Episode Summary

In this episode of the Make Space for More podcast, Melissa Swink shares some exciting news - she's been accepted into the prestigious Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program! She pulls back the curtain on why this opportunity feels like the perfect next step for her business, and how she's preparing both herself and her team for this intensive journey.

Tune in to hear Melissa's candid thoughts on why she’s investing this time in her personal growth while still running her growing business. You'll learn how she's strategically preparing for 15-20 hours of weekly coursework (yes, you read that right!) while ensuring her clients continue receiving the exceptional support they've come to expect. Plus, she shares her vision for how this program will shape the future of Melissa Swink & Co. and benefit her entire community of clients and followers.

Key Highlights:

• Growth requires stepping out of your comfort zone. Discover why Melissa said "yes" to this transformative opportunity.
• Sometimes the best way to serve your clients better is to invest in yourself first. Learn how this program aligns with Melissa's commitment to continuous improvement.
• Want to know the secret to scaling while studying? It's all about empowering your team and creating rock-solid systems.
• Building relationships with other growth-minded entrepreneurs isn't just about networking; it's about creating a community of future possibilities.

About Melissa:

Melissa Swink, Founder & CEO of Melissa Swink & Co., has a team of virtual assistants who provide administrative and marketing support for small businesses and non-profits.

Since 2012, Melissa and her team have helped more than 100 businesses grow through the services they offer, and she is dedicated to helping entrepreneurs create profitable, scalable businesses they love.

Her work is all about doing what works (and eliminating what doesn’t) and driving real, measurable results. Visit www.melissaswink.com to learn more! 

Thanks for listening!

If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!

Subscribe to the podcast

If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can also subscribe in your favorite podcast app.

Leave us an Apple Podcast review

Ratings and reviews from our listeners are really valuable and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review.

Hi everyone, welcome to the Make Space for More podcast, where we talk strategies for growing and scaling your business in a way that's authentic and aligned for you. I'm your host, Melissa Swink, and in today's episode, it is a solo show today because I have a very exciting announcement to make, and I wanna share something that I'm going to be working on over the next couple of months. So, all of that being said, just wanted to first of all just...

check in with you guys as if we were having a one-to-one for the first couple of minutes here, a virtual coffee chat. I know summer has wrapped up. It's the unofficial end to summer. I realize that the calendar says that summer goes until, what is it, like the second or third week of September, but for many of us, Labor Day kind of marks the unofficial end of summer, so my daughter and I have enjoyed the last couple of months of just having a more flexible schedule.

than certainly we do during the school year. Now that certainly brings some challenges in and of itself, particularly for us parents and business owners and people who are continuing to work through the summer and trying to figure out like, what do we do with these kids? So we've enjoyed kind of an alternating schedule of we did some summer school, we did some day camps throughout the summer, we had some open weeks during the summer where

Ava was completely unscheduled. We've had some babysitters coming over to hang out with her. So we just had a variety. And so as much as I enjoy kind of having that more relaxed schedule during the summer, I also really appreciate my routine. So today is kind of our first day back in your routine. When this episode airs, I'm recording this like two weeks in advance because I'm going to be on vacation next week. We're going to Chicago celebrating the end of the summer. So we're super excited about that.

But when this airs, it will be the first day of school. So I'll have to keep you guys posted on how that goes. Ava's going into fifth grade, going to a new school, and with all of her peers, they're moving on up, they're moving out of elementary school. And I'm super excited for her and what the school year is going to bring. So that's another thing we've been working on over the last couple of weeks is going to orientation at the new school, certainly getting school supplies, meeting teachers.

just getting onboarded with all the new things, all the new apps and all the new communication tools and channels that the new school has. So pretty excited for her sending good vibes her way, certainly into the future that this is gonna be an awesome school year for her and her friends. So as I mentioned, today is a solo show. We've had so many wonderful guests on the show. I highly recommend going back and listening to those episodes if you haven't caught up on them.

They are just full of so many great stories from such a variety of business owners and executive directors and people with a variety of backgrounds, a variety of skill sets. I think that it's super interesting to hear about number one, how they got into the roles that they did. And then also like kind of how they operate within those roles in terms of what are some of their highest priorities? What are some of the things that they are delegating? What are some of the first things that they outsource?

What are some of the tools that they love to use? So I highly recommend going back and listening to those. Everyone who's been on this show, I work very, very closely with in some way, or form, or I know them very well. And so I wanted to highlight their stories. They are not paying to come on the show. I'm not paying them to be on the show. If you ever decide to do business with any of the people that I've had on the show, I don't get any sort of.

referral fee or kickback or affiliate fee or anything like that. I'm just being fully transparent and that I am inviting people to be on the show that I think really have a lot to share. But today you guys get me. So we're taking a little bit of a break here from our guest series and we are going to be talking about something that I am super excited to be working on coming up this fall.

