November 19, 2024 • 31 mins
Quanetta “Q” McNeal loves two things: people and logistics. When she had the chance to combine these interests and launch her own company with her employer's support, she jumped in feet first. But starting her logistics business came with surprises no one could anticipate, like packages mysteriously disappearing, traffic jams stretching for miles and delivery trucks veering off course and crashing into trees.
Join Ben as he chats with Quanetta, founder of Haus of Logistics, about her journey from small business coach to entrepreneur. With 35 trucks on the road, she knows firsthand that each vehicle presents a unique opportunity for things to go awry. Ben is also joined by Dr. Gia Wiggins, founder of Auditocity, to explore human resource issues that small business owners must face to ensure their success. These are The Unshakeables.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Ruby.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Every boss knows that a call after hours rarely bodes well.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
If my phone rings after six, I get nervous.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
That's especially true in Q McNeil's kind of work. Her company,
House of Logistics, has thirty five trucks on the road.
One day, one of her drivers took the truck well
a little off roading.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
I received a phone call telling me one of our
drivers just hit a tree. The first tree he made
contact with took the side mirror off, broke the glass,
bent the driver's door.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
The truck was totaled, the packages were scattered. The driver
fortunately was fine, but he was shaken up.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
My ops manager, he's standing there with his hands on
his wheel. Looking at me, because he's waiting to see me
just explode.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
They called the police, a tow truck, and medical services
to make sure the driver was safe. After they had
all the photos they needed from the scene, everyone was
sent home. The next day, Q and her ops manager
caught up about the accident.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
He was like, miss cute, you were so calm out
there at the scene of his accident.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Good managers know how to solve problems even when others
get emotional. Great leaders know how to solve problems while
they manage their employees' emotions and their own emotions at
the same time.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
So you asked me a question about what do I
do to keep it together? That is when you want
to go into a moment of silence and solitude.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
By this point, Q was well practiced. House of Logistics
was only six months old, and she had already dealt
with an inventory of challenges. Staff had turned over, some
trucks had run into trees, and most notably, her business
partner had left just a month into its operations. And
there's more to it, just wait. House of Logistics was
all on her. Fortunately, Q is a masterclass in resilience.
(02:18):
Welcome to the Unshakeables from Chase for Business and Ruby
Studio from iHeartMedia. I'm Ben Walter, CEO of Chase for Business.
On the Unshakeables, we're sharing the daring moments of small
business owners facing their crisis points and telling the stories
of how they got through it. This week, we're heading
down to Alabama, but before we get back to Q's story,
(02:40):
we're also joined by doctor Gia Wiggins, founder and CEO
of Auditocity, a SaaS platform helping businesses with their compliance
and HR Processes GEO, Welcome to the show, Thanks for coming,
Thanks for having me in. I'm really happy to have
you on today because I mean, you're an expert in HR,
which a lot of businesses, particularly small businesses, when they're
starting out overlook, So I can't wait to have you
(03:01):
weigh in on this story. And you're also from Obile, Alabama.
Not only am I from there, but there's still a
store on Dauphin Street which was opened by my great
grandfather around nineteen oh seven.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
That is fantastic. Well, we've welcomed you to come down,
especially during Marty Gras.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Yeah, I know, come on down. All right, let's get
into this show. This is House of Logistics from Birmingham, Alabama.
Now I have some personal ties to the state, so
I'm really excited to do an episode about Alabama. We
were lucky enough to find an incredible business owner, Quanetta McNeil.
(03:38):
The first thing I learned about her when we met
was that no one calls her Quanetta. Quanetta, it is
so nice to meet you. I understand that most people
call you Q. May I call you Q.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
Absolutely everyone calls me Q.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
The second thing I learned was about the name of
her company its house of Logistics spelled HAUS.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
The foundation of the company was established to keep my
team fully informed. I run a transparent operation and typically
transparency resides in your home right, and so I have
my leadership team that I developed from the start of
my operations, identifying them as drivers. They became the heart
of the house. So we wanted to be a little different.
(04:21):
In the street version for a house means someone that
does things ridiculously well.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
Q has a ton of experience in business and entrepreneurship,
so it was no surprise to hear that she does
her job ridiculously well. She bounced around a bit at
the start of her career. She joined the military, she
worked in HR she taught business to seventh graders, and
then started a virtual assistant company supporting small businesses and individuals,
an opportunity that took her all the way to the Caribbean.
Speaker 3 (04:52):
I loved traveling and started helping couples with planning their
special occasions such as their anniversaries, weddings all across the
Caribbean market. And while I was in Jamaica, I was
approached by Pepsiicola to do contract negotiations for them in
the hotel industry.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
There, she'd made so many connections with vendors, hotels, and
decision makers across the island that another beverage company saw
huge potential in her.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Eventually, Heineken came into the Jamaican market and they recruited
me to come over and maintain relationships that I had
established with the hotel industry. I worked with both the
manufacturing and distribution side of the business.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Now we're only about four minutes into this episode and
Q has already used the word relationships several times. It's
key to her business story, and.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
I think that's what keeps me alive. It tickles me.
I do not meet strangers.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
A lot of folks tend to think of connections as
a soft skill, perhaps less important than other things when
running a business. I disagree, and Q does too. Her
ability to create relationships has served her exceptionally well, both
personally and professionally, so much so that it led to
what was likely the most important professional call of Q's life.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
So I got a call from a large US retailer
and they gave me an opportunity to return back to
the US. I came in in the corporate space as
a senior business coach supporting other small businesses. They were
also launching their delivery service partner. These were small business
owners that had been contracted out to do their deliveries
from their warehouse to customer's door and or to commercial spaces.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
Interesting because I think of them as doing their own deliveries,
but it sounds like they don't do all their own deliveries.
