April 17, 2025 • 38 mins
Entrepreneurs, listen up. Amplify Your Voice 2025, the financial edition is where you need to be. Brought to you by Canadian Small Business Women, a place for entrepreneurs to find the resources to take their businesses to the next stage. You'll learn from incredible keynote speakers and leave feeling more confident about your financial future. From getting clarity on building your stock portfolio to real estate investment, this event will be the perfect place to get the tools to level up your finances And the perks? They're good. Every guest gets a free professional headshot, a swag bag, and lunch. And most importantly, endless connections with like-minded entrepreneurs. This event isn’t just for women, it’s for everyone. Get your tickets today.
Marla Coffin has cracked the code, creating six vertically integrated companies while stepping back to focus purely on strategy and growth. In this episode, she reveals how she built and stepped back from six vertically integrated businesses to focus on strategy and growth while others handle daily operations.
Marla Coffin is a seasoned entrepreneur, business strategist, and mom to three wonderful girls. She owns six vertically integrated businesses and 18 months ago, stepped back from daily operations to focus on strategy and leadership coaching. Now, she helps business owners scale with structure and confidence, drawing from her deep experience in business ownership, vertical integration, and strategic hiring.
Marla specializes in guiding entrepreneurs beyond the operational grind so they can focus on growth and long-term success. She works across industries, tackling the common roadblocks that hinder both small and mid-sized businesses. Her strategic approach helps businesses build the foundations they need to scale, creating systems that drive efficiency and profitability. Spending the bulk of her time on this allows Marla to operate at her highest and best use and share her knowledge with other business owners.
Her mission is simple: to help business owners break free from operational overwhelm and take their companies to the next level.
You can learn more about Marla's company MARDA Management on their website.
You can can connect with Marla on LinkedIn.
You can connect with Julie on LinkedIn or Instagram.
Find Julie's writing at her blog or by ordering her book Big Gorgeous Goals and the brand new official companion workbook!
What did you think of this conversation? We'd love if you'd rate or review our show!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Julie (00:04):
Welcome to Figure 8, where we feature inspiring
stories of women entrepreneurswho have grown their businesses
to seven and eight figuresrevenue.
If you're in the mix of growinga bigger business, these
stories are for you.
Join us as we explore where thetough spots are, how to
overcome them and how to prepareyourself for the next portion
(00:27):
of the climb.
I'm your host, Julie Ellis.
I'm an author, entrepreneur anda growth and leadership coach
who co-founded, grew and exitedan eight-figure business.
This led me to exploring whysome women achieve great things,
and that led to my book BigGorgeous Goals.
(00:47):
Let's explore the systems,processes and people that help
us grow our businesses to newheights.
If you're interested in growingyour business, this podcast
will help.
Now let's get going.
Hello and welcome to thisepisode of Figure 8.
(01:08):
Today I have with me MarlaCoffin, and Marla has founded a
good number of businesses andI'm excited to dive in with her
today about why so many and whatthe potential she sees in them
are.
But she now owns six verticallyintegrated businesses and she
(01:29):
has stepped back from dailyoperations to work on strategy
and watch them scale without herhands being directly on the
wheel at all times.
So I'm really interested totalk to you today.
Welcome, Marla.
Marla (01:42):
Thank you so much, Julie, for having me.
I appreciate it.
Julie (01:45):
You're welcome.
So let's dive right into that,because I do think it's unusual
and fascinating, because itmakes a lot of sense as a way to
grow your businesses that youlet go and let other people run
them.
Marla (01:58):
Absolutely, absolutely.
We have really found it to bethe key for us and my husband
and I were business partners interms of what our everyday life
looks like now not necessarilybeing in the grind, not
necessarily having to do all ofthe things right, not always
being, you know, like you said,driving, driving the car.
Julie (02:20):
Yeah well, and I think it's interesting because I mean,
one of those six businesses isbookkeeping and you know you are
not an accountant, but you sawan opportunity, so how it allows
you to create anentrepreneurial venture without
having that sort of subjectmatter expertise.
Marla (02:38):
No question.
We have a few differentbusinesses that you know,
bookkeeping being one of them,where we partnered with someone
who is a bookkeeper by trade.
She runs the business, sheunderstands the business.
We certainly help her tonavigate, you know think
strategically, make biggerbusiness decisions and you know,
guide her along the way aspartners.
(03:00):
But she certainly runs all ofthe day to day operations as
partners.
But she certainly runs all ofthe day-to-day operations and by
default, because myself and myhusband we are not bookkeepers
although he certainly is moreinto, we'll say, the numbers
than I am by default we are notrunning the business.
We cannot step in on aday-to-day basis, regardless of
what facets are contributing tothe circumstances.
(03:23):
So we've learned to make surethat we have other systems in
place as backups.
So if something does transpireor our team lead needs time off,
whatever the circumstance maybe, there are systems in place
for that.
But instead we work more on astrategic level in that business
.
Julie (03:42):
Yeah, and it reminds me kind of of a board of directors
sort of structure, right, likeyou kind of function as the
board of directors andshareholders of the company, who
are not in the day to day butwho are involved in setting the
strategy, making sure that youhave those redundancies that
you're talking about built inall of those kinds of things.
Marla (04:04):
Definitely.
We definitely take more of anadvisory role, for sure, and you
know we are striving for thatin all of our businesses.
It's a little easier, or morebuilt in, I should say, in the
businesses where we have lessfamiliarity, like bookkeeping.
Julie (04:17):
Right, because you really automatically have to have your
hands out.
It's a forced situation.
Absolutely, which is not, youknow, the nature of most
entrepreneurs, so yeah, well,and that's why I think I find
what you're doing so interestingthat you, you know, are
(04:38):
spinning out these businessesbecause of, I mean, let's, you
know, rewind a little bit.
You started one business, yes,and if you want to maybe talk
about that a little bit, becausethat sort of spawned you seeing
a lot of other needs in theworld that brought you to
multiple businesses.
Marla (04:54):
Absolutely.
Our core business is calledMARDA Management.
It's a rental managementcompany for residential property
management, so that's our corebusiness.
My husband and I founded thattogether 15 years ago, started
as a side job and just sort ofevolved from there.
But as it became anintentionally structured
business which we were very muchrunning the day-to-day
(05:17):
operations of, including to thepoint where it was growing to 40
and 50 staff, we were stillrunning the day-to-day
operations.
We knew all of the intricacies,but we started to then identify
that there are a lot ofvertical integration
opportunities within this typeof business, and that is
primarily what initiated some ofour other businesses that have
(05:39):
both allowed us to verticallyintegrate but also taught us one
of the most important lessonswe could have asked for, which
is that you don't need to be inthe day to day, you don't need
to run it operationally.
You know you can exit withoutselling and it can be an income
producing asset for you.
Julie (05:56):
And would you say, there was like a moment or a time
period where you really becameaware of that and were able then
to step back Like what was itthat sort of prompted you to
view things in that way?
Marla (06:08):
Sure, I can sort of point to two different channels.
One was more of an evolutionfrom when we started to
vertically integrate, we startedto expand our holdings, we
started, you know, we acquiredsome businesses, we developed
some new businesses, we learnedhow to serve that core business
through other ventures, and thatwas more of an evolution.
And then, in addition to that,we worked with a coach who was
(06:32):
the first coach we ever workedwith and you know, I always say
you know, when it comes tocoaching, it is so much about
awareness, right, and you know,really heightening that
awareness level, and for me andmy husband it was an awareness
level.
It was certainly an aha momentfor us to come to realize that
what would happen if we steppedout of the day-to-day operations
(06:52):
of our core business?
What would that look like?
What would transpire?
You know, and we identified,through that aha moment, that
number one we would identifygaps.
What are the things that peopleneed to be cross-trained on?
Where do we need to delegatemore effectively?
You know, essentially, whereare the gaps.
And then, secondly, once youknow that is tended to, there
(07:14):
really is a path for you tocreate that income producing
asset instead of the job,instead of being the technician
or the primary person with yourhands on the wheel.
Julie (07:26):
Yeah, and so when you started stepping back, did you
and your husband both step backin all of your cases, or did you
and did you stagger that?
How did you find that happened?
Marla (07:37):
Yeah, so we intentionally chose a time period of one
month to both step back together.
During that month, you know, weput some systems in place for
things that couldn't be tendedto without us or that,
inadvertently, you know, would.
Of course things would arise.
So we did that, and we did thatin June of 2023 for the month
of June both of us.
