Dr. Shenica Nelson is the COO of SOPH Consulting. Dr. Nelson has over 12 years of experience in Small Business Research, Community Development, Change Management Practices, and Organizational Behavior. Dr. Nelson has over 15 years of experience creating innovative solutions within corporate settings nationally and internationally and over 10 years of experience working with new/emerging entrepreneurs.
Dr. Nelson is known for her strategic ability to assist consultants and business experts with scaling up, pitfall prevention, and building a solid industry-specific infrastructure necessary to sustain personal and economic growth. Dr. Nelson is also known for her ability to train and develop organizational leaders utilizing competencies in transformational leadership leading to the successful integration of work/home life balance.
You can reach Dr. Nelson here:
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Transcript
Transcript
Welcome, Doctor Nelson.
It's so nice to have.
You on the.
Tell us a little bit about how.
You got started.
Why you doing?
What you're doing and we're.
Talking about a little bit before.
The before we start the recording.
Thank you.
It's so good to be here.
I am doctor Shenica Nelson and I am an international business consultant.
I specialize in helping small businesses be scalable and have the.
Infrastructure in place so that they can grow.
I do that in what we call organizational development, which is essentially taking down the business process in phases and giving the entrepreneur, the founder or the business what they need for that phase.
And we kind of build off of that and see this evolution.
Happening within the small business world, it's.
It's wonderful. I love to.
Talk about it.
It is really exciting to watch businesses.
Start from just the ground.
It's like watching.
Little seeds grow.
And the.
The little leaves come.
Out, but if?
You have a plan, and that's what I think.
You're talking about.
I'm all about the plan.
So what?
What part of the process do you help entrepreneurs?
And coaches.
OK, so I consider myself like a business architect and what that means is we just like if you were consulting with an architect to build a.
They would partner with you to get the layout of that home.
Now they're not supplying you with the furniture.
They're not talking color palettes.
They're not talking, you know, kind of the accessories, if you will.
They go along in the process, but they're strictly talking about where, how many rooms do you want this?
To have you know, is it 2 layers?
Is it one layer?
You know, what's the square footage?
So I use that analogy of build.
The home because no matter the size of the business, kind of the frame is the same.
So there's just certain components of the business that all businesses need and that tends to be my niche that I focus on is architecting this business so that your goals can be met and you know at what phase of the process.
Those goals will be met.
I know.
Like, yeah, like building a house.
You have the you have the blueprint.
And that's what you provide.
But then you have you hire on contractors and the house doesn't just like suddenly appear first you gotta do the foundation.
And then comes the wiring and the plumbing.
And then we watched.
The house get built last summer.
How I know?
What the steps are?
Yeah, that's exactly what it is.
I use that analogy all the time is that we help you to build your business on a solid foundation.
And and knowing what steps to take and what order is crucial to having a business that's actually.
Going to give you the.
The kind of income that you're looking to generate, but that's only because you know what phases you need.
To go through in.
Order to help enough people to generate that kind of income because it always comes down to problem solving.
We're just.
Solving problems for other people and it's just on what scale do you?
Want to solve that problem?
So how do you how do you work with your clients?
Let's ask it that way.
So typically I know for other programs that are kind of services incubation model for entrepreneurs, they tend to operate in a group format.
And that's what my goals are to expand to, because I do know that there's just some universal concepts that businesses and entrepreneurs, startup founders, especially first generation.
Those are my favorite because there's not a blueprint, if you will, if you had a home.
Before you know what to expect, and so it's different when you're a first time home buyer or when you're a first time entrepreneur because there's so many gaps. And so I typically work one-on-one.
And that's because it's more personalized.
I like to really do the research on that industry so that I can help, you know it's it's it's more focal focused on industry specific coaching and that helps me to eliminate what's not necessary for this particular industry.
But again, I do see the benefits of universal principles because there are so many gaps to fill when you look at the whole concept of building, starting rebranding.
You know, whatever phase you're in of the building process.
Did you did you work with like people are in different places in the journey and I primarily work with.
Life, health and.
Transformational coaches in terms of helping them.
Get started, get focused.
But they too, they all have different places where they are in in the process of building their business.