It's a mix.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
No, they do not. They use tharred party contractors to
facilitate the last mile of their delivery.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
So Q is coaching small business owners in what's called
last mile delivery. This is what those in the business
call it when packages are picked up from a main
distribution center and put on the trucks to get to
your door. And a funny thing is happening when Q
is coaching these folks. They tell her that she should
get in the game too. This is people who would
be your competitors encouraging you to come compete.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
Yes, the small business owners would encourage me to start
up my own operation.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Q loved coaching the small business owners, but really wanted
to own her own business, so she decided to apply
This process is a little more involved than when you
click easy apply on LinkedIn.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Well, it starts with the application process, and while you're applying,
you really have to be developing your company, like you
have to get it to creation mode at the same time,
because you have to be able to present your idea
in terms of how are you going to run a
logistics company, how are you going to overcome the challenges
that are going to come your way, how are you
going to deal with your fleet, how are you going
(07:47):
to do your recruiting. You kind of have to be
developing and thinking about all of this while you are
in the application process.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Q turned to the small business owners to pressure test
all of her ideas. They offered up a lot of advice,
and all of them have a different strategy. You have
a lot of strong business leaders that have mastered their
way of what success looked like for them. I had
an opportunity to learn from many of them in terms
(08:16):
of what work and what does not work. I also
saw some of them have partners such as their spouse
for example, that are in this with them. I was
very impressed with their ability to share the load. Being
in the in the weeks with them every day help
prepare me for what was coming my way. Gee, I
(08:39):
want to bring you back in here because Q story
is already diverging from a lot of what we've heard
on this show so far.
Speaker 4 (08:45):
Yeah, I think to work for a company particular, to
be in the area where you are helping other businesses
to be successful within that company, and then to have
the opportunity to actually be a vendor and a part
of that company. Oftentimes, when people think, Okay, I'm going
to start a business, one of the questions that we
(09:05):
often ask is do you have any expertise at all
inside of that industry to be able to look at
the business and the way that the business operates from
behind the curtain, and to look at the challenges and
then to say, hey, I think I'm going to do that,
and then to be able to execute it so quickly
and to be able to ramp up so quickly because
(09:26):
you have that institutional knowledge of what it looks like
to be successful in their role. This is a fantastic pathway.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Thank you, Gia. I want to pivot a little bit
to Q for a second. Now she's an employee, but
she still has to go through this whole application and
vetting process. So she works there, but she has to
make a case for why she should be one of
their last mild delivery vendors.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
I was successful with the application process and they extended
a contract to me to leave the business and start
my own logistics company. And we launched on the thirtieth
of August.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Wow, so just over year ago. About a year and
a month ago now because it's early October, so not
that long ago.
Speaker 3 (10:05):
Not that long ago, all right.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
So Q, armed with tons of knowledge from others in
the same industry, launched House of Logistics on August thirtieth,
twenty twenty three in Birmingham. She returned home CEO of
her own company, and of course it was smooth sailing
from day one.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
Oh no, it is a lot of work to start
up a logistics business. They want partners that are willing
to accept the challenges and a partner that is willing
to grow.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Okay, now, you had something personal going on in your
life at the same time, right.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Yes, the personal side of my life, I mean, why
you're doing this. Life still happens, right.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Yeah, Life happens all the time. Just before launching her company,
Q got married. She and her partner went into the
marriage as they launched this company together.
Speaker 3 (11:00):
We were married one month before we launched. We didn't
have a honeymoon. The business was our baby. You know.
We had conversations around the challenges that's going to present themselves.
It was a very intense period. It did require both
of us to be very committed to what was necessary
(11:21):
to get the business up and off the ground running,
but led to, you know, this tension.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
They had decided prior to launch that Q would handle
the business part of running everything, and he would manage
the fleet and their operations. She asked him to give
six months to get the business up and running and
then they could properly celebrate their love. To Q, this
was a sacrifice she was more than willing to make.
Speaker 3 (11:45):
I absolutely loved my job. And I think when you're
doing something that you enjoy, when you're doing something that
you're passionate about, I think you come to the table differently.
I kind of felt like I wasn't thinking about myself
to be because this was part of who I felt
like I was, If this makes any sense. I love
(12:08):
people so much that I felt like I was investing
in myself by investing in other people. And I felt
like at some point I was going to reap the
reward of it, and so for me, I believe I
may have come to this totally different with a different mindset.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Her husband, though, didn't share the same passion for the business.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
You have to have your own drive. I can't give
that to you. I don't know if the challenge was
that I knew more when I was training my team,
I was also training him. I don't think we ever
really sat down and absorbed and talked about how are
you feeling about this? Unfortunately, my marriage did not survive that.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
Two months into the life of their company. Sadly, their
marriage fell apart.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
I had to get up and be at work morning
and carry on.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (13:02):
You know, by the business being so young, I literally
had to go in, I had to dispatch, I had
to carry on operations as business as usual. I really
didn't have that room to figure out what just happened.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Right, You couldn't grieve essentially, no, Wow, And you also
lost a business partner and someone who carried some of
that load, correct. I mean, that's a big moment, huge
for you for the business, for everything. Tell us how
you got through.
Speaker 3 (13:30):
That, and even my staff, you know, and even managing
you know who they interact with every day. I have
to remind myself whenever these challenges come up, why did
I start this. The good thing is that part of
my business plan that I had written, I did put
my heart and soul in this document. I was able
to remind myself why, and when things was not working
(13:55):
out personally, I had already got this in motion. I
stayed'su to the plan.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
This is really interesting, Q, because we've had some people
on the show who sort of have more of the
Mike Tyson approach to life, which is everybody has a
plan until they get punched in the face, right, and
then you just have to sort of wing it, Whereas
you've taken quite the opposite approach, which is I have
a plan, and when I get punched in the face,
I'm going to go back to the plan. I'm going
to stick with the plan. So that's really interesting. You know,
(14:24):
people have different approaches to this.
Speaker 3 (14:26):
This is what I needed to do, This is what
I needed to stick to. Now we have also had
to make changes because as we've grown as a company,
I also had to adjust. But the core portion of
it remains the same.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
And do you still own one hundred percent of the
business and.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
I still, oh, one hundred percent of the business.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
Gee, I think we have to take a moment here.
You know, people generally take time off to deal with
personal emergencies. Of course, I encourage my own team to
do the same. Family comes first, but entrepreneurship can be
a different beast. You don't have a safety net. There's
no one else to call or show up and take
care of the business if you're not there.