Now, of course, there arecertain things in any business
(08:01):
that certainly at your firstshot and probably even long term
, you will hold on to, likefinancial access and things of
that nature.
So there were some things thatwe knew we would have to do, but
we intentionally didn't go tothe office.
We intentionally set our teamsup to understand what level of
things we expected them toself-solve and what level of
(08:21):
things we understood they mayneed to reach out to us for, and
things like that.
And that was true for both myhusband and myself.
And so we did do that for thatmonth and we both found
significant gaps and holes,which we anticipated, but that
was a mechanism forself-identifying what those were
and how we could tend to them.
And by the end of that month,my husband, dale, did go back to
(08:44):
the business I'll say threequarter of his time, probably to
what he was previously andthat's now down a year and a
half later, almost a coupleyears later, to about, you know,
10 hours a week, and I neverwent back.
The only thing I did after thatmonth off was I intentionally
set aside time from home to dothat cross training, to hire, to
(09:07):
promote et cetera, torestructure our org chart and
things like that, to make sureour team was set up for success,
not just for the short term butfor the long term.
Julie (09:15):
Yeah, and make sure you do have that day-to-day
leadership that the team needsto look to to answer all those
questions and do those things.
Marla (09:22):
No question, it's key and it really pushed our team as
well through a process thatreally required them to
self-solve.
There are a lot of things that,by nature as humans, we just
ask the person who's therebecause they're there.
We want human connection, wewant to talk to our colleagues,
we want to work together withothers, so it's very natural for
(09:44):
us to go to those that areclosest to us especially.
You know I always operate on anopen door policy, which you
know I do for a reason, butcertainly that encourages people
to come on by and, before youknow it, as a business leader,
all day, every day, you end upwith hey got a minute, hey, do
you have a minute?
Can I borrow you for a sec?
Julie (10:03):
Very much Well, and it's interesting because I mean,
obviously you didn't just shutoff your phones and go on
vacation, you were keepingyourself available for finding
those holes.
But it must have been a veryinteresting day, one kind of
like what's going to happentoday.
Marla (10:23):
It was a very interesting day, one, I will say for sure,
and I think the team certainlytook a certain level of, you
know, responsibility to workthrough their own challenges,
and it pushed them just as muchas it pushed us, because, make
no mistake, it wasn't easy forus.
It wasn't just like poof, therewe go, things are running well.
And even when they were runningwell you know it's a control
(10:44):
factor that you're used to whenit's your developed business
that you've put a lot of, youknow, blood, sweat and tears
into, it's not so easy to justsay, oh, they got it, it's fine.
Whatever they come up with willbe great.
Julie (10:56):
No, and what was that part like?
Because I think that would be areally challenging part for a
lot of entrepreneurs.
Like you know, the letting goof control and you know there's,
there's your vision is involvedin that.
Ego can sometimes be involvedin that like there are a lot of
reasons why we hang on tight.
Marla (11:16):
For sure, for sure.
I mean, I think that there area couple of really critical
things that you need to makesure you have in place.
First, things like core values,things that will set your
vision straight, so that it'snot just current team members
that know and hopefully live it,but new team members that come
on board and, as your businessevolves and grows, you don't
lose sight of that somewherealong the way.
(11:37):
So we work pretty diligently tomake sure that was the case.
But once I could be confidentthat that was true, there was
still a whole myriad of things Ihad to work through, as you, as
you've explained here right.
It was no easy feat, but it wascertainly an evolution.
It was something that took time, I would say it took me
probably about eight monthsbefore I was mostly I'll call it
(12:00):
at ease with you know, allowingthe team to make the decisions,
recognizing what are the smallthings and what are the big
things.
You know, allowing the team tomake the decisions, recognizing
what are the small things andwhat are the big things.
You know because we're used to,as business owners, making all
the calls, small and big,whatever it may be in a lot of
ways.
Julie (12:14):
And we do it without thinking.
In a lot of ways, I thinkyou're just, you're there,
you're in it, you're, you know,you're moving through your day
making those decisions and so tothink about, like doing that
pullback and not being theperson who makes them.
Marla (12:30):
Totally and and and being okay with the fact that, hey,
if the decision that they arriveat is not exactly my decision,
it's probably okay, it's notgoing to make or break the
business, it's not going to, youknow, be significantly
consequential, probably right.
And those things that are atthat level, we're still part of
(12:51):
those conversations, we're stillpart of those decisions to make
sure that our vision, you know,does get carried through the
way we'd like to see it.
But when you're in it, you justmake all the calls, you know
hundreds, if not 1000s, ofdecisions a day and, like you
say, by nature it's just what'sthe next question, what's the
next need?
And so that, I would say, waspretty significant.
(13:12):
I did eventually, probably afterup to a year, might've been a
little bit less than a year Idid give up my, even my, office
space.
So I did have an office there,of course, but I did eventually
tell the person that I promotedyou know what you can, you can
have my office because I feltlike that was the final
component for me.
That was that piece of control.
(13:33):
It was the piece of comfort too, by the way, that I could just
slide back into that seat if Ineeded to.
So that was, for me personally,an emotional decision, but a
necessary one, and I felt likethat went a long way for the
team as well, because you haveto make clear to the team who's
in charge too.
Julie (13:51):
Sure you do, because people need to be told very
specifically that they are goingto be stepping into the gap.
And these are the decisions youneed to be making and this is
how, what you are accountablefor and how I'm going to you
know, measure you against that.
Marla (14:08):
Definitely.
And I had to be verydisciplined about redirecting
other people too, because teammembers would still come to me
even though I felt as though wewere clear people are, we are
all creatures of habit so theywould still come to me and I
would have to be verydisciplined about redirecting
and of course, by nature, we allwant to be helpful.
So I would consistently want tojust respond and you know it
(14:28):
was an easy question, easyanswer but I had to really push
myself diligently to redirectthat person through the right
channel, to the appropriate, tothe appropriate party.
Julie (14:38):
Yeah, the yes.
It will take you 10 seconds toanswer this, but then you're
creating, you know that slipperyslope.
Marla (14:45):
Totally, yeah, absolutely .
Julie (14:49):
And what do you feel like so that freeing of you to raise
yourself up?
What do you feel like thatunlocked in you in terms of what
your sort of best self is tobring to these businesses?
Marla (15:01):
Well, it certainly gave me an opportunity to even begin
to think about what that wouldbe, because when we're in the
grind all of us have been thereat some point for some length of
time or still are, you know youjust are making decisions one
after the other, and I alwayssay that when you're in the
weeds, so to speak, $20 problemsand $500 problems become one
(15:22):
pile, and that's the realchallenge, because you don't
know how to strategically thinkabout where to use your time or
where it's most effective.
You're just trying to get tothe next thing, and so it gave
me a chance to really thinkthoroughly about what is my
highest and best use, what can Ibring to these businesses that
will be most effective for thebusinesses, and what do I want
(15:45):
to spend my day-to-day timedoing?
What you know, what do I enjoythe most?
And where do I bring the mostvalue?
Julie (15:52):
Entrepreneurs, listen up, Amplify Your Voice 2025
Financial Edition is where youneed to be.
Brought to you by CanadianSmall Business Women.
A place for entrepreneurs tofind the resources to take their
businesses to the next stage.
You'll learn from incrediblekeynote speakers and leave
feeling more confident aboutyour financial future.
(16:14):
From getting clarity onbuilding your stock portfolio to
real estate investment, thisevent will be the perfect place
to get the tools to level upyour finances.
And the perks.
They're good.
Every guest gets a freeprofessional headshot, a swag
bag and lunch and, mostimportantly, endless connections
(16:36):
with like-minded entrepreneurs.
This event isn't just for women, it's for everyone.
Get your tickets today.
You'll find the link to buy inthe show notes.
There's some good parts aboutletting go, but I'm sure that
there were also parts that youdid enjoy doing that you let go
of also.
Marla (16:55):
For sure.
There's no question.
I love the team environment.
I love, you know, working withpeople, but that hasn't really
changed.
I mean it's just shifted.
So now I'm really working withall of the leaders of the
businesses instead of all of thepeople in each business.
I'm really working with thedifferent personalities through
(17:16):
helping to promote them intostronger leadership, as opposed
to, maybe, you know, with theone onone individual employee at
each business.
So it's it's different, butit's really just been a shift.
It's you just have to kind oflook at it from a little bit of
a different perspective.
I do still get a lot of thereward internal reward, I mean
that I feel and have felt fromworking with those people and
(17:40):
helping make them strongerleaders too.