And I.
I love that you're doing the foundational.
Work, but do you do you?
Focus primarily on like the entry level people coming in.
They know that they have their say.
They have their certification for teaching whatever they're going to teach or coaching people.
However, they're going to coach them.
Do you work?
Primarily with those people.
Or do you work?
More with the people in the mid.
Level or are you?
Helping people that already have an established business.
Fix it so that it's.
Scalable because a lot of.
People start out down here.
And then when they get to.
The mid level they're like ohh crap.
I should have had like 47 different things in place before I got here because now my plate is so full that I don't even have time to think about bringing.
They're on a team and then.
All of the things that are involved with the team.
So absolutely.
So what I in a perfect world, I would love to take you at the startup level, but I've seen when you are at the startup level, there's so many people, so much information.
We live in the information age where people go and they.
Try to do some of these.
Minor task.
Just because it's again, it's common knowledge.
I mean, if you go do a quick Google search, I'm pretty sure you're gonna find out.
You know all type of checklist, all type of things.
So in a.
Perfect world I would.
Love to start there and that way I can really guide on some of the next steps in next phases.
And so we kind of.
Grow together so most of all of my clients, we we grow together and when there is a a a pitfall or an.
To I do have where we do risk management, where we look at what actually led because sometimes the issues that we face in business, they're symptoms, they're not necessarily the root to why this happened.
And so I'm better able to navigate that if we've worked through the phases together, but if not, we just.
Sometimes you know, just like with the home, you.
Have to remodel and so I.
Don't work with the immersion entrepreneurs.
Hold on.
They're not scrapers.
Listen, I do a lot of.
Real estate has kind of just been a part of my life.
My husband is he does.
He has done real estate.
My stepfather was in real estate.
So a lot of the parents that I.
Use is going to be related to building a home that that's kind of where a lot of my business development started even as a kid.
You know, just seeing these different layers of this process, mine gets it going and you build on them along the way, whether it's your education or your relationships, your experiences, you build along the way.
And so yeah.
Yeah, you do and.
I kind of feel the same way I have.
I have real estate experience.
Also, I was a realtor.
Back in the 80s and it was the 90s in California.
You have the whole different market.
Yeah, yeah.
So there's little better the.
Rest of the nation Indian real estate in.
California. Yeah, yeah.
It's totally different.
World for sure that that's how it works.
We moved to Idaho and things here I still love.
I've bought and.
Sold tons of houses in my life and it's just like it's such a fun process to to go through and I like your analogy because building businesses is just like building houses and remodeling them.
And, you know, they all have their quirks, even new houses.
Works, but especially the older ones that have been added on to so they started with these little tiny homes.
I'm like, you know.
Coaching businesses and then then things get added on and the add-ons are kind of important because when you're adding on with the.
Some pieces really like some homes. You see the add-ons and you're like, hmm, I wonder what?
Made them decide to do that.
Sometimes it's like out of place.
Right.
Right.
And and the homeowner is like will it?
Make perfectly good sense.
To me, at the time and business owners are the same way.
It's like, well, I I needed that piece.
But it's, you know, the question is, is it serving you now still, is it really forwarding your main mission?
Do you even have a main mission?
I just.
Want to punch money?
Like that too.
And then sometimes, you know, we are experiencing so many changes on the Earth.
So it could have been a good idea when you thought about it, but the times have changed.
You might notice that your property it's settling in like so you start to see different cracks and like, hey, maybe this wasn't a good idea to build in this direction.
Maybe we should have went back instead of.
Going to the left or to the right, or adding that room.
There, or maybe we need to tear down a wall.
You know, maybe you want to update and add a different fireplace, you know, which comes with a different amount of knowledge because it's depending on if it's gas or electric.
So there's all of these concepts.
I I really feel it's just like.
You know, and depending on the experts that you consult with depends, I mean it really helps you to know not just know but have longevity from their expertise and be prepared for what's next and save you a lot of money and time and headache because I don't know if.
You ever been out of the house?
Trying to start over in your business from scratch, but those things, it takes a lot of patience.
I know a lot of people look at.