Speaker 4 (15:00):
Right, That's very true. It's another sort of relationship, kind
of like a marriage, one that absolutely requires one hundred
percent commitment in order to succeed.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
I'm really stunned by her commitment. I mean, she talked
about it a lot, but that commitment to a plan
and clearly like what she thinks of as a plan
is not what a lot of people think of business
plan is a lot of people think of business plan
is a few notes on a page. She thinks it's
a lot more. And I it sounds like from what
she said, if she hadn't had that, she'd have been
in real trouble.
Speaker 4 (15:29):
Yeah, it did sound that way.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
You know.
Speaker 4 (15:31):
I think that her having the understanding that you've got
to have that strategy somewhere where you can look at it. Sometimes,
when you get in the weeds as an entrepreneur, particularly
when you're going through challenges and you're in a growth stage,
it's really easy to get distracted about why you're doing
something and why you made the decision to do it
(15:52):
in the first place. And so I'm sure that inside
of that business plan she had all the other components
that are more true aditional with the business plan, but
having that mission and that reason why and the reason
why you get up every single day, particularly on tough days,
I mean, I think that's critical, and I'm pretty sure
she probably shares that with her employees as well, to
(16:14):
keep them motivated.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
It was sort of implicit in the story, but clearly
she went into business with family. In this case, it
was her fiance slash husband for a period of time.
Family businesses have their own challenges, but talk to us
about what the dynamics are that are different about family
businesses and frankly, what kind of protections people might need
as a result of that.
Speaker 4 (16:35):
The first thing I thought when she said that was
attorney attorney. Attorney attorney, like making sure that the details
of that arrangement are like etched and concrete. Right, I
have a tendency not to hire people that I can't fire.
If I can't have a performance relationship and it's going
to impact the way that we can address each other
(16:57):
at the dinner table, then we probably don't need to
be in business together. Having a really good legal framework
and a great relationship with an attorney where you can
be really frank about protections in case that relationship doesn't
work out, is really really critical. It seems like she
was fortunate she still was able to keep ownership of
our company, but everybody's not so lucky.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
So Q had made this plan on ambitious goals that
she had set for the company, but her business partner
had just walked out, her relationship had sadly ended, and
now her entire livelihood was on the line. Tell me, then,
what were the subsequent six months?
Speaker 3 (17:36):
Like?
Speaker 2 (17:36):
I mean, was it just mayhem? Was it that sounds
like a yes?
Speaker 3 (17:41):
Oh? Yes. We continue to have a lot of challenges.
Growth brings challenges, right, and you have to be prepared
for it. We went into November with over thirty five
trucks on the road. You also have thirty five opportunities
for something to go wrong.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Yep, no texting and driving.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
No, we have challenges out there on the road. Flat tires,
somebody tore off a bumper, somebody hit somebody's mailbox, to
a literal collision with community members or with a tree.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
The tree, I just had to ask about it. Sometimes
accidents happen, but not usually with a stationary object in
front of you.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
I received a phone call from my dispatch telling me, Misque,
one of our drivers just hit a tree, and they
sent me photos and I'm trying to make sense out
of this. I went to go pick up my fleet guy,
we called the toe truck, get out to the location
and there's a stop sign. There's a like a tee
(18:53):
So he's coming up to the stop sign and you
can only turn left or right. He made a left
turn right into a tree like this, kept going and
continuing to turn. We checked to make sure the driver
was saved. He was safe, but he was red. He
was walking around like wondering what Miss Qvan to do
to me, you know, like okay, so if you're okay,
(19:17):
how did this happen? Was there a community member that
drove out in front of you and you had to
veer off and defend yourself. None of that happened. He
claims he stopped at the stop sign. He claims he
was trying to stop a package from sliding and that's
what made him go into the tree. He actually hit
two trees. The first tree he made contact with took
(19:39):
the side mirror off, broke the glass, bent up the
driver's door, and then he nosed into the last tree,
which stopped the vehicle from going any further. And on
the way driving back to our station after we got
everything under control, that is when you want to go
into a moment of silence and solitude. And I that
(20:00):
the entire ride back to the station, and my fleet
manager knew this is not the time to have a
conversation with missque and that's when you have those moments
of solitude.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
I want to talk a little bit about where you
find the energy to do what you do, because you
talked about you've done a couple of things that I
think we should all be in awe of. You applied
for a business, serving the business that you were working
for as a full time employee, did your business plan
while you were a full time employee, and then we're
able to summon the energy to build your business in
(20:41):
the middle of a personal crisis, I mean, that's an
awful lot for anyone to bear. So talk to us
a little bit cue about where you find the energy
to plow through all that?
Speaker 3 (20:52):
Asks myself the same thing, man, I believe honestly, my
passion for people has been my driving force. My network
has been very influential in terms of positioning me to
be able to do what I do. From those that
(21:13):
recruited me, those whose teams I worked on, they were
such a force of encouragement, the small business owners that
I worked with. That positive network was critical when.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
It all feels overwhelming. Where do you dig deep? Where
do you find that push?
Speaker 3 (21:34):
I revert to my face at that point. I do
value quality time with myself, and sometimes it's at awkward hours.
My staff tease me and tell me they swear I
don't sleep, but I do. I always made sure to
find an opportunity to retreat and to have those moments
(21:54):
of you know, just quiet.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Whatever she's doing, it's working House of Logistics just celebrated
its one year anniversary. Q now has seventy five drivers
and a devoted leadership team who she's cultivated to fill
the gaps. She's also changing Birmingham while she's at.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
It this first year. In terms of us looking at
our impact across Birmingham, we have at some point provided
persons with the ability to pursue their education. We've had
people get their CDO. We've had people pursue total different
industry credit counseling, medical billing. They have taken up the
(22:36):
education benefit. We've helped single mothers and I think we
have had some single fathers take advantage of our childcare
stipend that we offer to help them offset some of
their costs to come to work by putting their children
in daycare or help paying for after school care. They
are now taking advantage of our medical and dental plan
(22:58):
that they did not have a for. We have some
people that are investing in four o one K that
I had to explain what is a four oh one k?
They are now saving for something that they've never saved before.
I challenged my people at the interview table that how
I meet you today is not how I want you
to be too much from now. I want to know
(23:19):
if you have a dream or a vision outside of
my company, great, let me hear about it. I get
excited to note that people in my house is doing
things different from when I first met them.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
Q is the perfect example of why we love small businesses.
