing it for nonprofit organizations and in small businesses that we serve. And so when it comes to 180, he spends, gosh, the vast majority of his time during the week with us because he has his own client load that he is working with and working to develop.
00:38:28 Miriam: So part of his, and if I bring in other consultants, and I am bringing in a couple soon, the way our model is set up is that, yes, if we have the, there's contracts and projects that I can't execute myself, right? I just can't do them all by myself and I need some help. But as the business grows, these folks who are coming in are expected to grow their own business platform, if you will so that they can continue to grow under 180. So it's not just, you know, you gotta have some skin in the game. It's not just, oh, we find all these projects where you come in and you just source them, you know, you execute and you make your money and you're out the door.
00:39:05 Miriam: No, we want folks who have an entrepreneurial spirit, who come in and want to grow the organization as well. Yes, we're going to provide as much as we can when it comes to leads and business development support, marketing support, all those things. We have the systems, we have the software, we use team, we use a lot of things, project management software, we use CRMs, we have all that stuff and we'll provide that, but there has to be some skin in the game. Come on in. This is the role for someone who wants to be a consultant, not a business owner, right? You want the consulting, you want the flexibility and the freedom. You want to work the projects, but you don't want to be a business owner. We have a space for you here.
00:39:45 Cindy: I love that. And there are, I think what's beautiful about that is like, we all get to decide what role is right for us. There's no one, is better than the other. It's that everyone has their place at the table. So good.
00:40:00 Miriam: And you know what your limitations are, right? Like it's not about being better or being worse than someone else. It's about, I know where the stops are for me. Doing more than this would not be healthy for me. Doing it that way would cramp my style. Like there's a way in which we wanna work and you have to figure out what that is. And when I started 180, it was really born out of the fact that I was working as a consultant remotely based at home. My children were young at the time. We had like seven, eight, 10 year olds, right? And here's mommy on the road, you know, overnight traveling to, you know, I was covering like four states, 12 hospital systems, and I was just spread thin. And here's daddy, daddy's pastoring.
00:40:52 Miriam: So who's taking the babies? We've got Bible study in the evenings. It's got prayer services and, you know, staff meetings, because we have a lot of volunteer staff and who's taking these babies to dance? Who's taking these babies to taekwondo? Who's taking these babies to do all this stuff? Who's doing the homework? Mommy's trying to meal prep and cook four meals ahead of time because I'm not sure if I'm going to be on the road. I was tired. And I was like, you know what? I see the writing on the wall. They're going to sell off these markets. These transitions are going to continue. They're going to continue to have these mergers and acquisitions.
00:41:26 Miriam: So what can I do? What shingle can I put out that's going to help me to have the balance that I needed? And at that time, more freelance was fine. Even though I had a bigger vision, but the freelance helped me to get through because that's where I was, right? Now we have three children who are 20, 21 and 23, something like that.
00:41:53 Jess: Well, it goes back to what you were saying about, like the right time, the right problem, like it all needs to add up.
00:41:58 Miriam: It all has to line up and add up for you, right? And so now that there are all, we have two in college and one college graduate, I have a different level of autonomy and freedom and flexibility. I will tell you that working together, my husband is great because we travel a lot together. So, you know, if we're gonna see a client, you know, in another state, another region, we're gonna try to make some fun out of it, having a good time while we're there. So I love the fact that we work together because we were able to do things now as somewhat empty nesters that we've never been able to do when they were younger. And this is the kind of life that we want to live. And I think that is what's important. Are you living the life that you want to live? Not the life you should live, not the life other people told you you should live, but living the life that you want to live that makes sense for you where you are today.
00:42:50 Cindy: Well, underscore, double click, all the things. Oh, I wish we could talk forever because there's so much more to say. But we're running out of time and I want to make sure we ask for a confession. So share with our listeners something about being a business owner or business where maybe you wouldn't be so keen to share in, other platforms or something that's more of a confession.
00:43:21 Miriam: My confession is, and I don't think this is a surprise, but people just don't say it. I probably quit this job 20 times.
00:43:31 Cindy: Okay, keep going, tell us a little bit more.
00:43:35 Miriam: Like, at some point you're like, is this really for me? I'm tired, I don't think I have anymore. I'm just done with it. And then something good will happen. You're like, oh, I'll give it another shot. I think I've turned the corner. I'm not trying to quit anymore, but for a while there, it was like, ah, this is heavy. I don't know if I want to continue to pull it. I could probably find something else to do. But then I realized, and I think many people will agree, that after a certain point, you become a really bad employee to someone else. Because you're always gonna be thinking about how you could grow this, do that, and you're not gonna be focused on the one job at hand that they're paying you to do.
00:44:17 Miriam: You're gonna be always dreaming about what it could be if you were to just do this one more thing or try this next process or strategy or whatever it is, and you'd be a really bad employee. If you're passionate about building your own business. And so that's my confession. I probably quit about 20 times before I got to the point where I was like, you know what? Just quitting is not an option.
00:44:41 Cindy: Miriam, where can our listeners connect with you and find you online?
00:44:46 Miriam: So connect with me on LinkedIn. We try to keep our LinkedIn profile, 180's, 180 Management Groups profile, as well as my personal profile, Miriam Dicks. I think it's Miriam Dicks, CCMP out there. We try to keep that updated. Any messages that come in, we try to respond to them soon, you know, within 24 hours. But if you want to schedule time just to talk to us and see if there's something we can help you with in your organization, because you've experienced those pain points that we're talking about, those symptoms of, you know, bad, you know, toxic culture and turnover and all those things, you can go to 180ManagementGroup.com. So 180ManagementGroup.com and just click on that button in the right hand corner of your screen. And it says schedule a call, you schedule, you click on that and you can schedule a call for operations, for leadership or for training speaking services. And we will be glad to talk with you about what it is we can help you with. So that's how you can reach us. And we look forward to hearing from you too.
00:45:41 Cindy: Thank you so much for joining us.
00:45:42 Jess: This is so fun.
00:45:44 Miriam: Thank you so much for having me.
00:45:48 Cindy: Thank you again for listening to the Confessions podcast for nonprofit coaches and consultants. If you enjoyed today's episode, which I sure hope you did, you can show your support in one of three ways.
00:45:59 Jess: Number one, post a screenshot of this episode to your Instagram stories or LinkedIn profile and tag Cindy and I so we can repost you.
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00:46:12 Jess: And number three, leave a positive review on Apple podcasts so we can continue to grow and reach new listeners.
00:46:18 Cindy: And of course, make sure you subscribe so you can get the latest and greatest interviews as they drop every Thursday.
00:46:25 Jess: And to our fellow nonprofit coaching and consulting friends, remember, we're an open book and here to answer your burning biz questions.
00:46:33 Cindy: See you next time.