Julie (17:43):
Yeah, and so how do you set up, I mean, I see, the
aligning of culture, making surepeople you know have the
responsibility on theirshoulders that you're very clear
of?
I'm giving this to you, andwhat were the other things that
you really found that you had todo in terms of yourself as a
(18:04):
leader?
Marla (18:05):
Well, a couple of things.
One is the thing that Iimplemented in all of the
businesses.
It took me some time to realizethat I needed it, but it's a
monthly managerial report thatreally just provides mainstream
communication between the personleading the business and the
ownership team.
I found that I was a little bittoo on top of them hey, what
happened with this?
(18:25):
Hey, by the way, what aboutthat?
What about that?
And that wasn't properlyempowering them to run with it.
But I still needed some of thesepieces of information, some of
them for my ability to bestrategic and some of them just
for my own peace of mind.
It's still, you know, ourbusiness.
It's still businesses that weworked hard to build, so some of
it was just sheer peace of mind.
So we've developed that.
(18:46):
We started that about ninemonths ago and it is going
pretty well.
Of course, it was a little bitof an adjustment period too,
because the report can be alittle bit intense, but trying
to focus on the most importantsets of information, the things
that are most relevant, if youwill, or are most needed, and I
think that that hassignificantly impacted the level
(19:08):
of what I call now ease finallygetting to a place of ease
where we have that appropriatecommunication and I'm not
necessarily having to bug peoplefor no reason about what
happened here and what happenedthere, and so that's made a big
difference.
Julie (19:24):
Yeah, Well, and yeah, and it's also that piece of like
you're getting timelyinformation at the right level
and you create that sort ofscorecard or template that
really, I think, just helps youwith your comfort level.
Marla (19:37):
For sure it's as much for me as it is for them, or as
much for them as it is for me,because, at the end of the day,
these are also the things thatthey should be spending their
time focusing on right, becausethey can get two in the weeds
too we all can.
So it helps give them thatdirection and expectation and it
helps ensure that I'm reallyonly focusing on those high
level things that I need to know.
Julie (19:56):
Yeah, and it gives you that boundary against the desire
to roll up your sleeves and putyour hands back in.
Marla (20:05):
It's an itch.
That is a bit of a battlesometimes, sometimes more than
ours but yeah, it's always there.
Julie (20:10):
Especially if you feel like things aren't going the way
you want them to go or going aswell as you want them to go.
I can see that that, though,anytime there's sort of more
difficulty, you always have tofight that urge right.
I mean, I see it in myself aswell, and it's so easy to
unravel right.
Marla (20:25):
We've worked so hard to build a team that can handle it,
and it's very easy to just diveback in because that's the
clearest path.
And then boom, you've unraveledmonths and months and months of
work.
Julie (20:35):
And suddenly you're losing people and you know all
of the things that come withthat right the trust is eroded,
all the things you've workedhard for for sure People are
saying wait, who do?
I call again.
Yeah, you're like.
Oh yes, did I do that right.
But like anything, it's aprocess and we're not perfect,
but, yes, making sure you've gotthose like boundaries to follow
(20:59):
, like to stay inside, so thatyou understand.
Yeah, yeah, I feel like that'sa real, like.
It's a very interesting point,right, like that impact we have
as leaders, both for the goodbut also for the bad, and
rolling up our sleeves anddiving in where we should not be
doing.
(21:19):
That is damaging actually tothe team dynamic and what's
happening.
Marla (21:24):
Yep, definitely, definitely, definitely.
Julie (21:27):
Yeah, Interesting.
And so now you are how spendingyour time.
How, what, what, what's, what'skeeping you interested and lit
up these days?
Marla (21:39):
I certainly have come to a place within my businesses
that I've been able to decide,you know, where do I want to
spend the most time, what do Iwant to do day to day, and I
think that you know helpingother business owners is
definitely key.
That's something that has donea lot for me for a long time,
(22:01):
even when I was doing so lessformally, if you will.
You know, coming to a placewhere I can take my mistakes, I
can take my decisions, I cantake the things that I've chosen
over time and share them withother people, has been so
(22:21):
consequential in being able togive me true satisfaction.
True satisfaction, it's ussharing with each other, it's us
going down the path of reallyfinding ourselves in a place
that, hey, these are the thingsthat worked for me, these are
the things that didn't.
And if you take even one littlebit of that and save yourself
(22:44):
from your own heartache, yourown mistakes, your own
tumultuous ups and downs that weall go through, you know, as
entrepreneurs then I've won.
That's, for me, what I've reallyrecognized as something that
makes a big difference.
So I've parlayed that into anew business called the growth
arena, where we can spend ourtime coaching people and
(23:08):
empowering them to be betterleaders, to recognize the things
that are most important intheir day-to-day business and,
for some people, depending ontheir goals.
Because we do try to work withpeople on developing their
individual goals, but for somepeople, figuring out how to exit
without selling, how to ensurethat their business is an income
producing asset and how tohonestly just get them to a
(23:32):
place where they are living whatwe call the good life right,
achieving their goals on a dayto day basis coach who really
helped you do this, and now youwant to sort of take what you
learned and implemented to morepeople, which I think is a
(23:53):
really nice circle.
I can appreciate that and youknow, when we started with a
coach because it wasn'tsomething we did originally, it
wasn't even something we wereaware of we came to understand
that there's a lot ofopportunities out there.
But sometimes we get so hung upin the day to day that we just
don't have that level ofawareness.
(24:14):
And sometimes it just takessomeone on the outside to say,
hey, why are you doing it likethis?
Or why aren't you doing it likethat?
And we all know as businessowners.
Sometimes the answer is it'sbecause that's how it's always
been done.
Julie (24:27):
That's what we're used to right, or because you don't
realize you're getting badadvice, or like you know.
There are so many areas youdon't know about when you enter
into entrepreneurship.
Marla (24:38):
You know they always say there's two kinds of you don't
know, right, you don't know whatyou know.
You don't know, I don't knowhow to be an author or do brain
surgery.
But then there are things Idon't know, that I don't know,
and if you can heighten myawareness, sometimes even a
little bit, it can make asignificant consequential
difference in my life, mybusiness, my family, my
(24:58):
entrepreneurship, whatever mychoices are.
So I've really just found thatif I can parlay some of what
I've learned along the way,showing other business owners
and demonstrating for them howbeneficial that vertical
integration can be, becausesometimes, you know, we do get
stuck in treading on the samewheel over and over again.
(25:20):
And you know, I think, if wereally consider how key it can
be to bring in some of thoseother factors, why am I paying
another business when I can bepotentially paying myself?
Why am I losing the controlthat maybe I need, depending on
what it is that hey, I can'tprioritize this because it's not
up to me, I'm hiring someoneelse to do it.
(25:42):
But if it's also an internalcompany that we begin to develop
, not only are we getting thefinancial benefit but we're
getting the operational benefitthat we can internally decide
among companies.
Where do our priorities lie?
What do we need to see happen?
And now we actually have somesay right.
So we've found that verticalintegration component to be so
(26:02):
critical and something that alot of businesses don't do
either at all, or they thinkthey're too small.
They think you know it doesn'tmake sense for me at this size
or this point.
But I think you just need torecognize what your TAM is,
understand what your goals arewithin that total addressable
market and then decide, hey, youmight want to branch out a
(26:24):
little bit, you know, tovertically integrate where
you're at and where you're going.
It can really strengthen youroverall portfolio, right.
Julie (26:31):
And what are some ways that you see people and have
been able to yourself implementthat vertical integration?
Marla (26:40):
Yeah, absolutely so.
A lot of times it's justthinking about what your core
business does and the ways thatyou might be able to bring
benefit if you did it, eitheryourself, or you brought under
your umbrella the ability to doit.
So, for example, at ourresidential property management
company, we've created abusiness for lawn care,
landscaping and snow removal.
(27:01):
It was simply just strategicfor us to do that internally.
It allows us to decide on ourown priorities.
It keeps the revenue under ouryou know our internal umbrella
and you know it's.
It's pretty, a pretty, um basic, straightforward company, but
it was something we wereoutsourcing, something we didn't
have control of before.
Julie (27:22):
And setting it up as its own business allows it to have
its own profit and loss manageits own way, because businesses
run on different kinds of models.
Marla (27:33):
Right.
Julie (27:33):
And so it just allows you .
And then also it could besomething that you expand beyond
only looking after yourproperties.