One of the first things we said when we launched
this show is that we celebrate small businesses because they're
on the ground across America. They make up large parts
of your town or city. They create community, and they
have the power to affect real change on a local level.
It's amazing stuff. It seems Birmingham is thriving under Q.
(23:55):
Oh and before I forget, there's something else that's thriving.
House of Logistic under q's leadership.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
Within the first six months of operation, we grossed in
over a million dollars.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
And were you cash flow positive?
Speaker 3 (24:10):
Cash flow positive month over month?
Speaker 2 (24:13):
Wow, I mean not a lot of people can say that.
You know, most people start a business, it takes them
a while to start generating cash. It's mostly it tends
to maybe it's the nature of that business, but a
lot of businesses tend to be cash flow negative for
a long time.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
Correct, You're right.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
I think a lot of people listening today would would
love to be able to start a business that could
grow that fast. Congratulations on all your success. Thank you
for being so generous with your time and so generous
with your story. We appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Thanks, and I appreciate the opportunity, Gia.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Now that we've heard all of Q's story, I'm just
I'm kind of overwhelmed by it. She probably used the
word relationship I don't know, three hundred times in that interview,
and you could tell number one, she really means it.
But too when you have people saying, yeah, we think
you should come into our market. You know, you don't
usually see people inviting others to come into their competitive set.
But they did.
Speaker 4 (25:04):
Often tell people. You know, when they say that they're
good at something, I say, yeah, well, you know, does
somebody other than your mother tell you that?
Speaker 2 (25:10):
Right?
Speaker 4 (25:10):
And so that was a great example of people being
able to see somewhere that she would be really talented.
And I think that's truly a testament to her ability
to build really solid relationships where people wanted to stand
side by side with her, even if that was going
to possibly impact their revenue. I mean, how impressive is that.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
I want to get a little more into the HR
side of things. I mean, that's your background, it's what
you and your company, Auditosity does, And Q talked a
lot about these HR issues with an ease and a
facility that is unusual I think for companies that young.
You know, how do you think young companies should think
about that.
Speaker 4 (25:46):
That's one of the areas that I think people struggle
with the most. The Department of Labor is very specific
about what the requirements are for companies, and I think
that most people would be really surprised about how many
employees you need to have to be under the Department
of Labor. There are multiple regulations that are compliance related
(26:08):
in HR where having one person outside the owner is
enough to trigger the Department of Labor for that organization.
It's really important to have all of those things worked
out before you bring the first employee in and then
be just absolutely dogged about the way that those things
are played out and the way that they are managed.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
So, Gia, let's get real breast tacks for our listeners
in the general HR space. Give me a checklist of
the things they need to make sure that they need
to think about, and then maybe some tools they can
use to go find out what they need to do.
Speaker 4 (26:42):
Okay, that was a love letter to me. Thank you,
I love you too. So I think that one is
a couple of the compliance things that I see a lot.
If you have more than one employee, you're supposed to
make sure that they have an nine nine. If you're
in one of twenty two states, you have to also
do everify. We go into organizations and we do none audits.
(27:03):
The fail rate on that is normally about seventy percent
of the company's. Number two the Equal Pay Act, which
says that men and women are supposed to be paid
equal money and money for the same type of work
with a couple of additional conditions. People think that that's
something that just happened, like in the two thousands when
Obama was in office. That was actually passed in nineteen
(27:24):
sixty three nineteen sixty three. Along those lines, having job
descriptions makes a ton of difference. If you're able to
do job descriptions, you have an opportunity to really kind
of grade out what those positions are and see if
those positions are truly supposed to be hourly or salaried.
(27:45):
When we go in to support companies and we ask
them questions specifically about their salaried employees, we find that
quite a few of the positions that they have set
a salary really should be hourly. And then once they
realize that they've misclassified them, they don't know what to do.
In order to fix it really quick. By the way,
it's easy to fix. All you have to do is
(28:07):
go ahead and make the correction, do a memos and
the person another offer letter, and then do a reclassification
and explain and show them how they're supposed to clock
in or to change the job description and possibly promote them.
And then inside of hiring, making sure that the position
is established and the skill set is established in advance.
So exactly what is this opportunity, Why do I need
(28:30):
this person? What do I need them to do? And
what are the qualifications that they need to have in order.
Speaker 3 (28:34):
To do this work.
Speaker 4 (28:35):
And so if you decide that you're going to hire
somebody specifically for culture, I really like them. You know,
we get along. You know, Well, you better make sure
that that's not an immediate need, because you're going to
need to give them time to be trained and learn
the organization and all these things in order for them
to be really effective inside of that role. However, if
you have an immediate need where you need somebody to
(28:57):
come in in day two and make a tremendous impact
that you need to really hire for talent and look
at the talent composition that you have and make sure
that you're bringing someone in that has a skill set
that is absolutely required to do that job. And so
that would be like my top five on my checklist.
I literally have thousands of things on a checklist.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
I wish we had time for thousands, but I think
those are my really useful one. So thank thank you, Gia.
Now one final thing before we go, can you let
listeners know why Alabama is such a great place for
small businesses.
Speaker 4 (29:27):
The thing that's really unique about being a business owner
in Alabama is the quality of life.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
One.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
I mean, we're right next to the beach. We have
access to go to larger areas when we want to.
But the thing that's really interested about being a business
owner here is that you have an opportunity to really
build a relationship with your potential customers and clients. The
whole thing about six degrees of separation, it's closer to
two degrees of separation in the state of Alabama. If
(29:56):
you are able to go out and you know, because
I'm a part of things like the chamber, or to
join and incubator or be a part of an innovation
space two degrees, you can absolutely meet anybody that you
want and have an opportunity to really build a meaningful
relationship so that you're not only servicing customers, but you
(30:16):
have an opportunity to build services alongside them. That is
one of the most wonderful uniquenesses about being an entrepreneur
inside of our state.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Thanks so much for listening to this episode of The Unshakeables,
and thank you to q McNeal and Dr. Gia for
speaking with us today. If you liked this episode, please
rate and review it. If you know someone who may
like the series, tell them about it. Next episode, we'll
hear from an entrepreneur whose city was in a big
mess and she was the only one able to clean
it up. We'll be speaking with Tia Johnson, CEO of
(30:49):
Fresh Bloom Bins out of Columbus, Ohio. I'm Ben Walter
and this is The Unshakeables from Chase for Business and
Ruby Studio from iHeart Media.