Shows on HGTV and Fixer uppers and so you know depending on your skill level the outcome would be different and so the same with the business depending on your skill level you know it's going to look different but you have to grace and pace yourself so that you can get the goals.
That you, you know, desire.
And so I love partnering with different phases.
If it's, you know, reducing that risk.
If it's lowering that cost, if it is simplifying the operations.
You know, if it is doing an audit so we can see what tools that you need for efficiency, if it is brand protection A.
Lot of there's.
We have a lot of partners.
So we don't just.
You know, it's just us, but we partner with other companies that service small businesses.
So that they can, they can be more.
Or prepared for.
The economic challenges that you might face in business, those are those are things that you have.
To think about.
You know, I particularly don't do a whole lot of work with of those who have, like, a side business or they are unless they're thinking long term, this is going to transition.
You know from here I'm using this as an investment.
For this idea, but essentially they want to grow their own brand.
You know, that's the long term goal because the goals are different.
They're more apt to be more invested in your expertise and as well as they're prepared for the financial long run.
I feel like those people are more responsible.
They they're not just sitting down to build without looking at the cost.
They're not.
They need to look at, you know, the materials they need.
To look at.
So what they're going to need for sustainability, and that's the beauty of it.
I feel like the world of business, we don't realize how much our economy thrives off of small businesses like.
Without small businesses.
Right leg.
What economy?
You know, like what economy?
I think the last couple of years have taught.
Us that everybody needs to contribute something.
And everybody's gifted in some way and it's.
Just so exciting right now to see all of the opportunity that's out there.
You were talking about the gaps earlier and you know those gaps that's opportunity.
And there's so much of it out there and.
The way people are.
Stepping up to fill those gaps, it's so exciting to me because it's just changing the whole you.
It's changing the whole economy.
Of the world.
I like to call it the you world economy.
Literally, yeah, we, we.
I was having this conversation where.
We're seeing, we read about history.
So we read about the industrial revolution.
Depending on the information that you get right, like you would either focus on the economic boom or you will focus on the economic calamity because both of those things coexisted during that era.
Right, right.
A lot of what?
Is seeing is a result of how innovative they were doing that.
We have an opportunity right now to innovate, you know, for consultants I mentioned to you just looking at the projection and it's projected to be like a $69 billion industry for us who are working with businesses. This is is ohh man, it's opportunity for us to get in the game and help to fill.
Anyone of those gaps?
Because there's so many.
9 billion people in the world, you only.
Need to help a few, yeah.
And you make a big.
Difference in individuals stepping up and doing something.
But they're gifted at a problem.
You've solved that you can share the solution with other people.
That's just like, that's how.
Well, electricity and light bulbs and.
The things.
There was a problem that needed solving and somebody thought, hey, I've got an idea and you know, several people get ideas and they start down the path and.
Sometimes the the idea is morph and change and other people will come along and say ohh yeah.
Take the baton from.
Here and we'll.
Run with it and it.
It's just like it's just I'm counting.
Explain how excited I am to.
Be living during this time.
It's just like.
There are times in in human history that are really, really significant, and I think we're living in one of them right now.
Literally we are.
I had this conversation with one of my mentors, so we were.
Talking about how.
Many people from different generations would say we don't need to reinvent the wheel.
I agree there's some wheels that we don't need to invent.
We just need to modify, right?
But then there's certain things that didn't exist when that wheel was invented.
And so you need to reinvent the wheel for those reasons.
We are living in different times and some of the issues that we.
You're seeing now we're not issues or they were not prevalent during the.
Different era one.
There's a lot of talk about work life balance me.
That's my specialty.
I love to talk about work life balance.
I did a lot of my research on work life balance.
Because, generationally, we've gotten to have a lot of options in our economy and.
There's a lot of tools and so you need to balance those things, whereas previous generations they may have balanced their work or their form, but they were at home already, so this was on their land.
They worked, they used their skills out of their homes.
This was before hospitals.
This was before.
You know, doctors had to leave their home.
They primarily worked at home.
Lawyers worked at home like they traveled to communicate with their clients.
But they're based with their home.
Well, Fast forward.
Now we're having to recalibrate to this same idea, but we have different tools we have, we have technology.