It could also be something thatyou sell independent of that at
some point.
Marla (27:45):
No question, and we do.
You know, depending on thebusiness, we have some
businesses that the only clientis our core business, but we
have other businesses, like youknow, the bookkeeping firm that
we spoke about.
That business serves manyindustries, many customers, not
just our internal businesses.
(28:06):
So it depends on the business,depends on what strategic at the
time.
And then the other thing is isyou can set yourself up for an
opportunity for growth.
So, even if today that newoffshoot serves you internally,
down the road you may be able togrow to a point where it can
(28:27):
actually service outsidecustomers as well.
Julie (28:31):
Right, yeah, which makes sense too, like I do think the
bookkeeping business is a greatexample because, let's face it,
there is a shortage ofbookkeeping out there in the
world quality people who knowtheir stuff.
Marla (28:43):
So if you've got, somebody you've got.
Julie (28:46):
You've got potential there, for sure.
Marla (28:48):
Yep and you can really start to work through some of
the operational challenges aswell.
When it's internal, that's alittle easier to do than when
you're serving outside clientsas well.
Julie (28:56):
Yeah, yes, and I think also from a financial
perspective it gives you somearm's length protection as an
entrepreneur inside of thebusinesses you have against
fraud and those kinds of things.
Marla (29:07):
No question for sure.
And so you know, when you'relooking at vertical integration,
it can be.
You know, sometimes people haveideas and then they bring it
under the umbrella of theexisting company because it's an
additional revenue stream,which is great.
And diversifying your revenuestreams, you know, is going to
do a lot for you as a business.
It's going to protect you from,you know, economic ups and
(29:30):
downs.
It's going to do a lot ofdifferent things for you by
diversifying that.
But depending on howsignificant that arm is, it
might make sense to bring it assomething within the umbrella,
but as a separate company, as aseparate entity.
So we could have just startedto do lawn and snow removal in
our property management company,but by really bringing it
outside.
(29:50):
That's what's going to bepivotal in diversifying our
client base, in growing, youknow, our revenue and all of
that.
Julie (29:57):
Yeah, it also makes it really easy to see where you're
making money, where you've gotproblems.
You're looking at them you'relooking at them all separately,
and so you can see going well,going well going well.
Marla (30:11):
Oh, we've got something or chart, you know, creating all
of the basics, starting todevelop, that you can cookie
cutter approach and say, okay,we'll do that over here, we'll
(30:33):
do that over here, we'll do thatover here.
And, of course, depending onyour goals and your desired
scalability, you also mightreach a point where you want to
sell a piece of that off.
Doesn't mean you need to sellthe whole thing.
Julie (30:45):
Right, right, which makes a lot of sense Because, as
entrepreneurs, we have ourbiggest assets are in our
business.
Marla (30:54):
Absolutely.
Julie (30:55):
Yeah yeah, and at some point in our lives.
We need to try and get themoney out.
Marla (31:02):
Yes, and that doesn't mean that you necessarily want
to exit on all fronts, but itdoes give you options, right?
So I like it for that reason aswell.
Julie (31:12):
Oh, that's good, and so let's talk a little bit more
about the growth arena.
What has that journey been likefor you?
Marla (31:18):
So it's been very, very interesting, very fascinating.
I never anticipated, you know,that I would kind of morph my
career into this.
I had a coach who said to me afew years ago you know, you'd be
, you'd be a great mentor, you'dbe a great coach, you'd be, you
know, really strong in businessconsulting.
And I looked at him like he hadthree heads or more.
I was like I'm a landlord.
(31:40):
So thanks, you know, I'm aproperty manager, that's my main
gig and, frankly, I loved it.
By the way, I went to bedthinking about our core business
.
I went to sleep thinking aboutMARDA.
That was a lot.
It brought a lot of enjoymentand because I did it with my
husband, we shared an office, wedid a lot of stuff together.
So that certainly was very, youknow, very robust for us at the
(32:03):
time.
But as it's evolved into aplace where I realized, wow,
first of all, I absolutely lovehelping businesses to grow, fix
problems, share the lessons I'velearned over the years as well,
which are a plenty, and sobeing able to parlay that into
something formal has been reallyrewarding.
(32:25):
I decided sometime I think itwas late last year that I would
document my growth through thegrowth arena.
Actually, what does it looklike to develop a business that
isn't necessarily raising, youknow, significant capital, where
we're kind of justbootstrapping the business on
purpose?
What does this look like?
Julie (32:44):
Because I want to be able to demonstrate for people once
it's off the ground these aresome of the things you can do
and it's not necessarily out ofreach for you.
Yeah Well, and in a world thatfeels like we're all being told
to raise capital right now, likeit kind of feels like the
pendulum is over on the you know, if you're bootstrapping, you
(33:06):
shouldn't be, you should beraising capital side, and and
that isn't it isn't true foreverybody.
It doesn't mean you can't builda great business by
bootstrapping.
Marla (33:15):
For sure, and I'm a firm believer in that and I think
that sometimes entrepreneurs,and certainly women, can be
intimidated by the idea ofgetting into an environment that
maybe they've never been anentrepreneur, maybe they've
never started up a business, youknow, maybe they've never
worked for themselves or beenaccountable to others in that
way, and so it can be reallyintimidating thinking that
(33:36):
they're going to do that andthey have to go out and, you
know, pitch investors and raisecapital, and while that can be
really important, especially incertain businesses, it's not
necessary and it's not mandatoryand there are other ways and I
think that's important todemonstrate.
Julie (33:53):
Yeah Well, and it leads to you know I had a conversation
on the podcast recently like itleads to you building a really
strong skillset in raising money, which takes a lot of time to
do, and so you also need to sortof weigh out the value of the
time of building different skillsets and building a skill set
and building the operationalskill set to grow the business
(34:14):
faster on that side.
Marla (34:16):
For sure, and it's really all about that competition
between time and money, right,you know, for all of us.
Julie (34:22):
It is and figuring out which path is the right path for
the business.
Marla (34:26):
You have the right path for the business you have.
That's right.
And what is your end game right?
I always say we need to startwith our end game in mind.
Where are we trying to takethis?
Where are we trying to go andthen work it back from there?
Julie (34:36):
Well, that's really exciting, and so six businesses.
Marla (34:43):
So I've got more ideas.
My ideas are a plenty.
Julie (34:45):
Only some of them have legs, though, so well, it's good
to know that, because sometimesthat's the hardest challenge is
figuring out which ones topursue yep for sure, and where
to spend our time.
Marla (34:56):
Right, and I think that one of the the best things we
can do when we're not sure ofhey, you know where should I
invest my time.
First of all, write it down.
Write all the things down.
Let's start there and then talkto the people you trust most.
Talk to the people in your lifewho can give you insight into
what might work and what mightnot, sometimes depending on
where we're at in our career.
(35:17):
That can be family, that can befriends, it can be colleagues,
it can be other people in theindustry, it can be people we
trust locally or even, or even,people we trust afar.
So I think it's reallyimportant to do that exercise to
narrow in on what should Ispend my time doing?
Julie (35:33):
Yeah, yeah, no, and I'm a big fan of having the systems
or the scaffolding that youbuild around what it is you want
, so that you set yourself upfor more success 100%.
Marla (35:47):
I couldn't agree with you more and I think that you know
there are a lot of ways intobusiness you can.
You know I just talked aboutthe growth arena.
We're starting it from kind ofsquare one here and we're doing
it this way intentionally.
I've, you know, developedbusinesses out of side jobs, out
of intentional verticalintegration.
We've acquired businesses aswell.
Acquisitions is something thatcertainly can also be looked at
(36:10):
as a potential way to parlayinto an entrepreneurship,
depending on where you're at oryou know what type of industry
you're in.
Right.
We've had a couple ofacquisitions over the years and
we've learned a lot from that.
It got us into another sector,another component of our
industry that we may not havebeen willing or able to spend
the time getting into ourselvesby manually building that up
(36:30):
right.
Julie (36:31):
Yep or yeah.
Would it just maybe not havebeen taken too long to get
profitable, or those kinds ofthings?
And I do think it's interestingbecause I think lots of times
people think that they, to becalled an entrepreneur, it has
to be built from scratch, fromthe ground up, and I really
don't see that as true.
You know you buy a business,you work in a business and you
(36:52):
know, acquire it from the personyou've been for a long time, or
you bring somethingcomplimentary or to give heft to
what you have.
I think it's so interesting allthe different ways we can
become entrepreneurs.