Ruby.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Every boss knows that a call after hours rarely bodes well.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
If my phone rings after six, I get nervous.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
That's especially true in Q McNeil's kind of work. Her company,
House of Logistics, has thirty five trucks on the road.
One day, one of her drivers took the truck well
a little off roading.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
I received a phone call telling me one of our
drivers just hit a tree. The first tree he made
contact with took the side mirror off, broke the glass,
bent the driver's door.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
The truck was totaled, the packages were scattered. The driver
fortunately was fine, but he was shaken up.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
My ops manager, he's standing there with his hands on
his wheel. Looking at me, because he's waiting to see me
just explode.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
They called the police, a tow truck, and medical services
to make sure the driver was safe. After they had
all the photos they needed from the scene, everyone was
sent home. The next day, Q and her ops manager
caught up about the accident.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
He was like, miss cute, you were so calm out
there at the scene of his accident.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Good managers know how to solve problems even when others
get emotional. Great leaders know how to solve problems while
they manage their employees' emotions and their own emotions at
the same time.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
So you asked me a question about what do I
do to keep it together? That is when you want
to go into a moment of silence and solitude.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
By this point, Q was well practiced. House of Logistics
was only six months old, and she had already dealt
with an inventory of challenges. Staff had turned over, some
trucks had run into trees, and most notably, her business
partner had left just a month into its operations. And
there's more to it, just wait. House of Logistics was
all on her. Fortunately, Q is a masterclass in resilience.
(02:18):
Welcome to the Unshakeables from Chase for Business and Ruby
Studio from iHeartMedia. I'm Ben Walter, CEO of Chase for Business.
On the Unshakeables, we're sharing the daring moments of small
business owners facing their crisis points and telling the stories
of how they got through it. This week, we're heading
down to Alabama, but before we get back to Q's story,
(02:40):
we're also joined by doctor Gia Wiggins, founder and CEO
of Auditocity, a SaaS platform helping businesses with their compliance
and HR Processes GEO, Welcome to the show, Thanks for coming,
Thanks for having me in. I'm really happy to have
you on today because I mean, you're an expert in HR,
which a lot of businesses, particularly small businesses, when they're
starting out overlook, So I can't wait to have you
(03:01):
weigh in on this story. And you're also from Obile, Alabama.
Not only am I from there, but there's still a
store on Dauphin Street which was opened by my great
grandfather around nineteen oh seven.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
That is fantastic. Well, we've welcomed you to come down,
especially during Marty Gras.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Yeah, I know, come on down. All right, let's get
into this show. This is House of Logistics from Birmingham, Alabama.
Now I have some personal ties to the state, so
I'm really excited to do an episode about Alabama. We
were lucky enough to find an incredible business owner, Quanetta McNeil.
(03:38):
The first thing I learned about her when we met
was that no one calls her Quanetta. Quanetta, it is
so nice to meet you. I understand that most people
call you Q. May I call you Q.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
Absolutely everyone calls me Q.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
The second thing I learned was about the name of
her company its house of Logistics spelled HAUS.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
The foundation of the company was established to keep my
team fully informed. I run a transparent operation and typically
transparency resides in your home right, and so I have
my leadership team that I developed from the start of
my operations, identifying them as drivers. They became the heart
of the house. So we wanted to be a little different.
(04:21):
In the street version for a house means someone that
does things ridiculously well.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
Q has a ton of experience in business and entrepreneurship,
so it was no surprise to hear that she does
her job ridiculously well. She bounced around a bit at
the start of her career. She joined the military, she
worked in HR she taught business to seventh graders, and
then started a virtual assistant company supporting small businesses and individuals,
an opportunity that took her all the way to the Caribbean.
Speaker 3 (04:52):
I loved traveling and started helping couples with planning their
special occasions such as their anniversaries, weddings all across the
Caribbean market. And while I was in Jamaica, I was
approached by Pepsiicola to do contract negotiations for them in
the hotel industry.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
There, she'd made so many connections with vendors, hotels, and
decision makers across the island that another beverage company saw
huge potential in her.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Eventually, Heineken came into the Jamaican market and they recruited
me to come over and maintain relationships that I had
established with the hotel industry. I worked with both the
manufacturing and distribution side of the business.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Now we're only about four minutes into this episode and
Q has already used the word relationships several times. It's
key to her business story, and.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
I think that's what keeps me alive. It tickles me.
I do not meet strangers.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
A lot of folks tend to think of connections as
a soft skill, perhaps less important than other things when
running a business. I disagree, and Q does too. Her
ability to create relationships has served her exceptionally well, both
personally and professionally, so much so that it led to
what was likely the most important professional call of Q's life.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
So I got a call from a large US retailer
and they gave me an opportunity to return back to
the US. I came in in the corporate space as
a senior business coach supporting other small businesses. They were
also launching their delivery service partner. These were small business
owners that had been contracted out to do their deliveries
from their warehouse to customer's door and or to commercial spaces.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
Interesting because I think of them as doing their own deliveries,
but it sounds like they don't do all their own deliveries.
It's a mix.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
No, they do not. They use tharred party contractors to
facilitate the last mile of their delivery.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
So Q is coaching small business owners in what's called
last mile delivery. This is what those in the business
call it when packages are picked up from a main
distribution center and put on the trucks to get to
your door. And a funny thing is happening when Q
is coaching these folks. They tell her that she should
get in the game too. This is people who would
be your competitors encouraging you to come compete.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
Yes, the small business owners would encourage me to start
up my own operation.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Q loved coaching the small business owners, but really wanted
to own her own business, so she decided to apply
This process is a little more involved than when you
click easy apply on LinkedIn.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Well, it starts with the application process, and while you're applying,
you really have to be developing your company, like you
have to get it to creation mode at the same time,
because you have to be able to present your idea
in terms of how are you going to run a
logistics company, how are you going to overcome the challenges
that are going to come your way, how are you
going to deal with your fleet, how are you going
(07:47):
to do your recruiting. You kind of have to be
developing and thinking about all of this while you are
in the application process.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Q turned to the small business owners to pressure test
all of her ideas. They offered up a lot of advice,
and all of them have a different strategy. You have
a lot of strong business leaders that have mastered their
way of what success looked like for them. I had
an opportunity to learn from many of them in terms
(08:16):
of what work and what does not work. I also
saw some of them have partners such as their spouse
for example, that are in this with them. I was
very impressed with their ability to share the load. Being
in the in the weeks with them every day help
prepare me for what was coming my way. Gee, I
(08:39):
want to bring you back in here because Q story
is already diverging from a lot of what we've heard
on this show so far.
