As a business strategy coach and technical consultant, I help my clients take strategic action so their work can have a greater impact.
I believe |
in building a business that supports your vision for your life. That the most successful business owners work to live, not live to work. |
I believe |
in curiosity and experimentation. I am constantly learning and apply ideas to find new and better ways to do things. |
I believe |
in sustainability and creating a business model that has a positive environmental and social impact while fulfilling your needs financially and emotionally. |
I believe |
that old models of management in business are breaking down, and it’s time to transform the way we do business. |
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I thrive
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on collaboration and creating value with others to help them achieve positive change and reach their personal goals of success. |
MY STORY
Work-life balance is an elusive goal that gets thrown around all the time. We’re all looking for it. We all crave it. But, few of us – especially small business owners – are ever able to fully achieve it.
I believe that our professional lives should support our personal pursuits and passions. Not only do I believe it, but I also live it.
Like many young professionals in New York City in the late 1990’s, I was living a work-hard, live-hard approach to life. I didn’t realize then that true work-life balance doesn’t mean fun weekends and 80-hour workweeks. For eight years, I’d been on call all the time, and looking back, my social life was built around my business and everything I did, I did with an eye toward how I could parlay it into business success. The last two years of my tenure leading a world-renowned fashion restoration business in New York City were brutal. I had a lot of professional successes, but they were killing my spirit.
Around that time, my wife and I started to take escape trips to Alaska – where we’d unplug for a week or more at a time. Turning off my phone and slowing down for even short periods allowed me
to view my life from the outside – and I realized I didn’t like the direction I was headed. It may sound cliché, but those trips brought me clarity on life balance. I began to intentionally redefine success to include short- and long-term personal goals as well as my business strategy.
In 2010, we made the decision to restructure our professional lives to support our spirits and personal goals. I created a business strategy to rebuild my business so it was no longer location-dependent and devised systems and programs that met the needs of my clients while fulfilling my personal goals. My wife and I planned and executed a multi-month dream trip across America and moved to Alaska full time. We devised and built a personal and professional life that allows us time to do the things we love – like camping, fly fishing, and lots of travel. And we are intentional about creating and maintaining this balance in our lives.
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
With over 30 years of experience working in the drycleaning industry, I’ve risen to the very highest level in the profession. This experience has given me broad business knowledge that can be applied to independent small businesses, family-owned businesses, and start-ups. My expertise includes solutions for business strategy, developing and managing a physical plant, retail locations, fleet maintenance, customer service, route management, operational systems, database management, staff development, and team building.
From 1995-2005, I was employed by Madame Paulette, a world-leading specialty cleaning and restorations service provider. While there, I managed the development of their state-of-the-art production facility as well as to developing and implementing some of the most advanced cleaning and garment care processes in the industry. While under my tenure as Operations Manager, Madame Paulette was recognized by New York Magazine in its annual “Best of New York” issue four times and was awarded the “Best of the Best” of the world in 2002 by the Robb Report.
I leveraged my knowledge and experience of production and customer service when I joined America’s Best Cleaners (ABC) in 2005. Over the past 20-plus years, I have been instrumental in helping make America’s Best Cleaners the leading institution on benchmarking quality in the drycleaning industry. As Executive Director and Partner, my responsibilities as the principal liaison with suppliers and manufacturers have led to the development of educational workshops and accreditation criteria for the organization.
Through ABC, I’ve assembled and lead a team of business experts to provide critical consulting and education to support small businesses, family-owned businesses, and entrepreneurs in the wholesale distribution, services, and skilled trade industries. Businesses in these verticals face similar challenges, and I work with my clients as they tackle improvements in organizational development and planning, process and system development, sustainable “green” business practices, retail and production facility design, team building and communication, sales coaching, leadership training, and more.