Marla (37:06):
Absolutely.
There are so many ways toarrive in this crazy
entrepreneurial world we'reliving in right.
It's not a straight path,that's for sure.
Julie (37:16):
No, I totally agree.
Well, thank you so much forjoining me today and sharing
about your journey.
I have really enjoyed learningmore about you.
Marla (37:25):
Thank you so much for having me, Julie.
Julie (37:27):
I look forward to seeing how many more businesses you end
up with, thank you.
Marla (37:29):
Thank you so much for having me, Julie.
Thank you, Julie.
My pleasure to be here andlooking forward to continuing to
set more big, gorgeous goalsAwesome.
Julie (37:36):
Thanks so much.
I hope you enjoyed today'sepisode.
Please remember to hitsubscribe on your favorite
podcast platform so you won'tmiss any episodes.
Figure 8 isn't just a podcast.
It's a way of seeing the big,gorgeous goals of women
entrepreneurs coming to life.
If you're interested inlearning more, you can find my
(37:59):
book Big Gorgeous Goals onAmazon, anywhere you might live.
For more about my growth andleadership training programs,
visit www.
julieellis.
ca to see how we might worktogether.
Read my blog or sign up to getyour free diagnostic.
Are you ready for growth?
(38:20):
Once again, that's www.
julieellis.
ca.
When we work together, we allwin.
See you again soon for anotherepisode of Figure 8.
Welcome to Figure 8, where we feature inspiring
stories of women entrepreneurswho have grown their businesses
to seven and eight figuresrevenue.
If you're in the mix of growinga bigger business, these
stories are for you.
Join us as we explore where thetough spots are, how to
overcome them and how to prepareyourself for the next portion
(00:27):
of the climb.
I'm your host, Julie Ellis.
I'm an author, entrepreneur anda growth and leadership coach
who co-founded, grew and exitedan eight-figure business.
This led me to exploring whysome women achieve great things,
and that led to my book BigGorgeous Goals.
(00:47):
Let's explore the systems,processes and people that help
us grow our businesses to newheights.
If you're interested in growingyour business, this podcast
will help.
Now let's get going.
Hello and welcome to thisepisode of Figure 8.
(01:08):
Today I have with me MarlaCoffin, and Marla has founded a
good number of businesses andI'm excited to dive in with her
today about why so many and whatthe potential she sees in them
are.
But she now owns six verticallyintegrated businesses and she
(01:29):
has stepped back from dailyoperations to work on strategy
and watch them scale without herhands being directly on the
wheel at all times.
So I'm really interested totalk to you today.
Welcome, Marla.
Marla (01:42):
Thank you so much, Julie, for having me.
I appreciate it.
Julie (01:45):
You're welcome.
So let's dive right into that,because I do think it's unusual
and fascinating, because itmakes a lot of sense as a way to
grow your businesses that youlet go and let other people run
them.
Marla (01:58):
Absolutely, absolutely.
We have really found it to bethe key for us and my husband
and I were business partners interms of what our everyday life
looks like now not necessarilybeing in the grind, not
necessarily having to do all ofthe things right, not always
being, you know, like you said,driving, driving the car.
Julie (02:20):
Yeah well, and I think it's interesting because I mean,
one of those six businesses isbookkeeping and you know you are
not an accountant, but you sawan opportunity, so how it allows
you to create anentrepreneurial venture without
having that sort of subjectmatter expertise.
Marla (02:38):
No question.
We have a few differentbusinesses that you know,
bookkeeping being one of them,where we partnered with someone
who is a bookkeeper by trade.
She runs the business, sheunderstands the business.
We certainly help her tonavigate, you know think
strategically, make biggerbusiness decisions and you know,
guide her along the way aspartners.
(03:00):
But she certainly runs all ofthe day to day operations as
partners.
But she certainly runs all ofthe day-to-day operations and by
default, because myself and myhusband we are not bookkeepers
although he certainly is moreinto, we'll say, the numbers
than I am by default we are notrunning the business.
We cannot step in on aday-to-day basis, regardless of
what facets are contributing tothe circumstances.
(03:23):
So we've learned to make surethat we have other systems in
place as backups.
So if something does transpireor our team lead needs time off,
whatever the circumstance maybe, there are systems in place
for that.
But instead we work more on astrategic level in that business
.
Julie (03:42):
Yeah, and it reminds me kind of of a board of directors
sort of structure, right, likeyou kind of function as the
board of directors andshareholders of the company, who
are not in the day to day butwho are involved in setting the
strategy, making sure that youhave those redundancies that
you're talking about built inall of those kinds of things.
Marla (04:04):
Definitely.
We definitely take more of anadvisory role, for sure, and you
know we are striving for thatin all of our businesses.
It's a little easier, or morebuilt in, I should say, in the
businesses where we have lessfamiliarity, like bookkeeping.
Julie (04:17):
Right, because you really automatically have to have your
hands out.
It's a forced situation.
Absolutely, which is not, youknow, the nature of most
entrepreneurs, so yeah, well,and that's why I think I find
what you're doing so interestingthat you, you know, are
(04:38):
spinning out these businessesbecause of, I mean, let's, you
know, rewind a little bit.
You started one business, yes,and if you want to maybe talk
about that a little bit, becausethat sort of spawned you seeing
a lot of other needs in theworld that brought you to
multiple businesses.
Marla (04:54):
Absolutely.
Our core business is calledMARDA Management.
It's a rental managementcompany for residential property
management, so that's our corebusiness.
My husband and I founded thattogether 15 years ago, started
as a side job and just sort ofevolved from there.
But as it became anintentionally structured
business which we were very muchrunning the day-to-day
(05:17):
operations of, including to thepoint where it was growing to 40
and 50 staff, we were stillrunning the day-to-day
operations.
We knew all of the intricacies,but we started to then identify
that there are a lot ofvertical integration
opportunities within this typeof business, and that is
primarily what initiated some ofour other businesses that have
(05:39):
both allowed us to verticallyintegrate but also taught us one
of the most important lessonswe could have asked for, which
is that you don't need to be inthe day to day, you don't need
to run it operationally.
You know you can exit withoutselling and it can be an income
producing asset for you.
Julie (05:56):
And would you say, there was like a moment or a time
period where you really becameaware of that and were able then
to step back Like what was itthat sort of prompted you to
view things in that way?
Marla (06:08):
Sure, I can sort of point to two different channels.
One was more of an evolutionfrom when we started to
vertically integrate, we startedto expand our holdings, we
started, you know, we acquiredsome businesses, we developed
some new businesses, we learnedhow to serve that core business
through other ventures, and thatwas more of an evolution.
And then, in addition to that,we worked with a coach who was
(06:32):
the first coach we ever workedwith and you know, I always say
you know, when it comes tocoaching, it is so much about
awareness, right, and you know,really heightening that
awareness level, and for me andmy husband it was an awareness
level.
It was certainly an aha momentfor us to come to realize that
what would happen if we steppedout of the day-to-day operations
(06:52):
of our core business?
What would that look like?
What would transpire?
You know, and we identified,through that aha moment, that
number one we would identifygaps.
What are the things that peopleneed to be cross-trained on?
Where do we need to delegatemore effectively?
You know, essentially, whereare the gaps.
And then, secondly, once youknow that is tended to, there
(07:14):
really is a path for you tocreate that income producing
asset instead of the job,instead of being the technician
or the primary person with yourhands on the wheel.
Julie (07:26):
Yeah, and so when you started stepping back, did you
and your husband both step backin all of your cases, or did you
and did you stagger that?
How did you find that happened?
Marla (07:37):
Yeah, so we intentionally chose a time period of one
month to both step back together.
During that month, you know, weput some systems in place for
things that couldn't be tendedto without us or that,
inadvertently, you know, would.
Of course things would arise.
So we did that, and we did thatin June of 2023 for the month
of June both of us.
Now, of course, there arecertain things in any business
(08:01):
that certainly at your firstshot and probably even long term
, you will hold on to, likefinancial access and things of
that nature.
So there were some things thatwe knew we would have to do, but
we intentionally didn't go tothe office.
We intentionally set our teamsup to understand what level of
things we expected them toself-solve and what level of
(08:21):
things we understood they mayneed to reach out to us for, and
things like that.
And that was true for both myhusband and myself.
And so we did do that for thatmonth and we both found
significant gaps and holes,which we anticipated, but that
was a mechanism forself-identifying what those were
and how we could tend to them.
