1837 – The Role of a Fractional CO Integrator with Cassie Saquing

Josh (00:00:05) - Hey, thoughtful listener, before we get going. Did you know that my company up my influence? Com has launched more than 200 business podcasts. The host of our shows are amazing leaders and collaborators. Folks I want to connect you with. Maybe you deserve your moment in the spotlight as a guest of one of these amazing shows. Just go to up my influence. Com where you can see more than 50 shows that are actively seeking business leader guests like you to celebrate right now in front of their high caliber audiences. Just click on the podcast tab and up my influence. Com where you'll see shows like Profit, Powerhouse with Glenn Close, sales negotiations and business insights. This isn't just another business podcast. It's a deep dive into the strategies that truly drive success. Hosted by Glenn Poulos, a seasoned sales strategist and business growth expert, each episode is packed with insights from top executives and business leaders. If you're a high level executive looking to share your expertise and story, we want you on profit powerhouse. Your experiences could be the exact insights Glenn's audience of ambitious business leaders are craving.

Josh (00:01:27) - And for our listeners, if you're ready to elevate your business acumen and learn from the best in the industry, Profit Powerhouse with Glenn Poulos is your go to resource. Subscribe now and join a community of professionals who are transforming the business world. Ready to be a part of something groundbreaking? Visit up my influence and click on the podcast tab to find profit powerhouse. Whether you're looking to be the next guest or just seeking invaluable business wisdom, this is where your journey begins. Again, just go to up my influence. Com and click on the podcast tab. With us right now Cassie socking Cassie you are as CEO of fractional Co integrator and you are also the founder of C, H s consulting Group. You're found on the web at Cassie socking com to a friend listening to our conversation. My recommendation is you just click on the show notes. Click around so you can follow along on Cassie's website. Because Cassie, your last name is Saku I ng. So that obviously is part of the website Cassie socking com.

Josh (00:02:38) - Cassie, thank you for joining us.

Cassie (00:02:40) - Thank you so much. I'm excited to be here. Josh.

Josh (00:02:42) - Yes. Well tell me what does a fractional co integrator do?

Cassie (00:02:48) - , you know, what we do is we go in and we basically like reset a business. So if you're kind of a six figure business and you're looking to scale or even just sell down the road, we go in and we establish all those systems and processes along with the money management piece, because that's part of the system. Right. And start the KPI tracker, all these fun things that really, really ground the business down and start to turnkey it so that if you want to scale and go to the next level, and if you ever want to get out of the the daily operations of your business, this is the way to do it.

Josh (00:03:19) - Yeah. So tell me how you work with people. Like, what does that look like?

Cassie (00:03:26) - You know? So what I do is I go in and I just start to assess.

Cassie (00:03:29) - We look at like the leadership team. We go through the staff, we start to really like for me, I, you know, I've run a business for almost 19 years and myself. So looking kind of from the top to the bottom of leadership, how things are done currently versus how we want to get into it and then what kind of systems that takes. And we start, you know, just documenting what's happening with the business and all the things that are said, all the things that are done and how can we change the behavior. And then part of that is going into cash flow and understanding, you know, the money flow into the business and out and how we can control operational expenses and things like that. What does it really take to bring things together so we know how to grow it? And I know a lot of businesses kind of get stuck. They get that they hit that ceiling and about six figures or multiple six figures, and they really want to go beyond that. So it's really all about, you know, establishing, first of all, rapport with the business owner and then the team.

Cassie (00:04:24) - And then just retraining the team on their behaviors and how they operate in the business and then establishing all those systems together., you know, how we communicate, how we say things in the business, what is the personality? What is the culture, mission, values, you know, all the goals that we have per quarter and how we're actually going to get there. You know, a lot of businesses talk about goals and and all the fun stuff, but they don't ever actually make the strategies to get there.

Josh (00:04:51) - ., and so let's kind of give if you were to give like a Ted talk to, to a group of founders CEOs and you were to kind of condense down maybe like a core message that, that you wish all founders and CEOs would hear,, what do you what would you imagine you would talk about? And feel free to give us a, a very mini condensed version of what that Ted talk might be. How's that for a question?