Speaker 4 (08:45):
Yeah, I think to work for a company particular, to
be in the area where you are helping other businesses
to be successful within that company, and then to have
the opportunity to actually be a vendor and a part
of that company. Oftentimes, when people think, Okay, I'm going
to start a business, one of the questions that we
(09:05):
often ask is do you have any expertise at all
inside of that industry to be able to look at
the business and the way that the business operates from
behind the curtain, and to look at the challenges and
then to say, hey, I think I'm going to do that,
and then to be able to execute it so quickly
and to be able to ramp up so quickly because
(09:26):
you have that institutional knowledge of what it looks like
to be successful in their role. This is a fantastic pathway.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Thank you, Gia. I want to pivot a little bit
to Q for a second. Now she's an employee, but
she still has to go through this whole application and
vetting process. So she works there, but she has to
make a case for why she should be one of
their last mild delivery vendors.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
I was successful with the application process and they extended
a contract to me to leave the business and start
my own logistics company. And we launched on the thirtieth
of August.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Wow, so just over year ago. About a year and
a month ago now because it's early October, so not
that long ago.
Speaker 3 (10:05):
Not that long ago, all right.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
So Q, armed with tons of knowledge from others in
the same industry, launched House of Logistics on August thirtieth,
twenty twenty three in Birmingham. She returned home CEO of
her own company, and of course it was smooth sailing
from day one.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
Oh no, it is a lot of work to start
up a logistics business. They want partners that are willing
to accept the challenges and a partner that is willing
to grow.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Okay, now, you had something personal going on in your
life at the same time, right.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Yes, the personal side of my life, I mean, why
you're doing this. Life still happens, right.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Yeah, Life happens all the time. Just before launching her company,
Q got married. She and her partner went into the
marriage as they launched this company together.
Speaker 3 (11:00):
We were married one month before we launched. We didn't
have a honeymoon. The business was our baby. You know.
We had conversations around the challenges that's going to present themselves.
It was a very intense period. It did require both
of us to be very committed to what was necessary
(11:21):
to get the business up and off the ground running,
but led to, you know, this tension.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
They had decided prior to launch that Q would handle
the business part of running everything, and he would manage
the fleet and their operations. She asked him to give
six months to get the business up and running and
then they could properly celebrate their love. To Q, this
was a sacrifice she was more than willing to make.
Speaker 3 (11:45):
I absolutely loved my job. And I think when you're
doing something that you enjoy, when you're doing something that
you're passionate about, I think you come to the table differently.
I kind of felt like I wasn't thinking about myself
to be because this was part of who I felt
like I was, If this makes any sense. I love
(12:08):
people so much that I felt like I was investing
in myself by investing in other people. And I felt
like at some point I was going to reap the
reward of it, and so for me, I believe I
may have come to this totally different with a different mindset.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Her husband, though, didn't share the same passion for the business.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
You have to have your own drive. I can't give
that to you. I don't know if the challenge was
that I knew more when I was training my team,
I was also training him. I don't think we ever
really sat down and absorbed and talked about how are
you feeling about this? Unfortunately, my marriage did not survive that.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
Two months into the life of their company. Sadly, their
marriage fell apart.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
I had to get up and be at work morning
and carry on.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (13:02):
You know, by the business being so young, I literally
had to go in, I had to dispatch, I had
to carry on operations as business as usual. I really
didn't have that room to figure out what just happened.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Right, You couldn't grieve essentially, no, Wow, And you also
lost a business partner and someone who carried some of
that load, correct. I mean, that's a big moment, huge
for you for the business, for everything. Tell us how
you got through.
Speaker 3 (13:30):
That, and even my staff, you know, and even managing
you know who they interact with every day. I have
to remind myself whenever these challenges come up, why did
I start this. The good thing is that part of
my business plan that I had written, I did put
my heart and soul in this document. I was able
to remind myself why, and when things was not working
(13:55):
out personally, I had already got this in motion. I
stayed'su to the plan.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
This is really interesting, Q, because we've had some people
on the show who sort of have more of the
Mike Tyson approach to life, which is everybody has a
plan until they get punched in the face, right, and
then you just have to sort of wing it, Whereas
you've taken quite the opposite approach, which is I have
a plan, and when I get punched in the face,
I'm going to go back to the plan. I'm going
to stick with the plan. So that's really interesting. You know,
(14:24):
people have different approaches to this.
Speaker 3 (14:26):
This is what I needed to do, This is what
I needed to stick to. Now we have also had
to make changes because as we've grown as a company,
I also had to adjust. But the core portion of
it remains the same.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
And do you still own one hundred percent of the
business and.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
I still, oh, one hundred percent of the business.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
Gee, I think we have to take a moment here.
You know, people generally take time off to deal with
personal emergencies. Of course, I encourage my own team to
do the same. Family comes first, but entrepreneurship can be
a different beast. You don't have a safety net. There's
no one else to call or show up and take
care of the business if you're not there.
Speaker 4 (15:00):
Right, That's very true. It's another sort of relationship, kind
of like a marriage, one that absolutely requires one hundred
percent commitment in order to succeed.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
I'm really stunned by her commitment. I mean, she talked
about it a lot, but that commitment to a plan
and clearly like what she thinks of as a plan
is not what a lot of people think of business
plan is a lot of people think of business plan
is a few notes on a page. She thinks it's
a lot more. And I it sounds like from what
she said, if she hadn't had that, she'd have been
in real trouble.