And by the end of that month,my husband, dale, did go back to
(08:44):
the business I'll say threequarter of his time, probably to
what he was previously andthat's now down a year and a
half later, almost a coupleyears later, to about, you know,
10 hours a week, and I neverwent back.
The only thing I did after thatmonth off was I intentionally
set aside time from home to dothat cross training, to hire, to
(09:07):
promote et cetera, torestructure our org chart and
things like that, to make sureour team was set up for success,
not just for the short term butfor the long term.
Julie (09:15):
Yeah, and make sure you do have that day-to-day
leadership that the team needsto look to to answer all those
questions and do those things.
Marla (09:22):
No question, it's key and it really pushed our team as
well through a process thatreally required them to
self-solve.
There are a lot of things that,by nature as humans, we just
ask the person who's therebecause they're there.
We want human connection, wewant to talk to our colleagues,
we want to work together withothers, so it's very natural for
(09:44):
us to go to those that areclosest to us especially.
You know I always operate on anopen door policy, which you
know I do for a reason, butcertainly that encourages people
to come on by and, before youknow it, as a business leader,
all day, every day, you end upwith hey got a minute, hey, do
you have a minute?
Can I borrow you for a sec?
Julie (10:03):
Very much Well, and it's interesting because I mean,
obviously you didn't just shutoff your phones and go on
vacation, you were keepingyourself available for finding
those holes.
But it must have been a veryinteresting day, one kind of
like what's going to happentoday.
Marla (10:23):
It was a very interesting day, one, I will say for sure,
and I think the team certainlytook a certain level of, you
know, responsibility to workthrough their own challenges,
and it pushed them just as muchas it pushed us, because, make
no mistake, it wasn't easy forus.
It wasn't just like poof, therewe go, things are running well.
And even when they were runningwell you know it's a control
(10:44):
factor that you're used to whenit's your developed business
that you've put a lot of, youknow, blood, sweat and tears
into, it's not so easy to justsay, oh, they got it, it's fine.
Whatever they come up with willbe great.
Julie (10:56):
No, and what was that part like?
Because I think that would be areally challenging part for a
lot of entrepreneurs.
Like you know, the letting goof control and you know there's,
there's your vision is involvedin that.
Ego can sometimes be involvedin that like there are a lot of
reasons why we hang on tight.
Marla (11:16):
For sure, for sure.
I mean, I think that there area couple of really critical
things that you need to makesure you have in place.
First, things like core values,things that will set your
vision straight, so that it'snot just current team members
that know and hopefully live it,but new team members that come
on board and, as your businessevolves and grows, you don't
lose sight of that somewherealong the way.
(11:37):
So we work pretty diligently tomake sure that was the case.
But once I could be confidentthat that was true, there was
still a whole myriad of things Ihad to work through, as you, as
you've explained here right.
It was no easy feat, but it wascertainly an evolution.
It was something that took time, I would say it took me
probably about eight monthsbefore I was mostly I'll call it
(12:00):
at ease with you know, allowingthe team to make the decisions,
recognizing what are the smallthings and what are the big
things.
You know, allowing the team tomake the decisions, recognizing
what are the small things andwhat are the big things.
You know because we're used to,as business owners, making all
the calls, small and big,whatever it may be in a lot of
ways.
Julie (12:14):
And we do it without thinking.
In a lot of ways, I thinkyou're just, you're there,
you're in it, you're, you know,you're moving through your day
making those decisions and so tothink about, like doing that
pullback and not being theperson who makes them.
Marla (12:30):
Totally and and and being okay with the fact that, hey,
if the decision that they arriveat is not exactly my decision,
it's probably okay, it's notgoing to make or break the
business, it's not going to, youknow, be significantly
consequential, probably right.
And those things that are atthat level, we're still part of
(12:51):
those conversations, we're stillpart of those decisions to make
sure that our vision, you know,does get carried through the
way we'd like to see it.
But when you're in it, you justmake all the calls, you know
hundreds, if not 1000s, ofdecisions a day and, like you
say, by nature it's just what'sthe next question, what's the
next need?
And so that, I would say, waspretty significant.
(13:12):
I did eventually, probably afterup to a year, might've been a
little bit less than a year Idid give up my, even my, office
space.
So I did have an office there,of course, but I did eventually
tell the person that I promotedyou know what you can, you can
have my office because I feltlike that was the final
component for me.
That was that piece of control.
(13:33):
It was the piece of comfort too, by the way, that I could just
slide back into that seat if Ineeded to.
So that was, for me personally,an emotional decision, but a
necessary one, and I felt likethat went a long way for the
team as well, because you haveto make clear to the team who's
in charge too.
Julie (13:51):
Sure you do, because people need to be told very
specifically that they are goingto be stepping into the gap.
And these are the decisions youneed to be making and this is
how, what you are accountablefor and how I'm going to you
know, measure you against that.
Marla (14:08):
Definitely.
And I had to be verydisciplined about redirecting
other people too, because teammembers would still come to me
even though I felt as though wewere clear people are, we are
all creatures of habit so theywould still come to me and I
would have to be verydisciplined about redirecting
and of course, by nature, we allwant to be helpful.
So I would consistently want tojust respond and you know it
(14:28):
was an easy question, easyanswer but I had to really push
myself diligently to redirectthat person through the right
channel, to the appropriate, tothe appropriate party.
Julie (14:38):
Yeah, the yes.
It will take you 10 seconds toanswer this, but then you're
creating, you know that slipperyslope.
Marla (14:45):
Totally, yeah, absolutely .
Julie (14:49):
And what do you feel like so that freeing of you to raise
yourself up?
What do you feel like thatunlocked in you in terms of what
your sort of best self is tobring to these businesses?
Marla (15:01):
Well, it certainly gave me an opportunity to even begin
to think about what that wouldbe, because when we're in the
grind all of us have been thereat some point for some length of
time or still are, you know youjust are making decisions one
after the other, and I alwayssay that when you're in the
weeds, so to speak, $20 problemsand $500 problems become one
(15:22):
pile, and that's the realchallenge, because you don't
know how to strategically thinkabout where to use your time or
where it's most effective.
You're just trying to get tothe next thing, and so it gave
me a chance to really thinkthoroughly about what is my
highest and best use, what can Ibring to these businesses that
will be most effective for thebusinesses, and what do I want
(15:45):
to spend my day-to-day timedoing?
What you know, what do I enjoythe most?
And where do I bring the mostvalue?
Julie (15:52):
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There's some good parts aboutletting go, but I'm sure that
there were also parts that youdid enjoy doing that you let go
of also.
Marla (16:55):
For sure.
There's no question.
I love the team environment.
I love, you know, working withpeople, but that hasn't really
changed.
I mean it's just shifted.
So now I'm really working withall of the leaders of the
businesses instead of all of thepeople in each business.
I'm really working with thedifferent personalities through
(17:16):
helping to promote them intostronger leadership, as opposed
to, maybe, you know, with theone onone individual employee at
each business.
So it's it's different, butit's really just been a shift.
It's you just have to kind oflook at it from a little bit of
a different perspective.
I do still get a lot of thereward internal reward, I mean
that I feel and have felt fromworking with those people and
(17:40):
helping make them strongerleaders too.
Julie (17:43):
Yeah, and so how do you set up, I mean, I see, the
aligning of culture, making surepeople you know have the
responsibility on theirshoulders that you're very clear
of?
I'm giving this to you, andwhat were the other things that
you really found that you had todo in terms of yourself as a
(18:04):
leader?
Marla (18:05):
Well, a couple of things.
One is the thing that Iimplemented in all of the
businesses.
It took me some time to realizethat I needed it, but it's a
monthly managerial report thatreally just provides mainstream
communication between the personleading the business and the
ownership team.
I found that I was a little bittoo on top of them hey, what
happened with this?
(18:25):
Hey, by the way, what aboutthat?
What about that?
And that wasn't properlyempowering them to run with it.
But I still needed some of thesepieces of information, some of
them for my ability to bestrategic and some of them just
for my own peace of mind.
It's still, you know, ourbusiness.
It's still businesses that weworked hard to build, so some of
it was just sheer peace of mind.
So we've developed that.
(18:46):
We started that about ninemonths ago and it is going
pretty well.
Of course, it was a little bitof an adjustment period too,
because the report can be alittle bit intense, but trying
to focus on the most importantsets of information, the things
that are most relevant, if youwill, or are most needed, and I
think that that hassignificantly impacted the level
(19:08):
of what I call now ease finallygetting to a place of ease
where we have that appropriatecommunication and I'm not
necessarily having to bug peoplefor no reason about what
happened here and what happenedthere, and so that's made a big
difference.