Cassie (00:05:18) - I always try, but, you know, as like a CEO integrator, I'm a talker by nature, so I'm going to try to keep it simple.

Cassie (00:05:23) - I think it really all boils down to decision making. If you're the CEO, the founder, the owner of your business, you really hit decision load very quickly. When you're the one who's the bottleneck, you're the filter for everything in your business every single day. And this is the issue that a lot of owners are facing. Or, you know, different all kinds of businesses, agency models, you know, individual practice owners, service businesses, even online businesses, they're just trying to get to the next level, but they have no time, but they're making all the decisions. So what I do and what you should think about is, how can I take those decisions off of my plate and put it onto someone else in my my company and work from there so that I can actually free my mind to do what I'm best at, which is that visionary of the business. We're, you know, looking ahead, fulfilling the vision and the mission and the value, all those things like pulling that together.

Cassie (00:06:15) - Because what we do is we get stuck, you know, in our business, not looking at it from a 30,000 foot view. And we just get stuck and we keep spinning our wheels. So how do you start moving those decisions if you start filtering through, what are my expectations? What decisions am I making every day? Start making a list and moving that off your plate. You're going to be able to scale and then hiring someone who can really integrate that, you know, boots on the ground, get the wheels moving and everything unstuck on bottlenecked, and you'll have a lot of more headroom and more time and space to move your business forward.

Josh (00:06:50) - Yeah, I would imagine it's kind of interesting to about I'm sure you have some observations around personalities and you know, how often kind of visionary personalities kind of, you know, create that CEO founder role. And,, we hope that they find someone that,, is an integrator, right? Is the a get it done or,, you know, I've got Alisa, who's our CEO and,, you know, because left to my druthers, I could come up with ideas every day.

Josh (00:07:22) - Right? And not all of those ideas should be integrated., but it it is just so great to be able to have,, you know, someone in that role, you know, just speaking to other founders, if you don't yet have that., I'm going to let you know it. Life gets better when you when you have a, an integrator in a, you know, leadership capacity to get, you know, to get your vision executed. Because again, it's like if I were responsible for getting done everything that we need to get done, there's no way like it would take me years what we're able to get done in months just because many hands make light work.

Cassie (00:07:58) - Yes. But, you know, there's so many issues of trust and also grieving that control. I think a lot of people who start companies, myself included, I think it took me two years to let go, which is way too long. Right. But I think we we relish that control. We relish that ability to just move mountains in minutes.

Cassie (00:08:16) - Right. But the reality is, is that there's always needing there's somebody who needs to be behind you kind of creating the structure or else. You know, a lot of times I find I'm cleaning up messes, and that's just how it is, because visionaries aren't always capable of understanding the context or what it really takes to get things, things done. But at the same time, my role as co integrator is to allow that space for the visionary to keep staying in that genius zone, staying in that energy of creation, marketing, bringing money in like the main role of a CEO is to bring money into the business, right? And they have to stay in that role. If they get bogged down, they're just going to like, die inside, right? Just going to like your soul is going to wither. So I think that,, you're absolutely right. But it's a grieving process. You have to let go. So the longer you've been holding on, you know, if you come in to a business as CEO, as, you know, integrator as five years versus 20, it's going to be a whole different level of grieving and processing for the owner.

Josh (00:09:12) - All right. So let's let's say we've got an audience of owners right now, which we do., and,, you know, it's maybe they don't have someone in that role, or maybe they have someone who's kind of fulfilling that role, but it's really just more of a project management person, you know?, so it's what would you recommend if they say, well, I don't know if I'm ready to hire someone? You know, it seems like a, you know, might come with a big budget, but, you know, maybe I can get there pretty soon. Really soon. And so what are some things that they can do prior to that kind of more, you know, fractional CEO or, you know, CEO integrator engagement,, to kind of get ready, I guess, for someone stepping in.

Cassie (00:09:56) - I love that question because I think that's that's really the first step. And I think a lot of us don't realize as owners, our first step is actually documenting ourselves. Like literally taking, I recommend a whole month, but even if you just take two solid weeks and write down what you do every single day, and then also how do you make that decision? And I find a lot of CEOs or owners or founders really say to me right away, I can't document myself.