I have officially been accepted into the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program. And if you don't know what that is, don't worry. I will share all the details with you in just a second here. But this is something that was on my radar at the beginning of this year. I was talking to, I think it was a client, I've had several clients go through the program. I'll talk about that a little bit later. But I was talking to a client and I was talking to a couple of prospective clients.

and this kept coming up. You know how sometimes where something comes into your circle or your radar and then it kind of keeps coming up? Well, I took that as a sign that I needed to look into this for myself. And so I went ahead and applied back in spring for the program.

and I made it through the first round of kind of initial applications and then submitted a lot of detailed information about my company, including a lot of financials, proof of ownership and all these things. And then lastly, had an interview back in July. It was a very informal interview. was, I had prepared thinking like, they're going to ask me all these super deep questions. And they did ask some great questions about my company. But, you know, of course it's one of those things where, you know, when you are kind of the expert,

in your particular, you're an expert in your business. I say expert saying that you are probably the person in the world who is the most qualified to talk about your business and what you do, generally speaking. Not that I know all the things that there is to know about business in general, but certainly I know the ins and outs of my company. So was really easy to just have a conversation with the panel that was interviewing applicants. And so I got

the great news actually just this past Friday. So that's how fresh this is. But with that being said, I have been intending that assuming this program is happening for the fall cohort, I'm going to start preparing now and I'm gonna share all of those behind the scenes things with you today. So if you are not familiar with the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program, the overall goal is

to grow and scale companies here in the United States. So they provide education in key business areas like operations, finance, marketing, and leadership. And overall, on top of that education, the goal is to help you create a customized five-year growth plan that's based on your goals. And also throughout the program and even beyond, after the program ends,

just building connections with others, other mentors that you meet along the way, your business advisor, other peers, other business owners and entrepreneurs who are growing and scaling companies just like you. So that is kind of the overall summary of what this program is all about. And so I decided to apply for this program because...

serving the role as her executive assistant. And I was actually helping her with some of the exercises that she was working on and some of the work that went into building out this five-year growth plan. And it was super interesting. It was a lot of fun to help her out with it. I know she poured a lot of time into it. We'll get to that in a second. But I had firsthand experience of seeing somebody work through this program. And then other clients over the years who have gone through the program have talked about,

how valuable it was. And so me being a lifelong learner wanted certainly piqued my interest. Some have described this program as like a mini MBA where your own business is the case study. So I'm not going to lie. I'm super excited to take some classes again and meet with a business advisor and meet other entrepreneurs who have a similar mindset to me. Super excited to get back into that environment because it's been quite a long time. As you know,

You know, I have a great business mastermind group that I've been a part of for years. I have great coaches. I'm a part of great business communities, but they have not been as structured as this is going to be. So I'm excited for that experience. The other thing is that I've talked on the podcast before, especially when I had Jenny Schubring on the podcast about how I have taken some steps over the years to learn more about my strengths. And so

With that being said, I understand that futuristic for me isn't in my top five or 10 strengths. I believe there are 34 strengths and futuristic for me falls somewhere in the middle. And so when I think about, when somebody asks me or when I think about, where do we wanna be in five years? I kind of draw a blank. And it's not that I feel like everything is very tentative in my life or my business, but it's just like,

I don't know, I kind of have some general ideas. Like on the business side of things, continuing to grow, right? We want to hit, you know, a million dollars plus at some point, you know, sooner rather than later, preferably, like we're working on that. Would love to continue to serve more businesses. Maybe it includes building up a new revenue stream. I see a lot of cool things that we can be doing with AI. You know, I have kind of some...

I have ambitions, but as far as saying like, I wanna be here and state it so specifically of where I see myself in the company in five years, that's just not necessarily one of my strong suits. And so having that help with really visioning out and forecasting what does the company look like in five years, I think is gonna be extremely impactful for me. And then also, I'll talk a little bit more about this.