So it makes it more accommodating for us to work from home.
Well, there's a balance.
There's a.
Some of the skills that we had communication, you know, some other time management, it was different then.
Boundaries. How now?
Hey need boundaries.
We have to learn those boundaries.
Now, because it's so easy to just work.
All the time.
I mean, there are some.
Of us that are like we'll.
Get up in the morning.
And we might not even get out of.
Our pajamas, and we're already starting to work.
On our soda and pulley.
And then then the whole day goes by and.
It suddenly 6:00 o'clock.
At night and you haven't done anything for yourself.
Or the things that you know you would normally do in the course of a day.
Or on the other side, there's people that.
Are working from home, but they've got.
Small children around.
Or families or obligations with, you know, parents that they're watching after.
And it's how.
To incorporate getting all of the pieces done that you need to do to move your.
Business forward.
And still have a life and say OK these.
Are the times I'm working.
But I am going to schedule some time in there for me.
To take a break.
When you're in.
An office.
You just take a break.
And you have, you know, coworkers that's talking to you well.
In my home, my kids, my husband.
We're coworkers.
So we have this relationship where we know one another's boundaries and I'm teaching them that at a young age, how to.
Say you know I need a boundary.
You know I.
Hey, can you knock on my door at this time?
I'm working on math, you know, at this time I'm doing my homework at this time and I teach how to communicate more effectively opposed to just being so overwhelmed that you know, something comes out from frustration and we.
You don't know that.
Hey, the reason the response was this way is because there's a lack of boundaries that were not communicated.
And so even in business though like.
You have to.
Consider that you need boundaries for the phase that you're in.
Sometimes I think as humans, our minds we are here in, in the future.
At the same.
Time and then nothing gets accomplished.
But if we can outsource meaning, hire those experts that are skilled for whatever level we're.
In it really helps to enhance your own life, not you know, when you look at it from a financial perspective.
But really it is beneficial.
It's advantageous for you to take advantage of the experts so that you can get the time and the freedom and the balance that you do.
I think that goes back to.
What you're doing in terms of helping people have a blueprint, a a blueprint is so important when you're starting a business, you need to have an idea of where you want to end up, what you want it to look like, what you want your business to look like and really.
Think about it.
Otherwise you would.
End up just, you know, building a little bit over here and building a little bit over there and building a little.
Bit over there and hoping that you're going.
This beautiful palace.
It almost never happens without a plan.
You can't get funding from the bank without a plan.
So same thing for your business, like how you have to think bigger in the context of where you are and where you want to grow to be.
And so when you for us that's what we do, we help to build out this plan.
And now we plug in the pieces so that you.
Can be.
You can experience this.
Operational excellence.
That's how I define it operational.
And you, you cannot monetize if you're not organized.
So organizational development to me, you know, and the work that I'm doing is essentially like the foundational.
Benefit that you?
Get from an expert to help you build.
On the side of.
Not saying that the weather isn't going to happen and you experienced an earthquake or, you know, a tornado or hurricane or snowstorm that sever the pipes.
Those things happen.
Those are common things.
But what I find is that when those things happen in a business that isn't prepared, then it's going to be a vacant.
Business or business that you walk.
Away from because the.
Cost of it.
Is so expensive and I did not consider to ensure this area of my company and I don't have.
The resources to.
Repair it on.
My own.
Or the people that want.
To just.
Pay as they go.
That doesn't.
Often work very well either.
You have to understand that there's going to be startup costs and there's going to be financial considerations.
The whole process.
It's going to.
Take a minute before you're actually making the money.
Going to have to hire experts along the way.
Everybody who's.
Ever made it?
Has hired people.
Along the way.
Even Tony Robbins, you know, when he first got started, I lived in San Diego and he lived in La Jolla.
And I I went and saw him when he was first getting started, and I knew the person who.
Ghost wrote his book.
At the time and there were some conversations about it, but it.
It was interesting that even.
He and he was so broke in the beginning.
He's very wealthy now, but he wasn't always really wealthy.
Everybody starts at the beginning.
We outside at the bottom.
Thank you.
You know, like we all start there, there's a.
There is.