Cassie (00:10:21) - It's my magic. It's my special potion. Like you, you can't document that. But what the truth is, yes you can. No. You know, somebody's not going to be you. Like, I'm not going to be the owner, but I can interpret and translate that owner to the rest of the team eventually as it grows. So if someone doesn't have that capacity to hire someone yet, I do recommend you documenting yourself for at least two weeks, preferably for. And if you have a cyclical but, you know, based business that's like, you know,, seasonal based or something, I mean, I would recommend even longer. But then the idea the next step would be to, I always say like, find your mini me, someone who has the potential, but yet has that yin and yang energy. Like, if you're the visionary, find someone who's grounded, who doesn't freak out at every moment because they're just like, oh, okay, let me process that. Don't get mad at them for saying, give me 24 hours to think about this, because they're actually like integrating and creating systems in their head for you, and they're going to serve you really well.

Cassie (00:11:16) - So find someone who has the same, you know, values, the same mission, the same kind of ideals, whatever it is that you can connect on, which takes some time, get to connect, but find your mini me and start then taking that list that you've created and start moving things over one by one. Little tests like I've also seen owners just be like, here you go. Bye. I'm going to Tahiti for two weeks. It's like, no, no, no, I can't do that. So you have to like gradually start putting things on their plate, like maybe your project manager or your PM is a really good candidate for this role. And they can grow into that. That role of really, really boots on the ground integration for you.

Josh (00:11:53) - , Cassie, are there any AI enabled tools or, you know, uses of AI tools like ChatGPT or whatever that you're seeing that you're finding are huge time savers or productivity increases or just, you know, again, kind of really assist in that,, you know, kind of the, I would say just just getting stuff done,, in integrating just anything that you've seen, you're like, you know, that's pretty clever.

Josh (00:12:19) - And I like that. I think that's going to be important.

Cassie (00:12:22) - I do use ChatGPT a lot, but only. What I create for my my clients is what I call playbook. So a lot of times we say, well, we have a manual, we have a handbook. That's not the same as how to do your individual job. Right. And when I kind of have a playbook, especially for all your C-suite levels and then your managers or your directors, however you've labeled them in your company, eventually you're creating these pockets or containers for them to land and when you hire and scale. But I would say that the first thing is, is to write out as you document yourself, run it through ChatGPT and explain, like, you know, please create,,, kind of an owner manual for this position., CEO or visionary of my company, this type of company, you know, word it in a way I usually I know I'm like really simplified here, but I usually word it say with warm.

Cassie (00:13:11) - I work with pediatric mostly like, you know, I have a daycare. One of my big clients is definitely a pediatric practice owner. So like I wanted to be warm and fuzzy, right? That's my goal.

Josh (00:13:24) - So so assign it a personality. I do, I do that as well for sure.

Cassie (00:13:29) - You do it a couple of times and you find what really fits for you. And obviously ChatGPT follows your your lead and kind of creates your own personality on that. But the things I do really recommend having some content written first and then entering it in and having it kind of rephrased and and repurposed in a way that's very professional, but yet, you know, relatable and connectable.

Josh (00:13:51) - Yeah, so many things I want to geek out because I've been, like, obsessed with,, ChatGPT over the past many months. But just recently, like, wow. Because just we have so many operational things going on as well. So, you know, and Cassie, that's that's another thing too, is,, you know, we also think about, you know, the secular nature of business.

Josh (00:14:12) - I think a lot of us like we'll go through, as you know, in business and in SMB world. Right., we can kind of really go through these big pushes where there's something big about to happen. We're planning for an event, you know, we've got a product launch. We've got I mean,, can you maybe share just a bit about, you know, kind of those ebbs and flows and activity and how an integrator or someone, you know, who's really,, kind of in that leadership position. Helps with the overall I say culture of the company, but but helps kind of weather those storms because they're storms in some way. They're very exciting and stuff, but they can cause a lot of stress to an organization.