Overall, the goal is to create jobs as well. And so I am super excited about being able to do more of that. I have a fantastic team, our clients and certainly many of our past clients will even tell you, we have a great team around here and we wanna have more very capable and skilled and talented people being able to support the small businesses and nonprofits that are not only our current clients, but also future clients as well. I'll talk a little bit more about jobs creation.

a little bit later in this episode. But all of that being said, this program and the fall cohort that I'm in runs from about mid September to about mid December. So it's about three months or so, and it requires approximately 15 to 20 hours per week, not only for class times, but then also meetings with peers, meetings with advisors and mentors, and then also the work itself that you're going to be putting into

the program. So it is not a small commitment for sure, but I'm ready for it. And I'm making some adjustments to really protect my time and be very intentional about where my focus and my time and my energy is being spent over the next several months. And I've also been working to make sure that my team is set up for success during this time as well. So

I wanted to share a little bit more behind the scenes about how my team and I are preparing for me to participate in this particular program, because I think that it can be helpful for if you you, our listeners, are preparing for doing a similar program, or you know that you are going to be focusing on a large goal. Maybe you plan on writing a book. Maybe you are training for a triathlon. There could be so many things that...

you have in front of you that you want to be 100 % focused on and you also want to make sure that everything else around you is taken care of so that you're able to do that. Maybe you're preparing for maternity leave. I remember back in the day, the first couple of years of owning my business, I was preparing for maternity leave and trying to figure out how the business is going to continue to run even when I'm taking a step back. So no matter what you're planning, whether it be

a maternity leave, whether it be to be heads down and all in on a particular goal, or maybe you're stepping back for other reasons and need to scale back your hours a little bit. I think it's super helpful to hear and get ideas on what are other people doing when they've faced a similar situation. So first things first, want to talk about the podcast. So, and actually I'm gonna take a further step back. What I am not doing and what my team is not doing

is discontinuing any of the work that we're already doing. So I want to first of all say that client support is going to remain seamless. Our priorities are staying the same. We are all in 100 % in continuing to make sure that things are running smoothly. So when I say that we are not discontinuing anything, I mean that we are not letting anything fall by the wayside.

a couple of examples of this to share with you. The podcast, we are going to continue to release new podcast episodes. I've been recording a lot over the summer. I'll continue to record for the first couple of weeks in September here, and we're going to be releasing those on a little bit different schedule than you're used to. Up until now, we have been releasing a new podcast episode every single week since we started

starting next week if you're like, wait a second, where's this week's episode? Is my app not updating? No, don't worry, we are going to be going to that little bit reduced schedule, but we're not discontinuing completely, don't worry about that. The other thing that we are doing in addition to having this content prerecorded and scheduling them to be released out so that you all aren't left hanging during the time that I'm going to be participating in the program,

We also are planning out all of our marketing content really through January So my team my marketing team and I meet once a month and we plan the upcoming month's content So that's why we're scheduling everything out through January or planning everything out So we have things that we're going to be talking about later in September Sneak peek I am celebrating my 40th birthday in a couple of weeks So we're gonna have some special marketing content related to that more like

lessons learned and things like that, maybe both personal, some professional. That's going to be a great post. That's going to be a great blog. So be on the lookout for that. Check out my website later in September. If you're on our mailing list, fantastic. You'll be getting a copy of that in your inbox later on this month. But just to give you an example, we're going to be talking about Small Business Saturday and doing some features on

some of the great places that I love to support here in the Green Bay, Wisconsin area. We're going to be doing our famous 12 days of delegation pod, excuse me, social media content in December. We've got things planned out. So then my team knows exactly what needs to be going out through January. We're talking about lots of themes, lots of topics that we want to make sure that we cover. So marketing content is going to

is going to continue as is. So we're still gonna be doing all our social media. We're gonna be doing our blogs. We're gonna be doing our email newsletters and all the things that we normally do. So I share that again because sometimes the tendency is that I've seen with other business owners is, know, when life gets busy or priorities shift, sometimes things fall by the wayside. I think the issue with that is you run the risk of that kind of feast and famine cycle. And I see this

especially with newer business owners and people who are working solo, it's they get really booked up maybe with client work or they are working on developing a new program or they're launching a new course or whatever it is and they go heads down, they're all in their focus and everything else falls to the wayside and then all of a sudden you're like, wait, okay, I'm ready for more business again and then you've got to kind of ramp things back up again. So we are not going to miss a beat on our marketing but

We've talked about it, we've planned for it all in advance so then everything will just continue to run with the help of my incredible marketing team. Well, I am focusing on this particular program. The other thing that I've done over the summer is increase the work that we're doing with our bookkeeper. We have a fantastic bookkeeper who supports me and my business and I have delegated additional accounting responsibilities over to her.

so that I am not the bottleneck for certain processes that absolutely need to happen at the company. So this was important even if I did not get accepted into the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program. I looked at this also from a risk standpoint. So some of the things that she is taking over include team payments. So all of our client invoicing, I should say 90.