Her name is ISA, and she's a filmmaker turned producer turned actress, you know, but one of the things that stood out to me and listening to her story, I, I love to look at people who started from humble beginnings and watched.
Their life unfold and one of the things that she said is she looked across and she looked around, so she didn't try to get people to help her.
That was on a different level.
She looked at those people.
Who could?
She could benefit from, who had a skill, and they partnered together.
And so out of it, you know, morphed, you know, a production company, you know, writing scripts and teaching master classes.
But it was a level of starting with what you have.
And building from there.
And so we get this idea because we see these people where most entrepreneurs, they're see these people and they're so inspired by the end result.
But they all had to start.
With step one.
Yep, Yep.
And now it there are more and more people coming along like.
You that can say.
OK, you're you're here.
I know how to get you to here.
If that's where you want.
To go.
Let's sit down and just.
Walk through the steps.
Yeah, it's a beautiful thing.
It really is.
It's, it's awesome.
And I personally I encourage, I love to partner with other consultants because there's so much ground to cover and there's so much opportunity in this work that we get to do.
We get to do this work, this work that we get.
To do is so beautiful.
It is it.
Is and you know really in my worldview.
It's just all about helping each other and there's.
Plenty to go around.
There's so much work that needs to be done that the more people that will just block arms and we can.
Just all help.
Keep going.
Keep going and the world is going to end up being just this phenomenal place where people are helping each other and the abundance is amazing because when production happens, abundance is the result.
Said Lilly.
You know, planting seeds and.
Watching the hard and you never plant.
In the same season that you reap safely.
Just get out there and throw the seeds.
Out absolutely.
And recognize that they're not gonna all fall on this.
Soil. Yeah, yeah.
But you cannot pay attention to that, so you have to keep going.
You have to keep pressing.
Sometimes they pop up in places that you don't expect.
The lettuce that.
Grows in our grass.
Yeah, you like.
Honey, be.
How did you get here?
So my lettuce patch, yes.
It's it's fun.
So what's the one main thing that you want people to take away?
From our conversation today.
It's OK not to know every step.
But you have help.
We live in a beautiful time where there's so many people who are knowledgeable, who are educated to help you and don't be shy with needing help.
Reach out to the experts and it will save you a lot of time, energy and wasted money.
The wasted money thing.
I don't know how many people have said Ohh I can't afford that.
It's like how can you not afford that?
Are you're building a business?
There's, there's just some things that.
You have to afford if you're gonna.
Be in business in.
There's some.
There's some.
What do you call it?
There are just had a brain freeze.
But there is.
A concept that you know my husband was just telling me about.
I can't remember the first thing I was going to say, but he calculated how much money we would spend on the weekends for our pleasures.
So eating out, right?
And after he finished calculating.
And he was like, do you know we spend.
You know this amount of money eating out each week and I'm like you did that time full. But he's like, yeah, there's like $12,000 a year. And so I think that people have to recognize that it's not that you can't afford it.
You need to reallocate from something that you are spending your resources on, and sometimes it to sacrifice.
You know, maybe your coffee, you know, you know, we all like to be on the go because we are are busy people, but reallocating is not saying that you would never have this.
I won't.
I will sacrifice this right now to put it towards something that will compound or help me.
In the future.
Yeah, and that is a big concept that it's really important for people to grasp the the delayed gratification or the transfer of resources to something that's important for you.
Now that will further you.
Later and making learning to you know.
There's fun and.
I don't.
Does it sound like it should be?
But sometimes when you're when you're not doing something so you could do something else.
There's a feeling that you get that.
It's just so empowering.
It's like I'm doing this.
It's happening.
And I made it happen.
I chose to.
To say no.
To this, so I could say yes to.
Yes, absolutely.
It strengthens your muscles for.
And sometimes we just need that then yeah, because at the end of the day, it's the decisions we make along the way that really shape our lives.
On who we become and how we end up helping and contributing.
To the world.
So how can people get in touch with you?
Yes, you can visit my website www.softconsulting.softspelledsophconsulting.com. You can also e-mail me at doctorshanika@sophconsultingllc.com.
Perfect. Thanks so much.
For being on our show today.
Thank you for having me.