Speaker 4 (15:29):
Yeah, it did sound that way.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
You know.
Speaker 4 (15:31):
I think that her having the understanding that you've got
to have that strategy somewhere where you can look at it. Sometimes,
when you get in the weeds as an entrepreneur, particularly
when you're going through challenges and you're in a growth stage,
it's really easy to get distracted about why you're doing
something and why you made the decision to do it
(15:52):
in the first place. And so I'm sure that inside
of that business plan she had all the other components
that are more true aditional with the business plan, but
having that mission and that reason why and the reason
why you get up every single day, particularly on tough days,
I mean, I think that's critical, and I'm pretty sure
she probably shares that with her employees as well, to
(16:14):
keep them motivated.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
It was sort of implicit in the story, but clearly
she went into business with family. In this case, it
was her fiance slash husband for a period of time.
Family businesses have their own challenges, but talk to us
about what the dynamics are that are different about family
businesses and frankly, what kind of protections people might need
as a result of that.
Speaker 4 (16:35):
The first thing I thought when she said that was
attorney attorney. Attorney attorney, like making sure that the details
of that arrangement are like etched and concrete. Right, I
have a tendency not to hire people that I can't fire.
If I can't have a performance relationship and it's going
to impact the way that we can address each other
(16:57):
at the dinner table, then we probably don't need to
be in business together. Having a really good legal framework
and a great relationship with an attorney where you can
be really frank about protections in case that relationship doesn't
work out, is really really critical. It seems like she
was fortunate she still was able to keep ownership of
our company, but everybody's not so lucky.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
So Q had made this plan on ambitious goals that
she had set for the company, but her business partner
had just walked out, her relationship had sadly ended, and
now her entire livelihood was on the line. Tell me, then,
what were the subsequent six months?
Speaker 3 (17:36):
Like?
Speaker 2 (17:36):
I mean, was it just mayhem? Was it that sounds
like a yes?
Speaker 3 (17:41):
Oh? Yes. We continue to have a lot of challenges.
Growth brings challenges, right, and you have to be prepared
for it. We went into November with over thirty five
trucks on the road. You also have thirty five opportunities
for something to go wrong.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Yep, no texting and driving.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
No, we have challenges out there on the road. Flat tires,
somebody tore off a bumper, somebody hit somebody's mailbox, to
a literal collision with community members or with a tree.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
The tree, I just had to ask about it. Sometimes
accidents happen, but not usually with a stationary object in
front of you.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
I received a phone call from my dispatch telling me, Misque,
one of our drivers just hit a tree, and they
sent me photos and I'm trying to make sense out
of this. I went to go pick up my fleet guy,
we called the toe truck, get out to the location
and there's a stop sign. There's a like a tee
(18:53):
So he's coming up to the stop sign and you
can only turn left or right. He made a left
turn right into a tree like this, kept going and
continuing to turn. We checked to make sure the driver
was saved. He was safe, but he was red. He
was walking around like wondering what Miss Qvan to do
to me, you know, like okay, so if you're okay,
(19:17):
how did this happen? Was there a community member that
drove out in front of you and you had to
veer off and defend yourself. None of that happened. He
claims he stopped at the stop sign. He claims he
was trying to stop a package from sliding and that's
what made him go into the tree. He actually hit
two trees. The first tree he made contact with took
(19:39):
the side mirror off, broke the glass, bent up the
driver's door, and then he nosed into the last tree,
which stopped the vehicle from going any further. And on
the way driving back to our station after we got
everything under control, that is when you want to go
into a moment of silence and solitude. And I that
(20:00):
the entire ride back to the station, and my fleet
manager knew this is not the time to have a
conversation with missque and that's when you have those moments
of solitude.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
I want to talk a little bit about where you
find the energy to do what you do, because you
talked about you've done a couple of things that I
think we should all be in awe of. You applied
for a business, serving the business that you were working
for as a full time employee, did your business plan
while you were a full time employee, and then we're
able to summon the energy to build your business in
(20:41):
the middle of a personal crisis, I mean, that's an
awful lot for anyone to bear. So talk to us
a little bit cue about where you find the energy
to plow through all that?
Speaker 3 (20:52):
Asks myself the same thing, man, I believe honestly, my
passion for people has been my driving force. My network
has been very influential in terms of positioning me to
be able to do what I do. From those that
(21:13):
recruited me, those whose teams I worked on, they were
such a force of encouragement, the small business owners that
I worked with. That positive network was critical when.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
It all feels overwhelming. Where do you dig deep? Where
do you find that push?
Speaker 3 (21:34):
I revert to my face at that point. I do
value quality time with myself, and sometimes it's at awkward hours.
My staff tease me and tell me they swear I
don't sleep, but I do. I always made sure to
find an opportunity to retreat and to have those moments
(21:54):
of you know, just quiet.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Whatever she's doing, it's working House of Logistics just celebrated
its one year anniversary. Q now has seventy five drivers
and a devoted leadership team who she's cultivated to fill
the gaps. She's also changing Birmingham while she's at.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
It this first year. In terms of us looking at
our impact across Birmingham, we have at some point provided
persons with the ability to pursue their education. We've had
people get their CDO. We've had people pursue total different
industry credit counseling, medical billing. They have taken up the
(22:36):
education benefit. We've helped single mothers and I think we
have had some single fathers take advantage of our childcare
stipend that we offer to help them offset some of
their costs to come to work by putting their children
in daycare or help paying for after school care. They
are now taking advantage of our medical and dental plan
(22:58):
that they did not have a for. We have some
people that are investing in four o one K that
I had to explain what is a four oh one k?
They are now saving for something that they've never saved before.
I challenged my people at the interview table that how
I meet you today is not how I want you
to be too much from now. I want to know
(23:19):
if you have a dream or a vision outside of
my company, great, let me hear about it. I get
excited to note that people in my house is doing
things different from when I first met them.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
Q is the perfect example of why we love small businesses.
One of the first things we said when we launched
this show is that we celebrate small businesses because they're
on the ground across America. They make up large parts
of your town or city. They create community, and they
have the power to affect real change on a local level.
It's amazing stuff. It seems Birmingham is thriving under Q.
(23:55):
Oh and before I forget, there's something else that's thriving.