Cassie (00:14:53) - Yes. I love that question, Josh, because it's so true. I find that most visionaries are like, let's have six events per month, you know, six launches, and you're like, wait a second. And the more you know just this, as a rule to state, the more staff you have or the more the bigger the team, the more lead time you need.

Cassie (00:15:12) - So it has to go through the cycle. It has to go through everyone. So you just have to make sure that, you know, the more people you have, the more lead time you give. Because you're so used to doing everything on your own. You're a solopreneur. You're just like, you know, I'm doing my thing, and I can just reach out and make change and move mountains in a minute, like I said before. But the more you grow, the more you have to establish these boundaries of like, okay, so we have a team of five. How many events or launches can the company really handle? And that's the integrators job. That is completely the integrators job to create those positive boundaries. Like, hey, I really believe that this company right now, in its in its iteration at this moment, can handle one launch per month or one big event, right? Right. The budget or killing the people. Like sometimes we forget, right? When we're visionaries, we're like, let's go, let's go, let's go.

Cassie (00:16:06) - And we just forget. Like there's a trail.

Speaker 3 (00:16:07) - All the things and we're like, what's happening? Where is everybody? You know?

Cassie (00:16:13) - So I think establishing those and it changes as you grow. You can handle more and you create teams and you, you know, spread things out. But especially as you're, you know, 6 to 7 figures and scaling, that's really important to maintain that. And I know that's frustrating for visionaries. But you can also do an annual calendar and map things out to kind of feel that need for the visionary to feel like, okay, at least we have things planned. We've got things on the books,, and we know what's coming up.

Josh (00:16:38) - And we're so, I mean, just for us, like, we're launching a, a product that's pretty much already was, you know, pretty much already built. But, you know, just, you know, we have to just set up so many different flows and, you know, just all these little tiny considerations.

Josh (00:16:55) - It's just amazing, you know, when as the organizations get bigger,, how many moving parts there can be or, you know, again, if you have a greater volume of customers or just. Yeah, it's,, and again,, you know, it's easy for visionaries to say, you know, come up with a fresh idea., but again, again, I think a great integrator is going to try to break that down and to to show what that actually is going to take to do it. Well,, because again, it's kind of that stopping, pausing, planning and laying it all out and you're like, whoa, there's a lot of parts there., and so just, you know, thank you for answering that because, you know, I think right now, like, that's we're in a push right now. And so just, you know, just I'm grateful for Alisa, who again, who's communicating well with our team and organization., and and trying to take, you know, what what,, you know, what's being laid out into, you know, more manageable bites.

Josh (00:17:51) - , okay. So, Cassie, your website, Cassie stocking.com,, share for someone that's been listening to our conversation,, it can go to your website, but what what do you recommend for people who are enjoying the conversation and want more?

Cassie (00:18:08) - Oh, I appreciate that. You know, I really want to offer a free gift. And I think a lot of that is like my goal this year. I've been working with high ticket clients and, you know, private clients and these things. And I my goal is really to get it to more people because I do feel like managing your cash flow, containing your operational budget, understanding your process, documentation, all these things are so important to the next steps, like what are the next steps for you? If you really want to grow or you want to sell. Some people are like, I really don't want to scale it. I just want to build it to a place where I can just sell it and I'm ready to go. A lot of that is going to be based on your company valuation, right? It's about how much how consistent is your revenue, how much is your cash flow and your profitability.

Cassie (00:18:49) - All these things go into that. So part of it is like, you know, offering people a free,, webinar that's called Cash Flow Freedom Webinar. I just want freedom for everybody. So it's that, you know, Bitly slash cash flow freedom video, and you can go find that there. And I'm also at Profit Passion Academy I'm there. Like if people want to DM me and ask me questions, I'm available. I'm I'm the one who answers it for my consulting because it's really important to me to have that connection with other business owners as well.

Josh (00:19:16) - Yeah. Cassie socking again your website Cassie socking com Cassie Cassie s aq I n g and Cassie again fractional CEO, integrator and founder of CSW consulting Group. Cassie, thank you so much for joining us.

Cassie (00:19:37) - Thank you so much Josh, I appreciate it.

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