Julie (19:24):
Yeah, Well, and yeah, and it's also that piece of like
you're getting timelyinformation at the right level
and you create that sort ofscorecard or template that
really, I think, just helps youwith your comfort level.
Marla (19:37):
For sure it's as much for me as it is for them, or as
much for them as it is for me,because, at the end of the day,
these are also the things thatthey should be spending their
time focusing on right, becausethey can get two in the weeds
too we all can.
So it helps give them thatdirection and expectation and it
helps ensure that I'm reallyonly focusing on those high
level things that I need to know.
Julie (19:56):
Yeah, and it gives you that boundary against the desire
to roll up your sleeves and putyour hands back in.
Marla (20:05):
It's an itch.
That is a bit of a battlesometimes, sometimes more than
ours but yeah, it's always there.
Julie (20:10):
Especially if you feel like things aren't going the way
you want them to go or going aswell as you want them to go.
I can see that that, though,anytime there's sort of more
difficulty, you always have tofight that urge right.
I mean, I see it in myself aswell, and it's so easy to
unravel right.
Marla (20:25):
We've worked so hard to build a team that can handle it,
and it's very easy to just diveback in because that's the
clearest path.
And then boom, you've unraveledmonths and months and months of
work.
Julie (20:35):
And suddenly you're losing people and you know all
of the things that come withthat right the trust is eroded,
all the things you've workedhard for for sure People are
saying wait, who do?
I call again.
Yeah, you're like.
Oh yes, did I do that right.
But like anything, it's aprocess and we're not perfect,
but, yes, making sure you've gotthose like boundaries to follow
(20:59):
, like to stay inside, so thatyou understand.
Yeah, yeah, I feel like that'sa real, like.
It's a very interesting point,right, like that impact we have
as leaders, both for the goodbut also for the bad, and
rolling up our sleeves anddiving in where we should not be
doing.
(21:19):
That is damaging actually tothe team dynamic and what's
happening.
Marla (21:24):
Yep, definitely, definitely, definitely.
Julie (21:27):
Yeah, Interesting.
And so now you are how spendingyour time.
How, what, what, what's, what'skeeping you interested and lit
up these days?
Marla (21:39):
I certainly have come to a place within my businesses
that I've been able to decide,you know, where do I want to
spend the most time, what do Iwant to do day to day, and I
think that you know helpingother business owners is
definitely key.
That's something that has donea lot for me for a long time,
(22:01):
even when I was doing so lessformally, if you will.
You know, coming to a placewhere I can take my mistakes, I
can take my decisions, I cantake the things that I've chosen
over time and share them withother people, has been so
(22:21):
consequential in being able togive me true satisfaction.
True satisfaction, it's ussharing with each other, it's us
going down the path of reallyfinding ourselves in a place
that, hey, these are the thingsthat worked for me, these are
the things that didn't.
And if you take even one littlebit of that and save yourself
(22:44):
from your own heartache, yourown mistakes, your own
tumultuous ups and downs that weall go through, you know, as
entrepreneurs then I've won.
That's, for me, what I've reallyrecognized as something that
makes a big difference.
So I've parlayed that into anew business called the growth
arena, where we can spend ourtime coaching people and
(23:08):
empowering them to be betterleaders, to recognize the things
that are most important intheir day-to-day business and,
for some people, depending ontheir goals.
Because we do try to work withpeople on developing their
individual goals, but for somepeople, figuring out how to exit
without selling, how to ensurethat their business is an income
producing asset and how tohonestly just get them to a
(23:32):
place where they are living whatwe call the good life right,
achieving their goals on a dayto day basis coach who really
helped you do this, and now youwant to sort of take what you
learned and implemented to morepeople, which I think is a
(23:53):
really nice circle.
I can appreciate that and youknow, when we started with a
coach because it wasn'tsomething we did originally, it
wasn't even something we wereaware of we came to understand
that there's a lot ofopportunities out there.
But sometimes we get so hung upin the day to day that we just
don't have that level ofawareness.
(24:14):
And sometimes it just takessomeone on the outside to say,
hey, why are you doing it likethis?
Or why aren't you doing it likethat?
And we all know as businessowners.
Sometimes the answer is it'sbecause that's how it's always
been done.
Julie (24:27):
That's what we're used to right, or because you don't
realize you're getting badadvice, or like you know.
There are so many areas youdon't know about when you enter
into entrepreneurship.
Marla (24:38):
You know they always say there's two kinds of you don't
know, right, you don't know whatyou know.
You don't know, I don't knowhow to be an author or do brain
surgery.
But then there are things Idon't know, that I don't know,
and if you can heighten myawareness, sometimes even a
little bit, it can make asignificant consequential
difference in my life, mybusiness, my family, my
(24:58):
entrepreneurship, whatever mychoices are.
So I've really just found thatif I can parlay some of what
I've learned along the way,showing other business owners
and demonstrating for them howbeneficial that vertical
integration can be, becausesometimes, you know, we do get
stuck in treading on the samewheel over and over again.
(25:20):
And you know, I think, if wereally consider how key it can
be to bring in some of thoseother factors, why am I paying
another business when I can bepotentially paying myself?
Why am I losing the controlthat maybe I need, depending on
what it is that hey, I can'tprioritize this because it's not
up to me, I'm hiring someoneelse to do it.
(25:42):
But if it's also an internalcompany that we begin to develop
, not only are we getting thefinancial benefit but we're
getting the operational benefitthat we can internally decide
among companies.
Where do our priorities lie?
What do we need to see happen?
And now we actually have somesay right.
So we've found that verticalintegration component to be so
(26:02):
critical and something that alot of businesses don't do
either at all, or they thinkthey're too small.
They think you know it doesn'tmake sense for me at this size
or this point.
But I think you just need torecognize what your TAM is,
understand what your goals arewithin that total addressable
market and then decide, hey, youmight want to branch out a
(26:24):
little bit, you know, tovertically integrate where
you're at and where you're going.
It can really strengthen youroverall portfolio, right.
Julie (26:31):
And what are some ways that you see people and have
been able to yourself implementthat vertical integration?
Marla (26:40):
Yeah, absolutely so.
A lot of times it's justthinking about what your core
business does and the ways thatyou might be able to bring
benefit if you did it, eitheryourself, or you brought under
your umbrella the ability to doit.
So, for example, at ourresidential property management
company, we've created abusiness for lawn care,
landscaping and snow removal.
(27:01):
It was simply just strategicfor us to do that internally.
It allows us to decide on ourown priorities.
It keeps the revenue under ouryou know our internal umbrella
and you know it's.
It's pretty, a pretty, um basic, straightforward company, but
it was something we wereoutsourcing, something we didn't
have control of before.
Julie (27:22):
And setting it up as its own business allows it to have
its own profit and loss manageits own way, because businesses
run on different kinds of models.
Marla (27:33):
Right.
Julie (27:33):
And so it just allows you .
And then also it could besomething that you expand beyond
only looking after yourproperties.
It could also be something thatyou sell independent of that at
some point.
Marla (27:45):
No question, and we do.
You know, depending on thebusiness, we have some
businesses that the only clientis our core business, but we
have other businesses, like youknow, the bookkeeping firm that
we spoke about.
That business serves manyindustries, many customers, not
just our internal businesses.
(28:06):
So it depends on the business,depends on what strategic at the
time.
And then the other thing is isyou can set yourself up for an
opportunity for growth.
So, even if today that newoffshoot serves you internally,
down the road you may be able togrow to a point where it can
(28:27):
actually service outsidecustomers as well.
Julie (28:31):
Right, yeah, which makes sense too, like I do think the
bookkeeping business is a greatexample because, let's face it,
there is a shortage ofbookkeeping out there in the
world quality people who knowtheir stuff.
Marla (28:43):
So if you've got, somebody you've got.
Julie (28:46):
You've got potential there, for sure.
Marla (28:48):
Yep and you can really start to work through some of
the operational challenges aswell.
When it's internal, that's alittle easier to do than when
you're serving outside clientsas well.
Julie (28:56):
Yeah, yes, and I think also from a financial
perspective it gives you somearm's length protection as an
entrepreneur inside of thebusinesses you have against
fraud and those kinds of things.
Marla (29:07):
No question for sure.
And so you know, when you'relooking at vertical integration,
it can be.