House of Logistic under q's leadership.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
Within the first six months of operation, we grossed in
over a million dollars.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
And were you cash flow positive?
Speaker 3 (24:10):
Cash flow positive month over month?
Speaker 2 (24:13):
Wow, I mean not a lot of people can say that.
You know, most people start a business, it takes them
a while to start generating cash. It's mostly it tends
to maybe it's the nature of that business, but a
lot of businesses tend to be cash flow negative for
a long time.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
Correct, You're right.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
I think a lot of people listening today would would
love to be able to start a business that could
grow that fast. Congratulations on all your success. Thank you
for being so generous with your time and so generous
with your story. We appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Thanks, and I appreciate the opportunity, Gia.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Now that we've heard all of Q's story, I'm just
I'm kind of overwhelmed by it. She probably used the
word relationship I don't know, three hundred times in that interview,
and you could tell number one, she really means it.
But too when you have people saying, yeah, we think
you should come into our market. You know, you don't
usually see people inviting others to come into their competitive set.
But they did.
Speaker 4 (25:04):
Often tell people. You know, when they say that they're
good at something, I say, yeah, well, you know, does
somebody other than your mother tell you that?
Speaker 2 (25:10):
Right?
Speaker 4 (25:10):
And so that was a great example of people being
able to see somewhere that she would be really talented.
And I think that's truly a testament to her ability
to build really solid relationships where people wanted to stand
side by side with her, even if that was going
to possibly impact their revenue. I mean, how impressive is that.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
I want to get a little more into the HR
side of things. I mean, that's your background, it's what
you and your company, Auditosity does, And Q talked a
lot about these HR issues with an ease and a
facility that is unusual I think for companies that young.
You know, how do you think young companies should think
about that.
Speaker 4 (25:46):
That's one of the areas that I think people struggle
with the most. The Department of Labor is very specific
about what the requirements are for companies, and I think
that most people would be really surprised about how many
employees you need to have to be under the Department
of Labor. There are multiple regulations that are compliance related
(26:08):
in HR where having one person outside the owner is
enough to trigger the Department of Labor for that organization.
It's really important to have all of those things worked
out before you bring the first employee in and then
be just absolutely dogged about the way that those things
are played out and the way that they are managed.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
So, Gia, let's get real breast tacks for our listeners
in the general HR space. Give me a checklist of
the things they need to make sure that they need
to think about, and then maybe some tools they can
use to go find out what they need to do.
Speaker 4 (26:42):
Okay, that was a love letter to me. Thank you,
I love you too. So I think that one is
a couple of the compliance things that I see a lot.
If you have more than one employee, you're supposed to
make sure that they have an nine nine. If you're
in one of twenty two states, you have to also
do everify. We go into organizations and we do none audits.
(27:03):
The fail rate on that is normally about seventy percent
of the company's. Number two the Equal Pay Act, which
says that men and women are supposed to be paid
equal money and money for the same type of work
with a couple of additional conditions. People think that that's
something that just happened, like in the two thousands when
Obama was in office. That was actually passed in nineteen
(27:24):
sixty three nineteen sixty three. Along those lines, having job
descriptions makes a ton of difference. If you're able to
do job descriptions, you have an opportunity to really kind
of grade out what those positions are and see if
those positions are truly supposed to be hourly or salaried.
(27:45):
When we go in to support companies and we ask
them questions specifically about their salaried employees, we find that
quite a few of the positions that they have set
a salary really should be hourly. And then once they
realize that they've misclassified them, they don't know what to do.
In order to fix it really quick. By the way,
it's easy to fix. All you have to do is
(28:07):
go ahead and make the correction, do a memos and
the person another offer letter, and then do a reclassification
and explain and show them how they're supposed to clock
in or to change the job description and possibly promote them.
And then inside of hiring, making sure that the position
is established and the skill set is established in advance.
So exactly what is this opportunity, Why do I need
(28:30):
this person? What do I need them to do? And
what are the qualifications that they need to have in order.
Speaker 3 (28:34):
To do this work.
Speaker 4 (28:35):
And so if you decide that you're going to hire
somebody specifically for culture, I really like them. You know,
we get along. You know, Well, you better make sure
that that's not an immediate need, because you're going to
need to give them time to be trained and learn
the organization and all these things in order for them
to be really effective inside of that role. However, if
you have an immediate need where you need somebody to
(28:57):
come in in day two and make a tremendous impact
that you need to really hire for talent and look
at the talent composition that you have and make sure
that you're bringing someone in that has a skill set
that is absolutely required to do that job. And so
that would be like my top five on my checklist.
I literally have thousands of things on a checklist.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
I wish we had time for thousands, but I think
those are my really useful one. So thank thank you, Gia.
Now one final thing before we go, can you let
listeners know why Alabama is such a great place for
small businesses.
Speaker 4 (29:27):
The thing that's really unique about being a business owner
in Alabama is the quality of life.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
One.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
I mean, we're right next to the beach. We have
access to go to larger areas when we want to.
But the thing that's really interested about being a business
owner here is that you have an opportunity to really
build a relationship with your potential customers and clients. The
whole thing about six degrees of separation, it's closer to
two degrees of separation in the state of Alabama. If
(29:56):
you are able to go out and you know, because
I'm a part of things like the chamber, or to
join and incubator or be a part of an innovation
space two degrees, you can absolutely meet anybody that you
want and have an opportunity to really build a meaningful
relationship so that you're not only servicing customers, but you
(30:16):
have an opportunity to build services alongside them. That is
one of the most wonderful uniquenesses about being an entrepreneur
inside of our state.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Thanks so much for listening to this episode of The Unshakeables,
and thank you to q McNeal and Dr. Gia for
speaking with us today. If you liked this episode, please
rate and review it. If you know someone who may
like the series, tell them about it. Next episode, we'll
hear from an entrepreneur whose city was in a big
mess and she was the only one able to clean
it up. We'll be speaking with Tia Johnson, CEO of
(30:49):
Fresh Bloom Bins out of Columbus, Ohio. I'm Ben Walter
and this is The Unshakeables from Chase for Business and
Ruby Studio from iHeart Media.
Hosts And Creators
Ben Walter
Kathleen Griffith
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