You know, sometimes people haveideas and then they bring it
under the umbrella of theexisting company because it's an
additional revenue stream,which is great.
And diversifying your revenuestreams, you know, is going to
do a lot for you as a business.
It's going to protect you from,you know, economic ups and
(29:30):
downs.
It's going to do a lot ofdifferent things for you by
diversifying that.
But depending on howsignificant that arm is, it
might make sense to bring it assomething within the umbrella,
but as a separate company, as aseparate entity.
So we could have just startedto do lawn and snow removal in
our property management company,but by really bringing it
outside.
(29:50):
That's what's going to bepivotal in diversifying our
client base, in growing, youknow, our revenue and all of
that.
Julie (29:57):
Yeah, it also makes it really easy to see where you're
making money, where you've gotproblems.
You're looking at them you'relooking at them all separately,
and so you can see going well,going well going well.
Marla (30:11):
Oh, we've got something or chart, you know, creating all
of the basics, starting todevelop, that you can cookie
cutter approach and say, okay,we'll do that over here, we'll
(30:33):
do that over here, we'll do thatover here.
And, of course, depending onyour goals and your desired
scalability, you also mightreach a point where you want to
sell a piece of that off.
Doesn't mean you need to sellthe whole thing.
Julie (30:45):
Right, right, which makes a lot of sense Because, as
entrepreneurs, we have ourbiggest assets are in our
business.
Marla (30:54):
Absolutely.
Julie (30:55):
Yeah yeah, and at some point in our lives.
We need to try and get themoney out.
Marla (31:02):
Yes, and that doesn't mean that you necessarily want
to exit on all fronts, but itdoes give you options, right?
So I like it for that reason aswell.
Julie (31:12):
Oh, that's good, and so let's talk a little bit more
about the growth arena.
What has that journey been likefor you?
Marla (31:18):
So it's been very, very interesting, very fascinating.
I never anticipated, you know,that I would kind of morph my
career into this.
I had a coach who said to me afew years ago you know, you'd be
, you'd be a great mentor, you'dbe a great coach, you'd be, you
know, really strong in businessconsulting.
And I looked at him like he hadthree heads or more.
I was like I'm a landlord.
(31:40):
So thanks, you know, I'm aproperty manager, that's my main
gig and, frankly, I loved it.
By the way, I went to bedthinking about our core business
.
I went to sleep thinking aboutMARDA.
That was a lot.
It brought a lot of enjoymentand because I did it with my
husband, we shared an office, wedid a lot of stuff together.
So that certainly was very, youknow, very robust for us at the
(32:03):
time.
But as it's evolved into aplace where I realized, wow,
first of all, I absolutely lovehelping businesses to grow, fix
problems, share the lessons I'velearned over the years as well,
which are a plenty, and sobeing able to parlay that into
something formal has been reallyrewarding.
(32:25):
I decided sometime I think itwas late last year that I would
document my growth through thegrowth arena.
Actually, what does it looklike to develop a business that
isn't necessarily raising, youknow, significant capital, where
we're kind of justbootstrapping the business on
purpose?
What does this look like?
Julie (32:44):
Because I want to be able to demonstrate for people once
it's off the ground these aresome of the things you can do
and it's not necessarily out ofreach for you.
Yeah Well, and in a world thatfeels like we're all being told
to raise capital right now, likeit kind of feels like the
pendulum is over on the you know, if you're bootstrapping, you
(33:06):
shouldn't be, you should beraising capital side, and and
that isn't it isn't true foreverybody.
It doesn't mean you can't builda great business by
bootstrapping.
Marla (33:15):
For sure, and I'm a firm believer in that and I think
that sometimes entrepreneurs,and certainly women, can be
intimidated by the idea ofgetting into an environment that
maybe they've never been anentrepreneur, maybe they've
never started up a business, youknow, maybe they've never
worked for themselves or beenaccountable to others in that
way, and so it can be reallyintimidating thinking that
(33:36):
they're going to do that andthey have to go out and, you
know, pitch investors and raisecapital, and while that can be
really important, especially incertain businesses, it's not
necessary and it's not mandatoryand there are other ways and I
think that's important todemonstrate.
Julie (33:53):
Yeah Well, and it leads to you know I had a conversation
on the podcast recently like itleads to you building a really
strong skillset in raising money, which takes a lot of time to
do, and so you also need to sortof weigh out the value of the
time of building different skillsets and building a skill set
and building the operationalskill set to grow the business
(34:14):
faster on that side.
Marla (34:16):
For sure, and it's really all about that competition
between time and money, right,you know, for all of us.
Julie (34:22):
It is and figuring out which path is the right path for
the business.
Marla (34:26):
You have the right path for the business you have.
That's right.
And what is your end game right?
I always say we need to startwith our end game in mind.
Where are we trying to takethis?
Where are we trying to go andthen work it back from there?
Julie (34:36):
Well, that's really exciting, and so six businesses.
Marla (34:43):
So I've got more ideas.
My ideas are a plenty.
Julie (34:45):
Only some of them have legs, though, so well, it's good
to know that, because sometimesthat's the hardest challenge is
figuring out which ones topursue yep for sure, and where
to spend our time.
Marla (34:56):
Right, and I think that one of the the best things we
can do when we're not sure ofhey, you know where should I
invest my time.
First of all, write it down.
Write all the things down.
Let's start there and then talkto the people you trust most.
Talk to the people in your lifewho can give you insight into
what might work and what mightnot, sometimes depending on
where we're at in our career.
(35:17):
That can be family, that can befriends, it can be colleagues,
it can be other people in theindustry, it can be people we
trust locally or even, or even,people we trust afar.
So I think it's reallyimportant to do that exercise to
narrow in on what should Ispend my time doing?
Julie (35:33):
Yeah, yeah, no, and I'm a big fan of having the systems
or the scaffolding that youbuild around what it is you want
, so that you set yourself upfor more success 100%.
Marla (35:47):
I couldn't agree with you more and I think that you know
there are a lot of ways intobusiness you can.
You know I just talked aboutthe growth arena.
We're starting it from kind ofsquare one here and we're doing
it this way intentionally.
I've, you know, developedbusinesses out of side jobs, out
of intentional verticalintegration.
We've acquired businesses aswell.
Acquisitions is something thatcertainly can also be looked at
(36:10):
as a potential way to parlayinto an entrepreneurship,
depending on where you're at oryou know what type of industry
you're in.
Right.
We've had a couple ofacquisitions over the years and
we've learned a lot from that.
It got us into another sector,another component of our
industry that we may not havebeen willing or able to spend
the time getting into ourselvesby manually building that up
(36:30):
right.
Julie (36:31):
Yep or yeah.
Would it just maybe not havebeen taken too long to get
profitable, or those kinds ofthings?
And I do think it's interestingbecause I think lots of times
people think that they, to becalled an entrepreneur, it has
to be built from scratch, fromthe ground up, and I really
don't see that as true.
You know you buy a business,you work in a business and you
(36:52):
know, acquire it from the personyou've been for a long time, or
you bring somethingcomplimentary or to give heft to
what you have.
I think it's so interesting allthe different ways we can
become entrepreneurs.
Marla (37:06):
Absolutely.
There are so many ways toarrive in this crazy
entrepreneurial world we'reliving in right.
It's not a straight path,that's for sure.
Julie (37:16):
No, I totally agree.
Well, thank you so much forjoining me today and sharing
about your journey.
I have really enjoyed learningmore about you.
Marla (37:25):
Thank you so much for having me, Julie.
Julie (37:27):
I look forward to seeing how many more businesses you end
up with, thank you.
Marla (37:29):
Thank you so much for having me, Julie.
Thank you, Julie.
My pleasure to be here andlooking forward to continuing to
set more big, gorgeous goalsAwesome.
Julie (37:36):
Thanks so much.
I hope you enjoyed today'sepisode.
Please remember to hitsubscribe on your favorite
podcast platform so you won'tmiss any episodes.
Figure 8 isn't just a podcast.
It's a way of seeing the big,gorgeous goals of women
entrepreneurs coming to life.
If you're interested inlearning more, you can find my
(37:59):
book Big Gorgeous Goals onAmazon, anywhere you might live.
For more about my growth andleadership training programs,
visit www.
julieellis.
ca to see how we might worktogether.
Read my blog or sign up to getyour free diagnostic.
Are you ready for growth?
(38:20):
Once again, that's www.
julieellis.
ca.
When we work together, we allwin.
See you again soon for anotherepisode of Figure 8.
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