98 % of our client invoicing is fully automated. Invoices raise every month, payments automatically process. There's very little intervention that needs to happen with our billing. So there's just a little bit here and there that needs to get manually billed out. Like if a client adds on a project or we need to bill a client for some extra hours that we work with their prior permission, little shameless plug there, we don't send surprise bills, but anything like that,

Those are kind of one-off things, but also more importantly, team payments. So making sure that all of our vendors and team members are getting paid in a timely manner. And for the longest time, and I actually enjoy accounting, I will preface this by saying that I started off as an accounting major in college. I really appreciate the cashflow and the budgeting and everything. I nerd out on that stuff. I love spreadsheets, but I also recognize that by being the only person who could

transfer funds and make payments and that was a risk. That was a risk because God forbid if anything happened to me or I suddenly was unavailable to you know transfer funds make payments and do some of those critical accounting processes and some of those those crucial pieces then things would come to a halt pretty quickly. So I wanted to make sure and there was something on my mind where like

I really need to get somebody else cross-trained on this. And then there was a question of who do I have do it? Is it my executive assistant? And then my bookkeeper was completely open to taking this on. So we have spent some time over the summer, first of all, getting her access to the systems that she needs access to, which involves, know, banking and things like that. So there's a few more steps. It's not like just, you know, securely sharing a password to.

a particular software or a website, there's a little bit more to it than that when it comes to money and finance. So took us some time to get permission set and make sure that she was able to do everything she needed to do, streamlining the process so that it wasn't so convoluted to share with somebody else. So there's been a lot of work going in behind the scenes in order to make this happen. But again, now we have her up and running, so then I am not going to be responsible for those particular activities.

while I'm focusing on this program. And added benefit, again, just to reiterate that from a risk standpoint of me being the bottleneck, that is then alleviated by having her involved. The other thing that my team and I are doing just to make sure that they are fully empowered to continue doing their work in the business, continuing to run as normal while I'm taking on this extra responsibility,

It's just empowering my senior VA team, the ones who are working very closely with our team members, making sure that everything is running smoothly with work with clients. They're the ones who are maybe helping to troubleshoot whenever client team members like, gosh, this is what we're trying to accomplish. Let's get some outside perspective on what tool might be best or what would be the best process in order to make something like this happen. They're always a great sounding board for our clients.

and our team members as well. They're also checking in with clients to make sure that work is going well with the team. So they're also our quote unquote quality control as well. So I wanna make sure that my senior VA team is fully empowered to continue to support the work that our team is doing with our clients as well. So there's a lot of preparation going in behind the scenes. I feel like the business is in incredibly capable hands. I do not expect to have...

client services disrupted at all by my participation in this program. If anything, I think things are going to be elevated to an even higher level after this experience and being able to introduce all kinds of things that will make our work even better with our clients. So I realized that was not very eloquently said, but you get the idea. I think that overall,

We are just going to go to a whole nother level with not only you know creating jobs But also with supporting our clients and you know our businesses and our nonprofits as well So that kind of leads me into you know, what do I hope to gain from this? But also what I hope to share with all of you as well I think overall just that clarity and that growth strategy

for that five-year plan, really solidifying what we want things to look like over the next year to two years to five years and so on and beyond. And just have that stronger foundation for scaling because of all that new information and all of that outside perspective, that really in-depth insight into the company now and what it could look like in five years, I think is gonna be very, very beneficial. I'm also looking forward to building relationships with

really my peers and mentors who are going to be in the program as well. I will be honest and say that I have not been part of a formal networking group in quite some time, certainly since COVID. I feel like a lot of networking groups that we're meeting regularly prior to COVID, some of them have fallen by the wayside or the format's different now. And I haven't quite found the right fit in terms of that connection. And so I think that

in a program like this, you're surrounded by a lot of like-minded people from a wide variety of industries, lots of different types of businesses, but who are all committed to growth and committed to creating jobs and just making an impact, making a positive impact on the world around them. I think it's gonna be really exciting to meet a lot of people. And I know that the networking is one of the things that...

and the relationships, should say. Networking just sounds very cool, but you get the idea. Building a network of quality people is kind of where my thought process is there, but I know that's something that clients and people who have participated in the program said that they enjoyed as well. But also, I am very excited to be able to share what I am learning along the way with our clients and all of you who are listening to the podcast and our audience.

because I love to share here are some great ideas that I've learned in order to do X, Y or Z. And this is what I found to work for me. And I want to share this as well. I'm very, very transparent if you haven't noticed that by now. And certainly I feel like our team and our clients would agree that I'm happy to share as much as I possibly can in order to contribute to the success of others, because I think that a rising tide lifts all boats.

not to sound corny there, but I really do believe that this program allows the opportunity for me to just continue to pour into my team, pour into my clients, pour into all of you to continue to grow and expand your businesses as well. So all of that being said, I just want to conclude this episode by first of all, thank you so much for the support, not only for listening to this podcast, but also just my entrepreneurial journey as well. There are many people that

I have known since the very early days of starting my company and figuring things out along the way to, you know, all the way now and where we're at. It's very, very exciting. Again, I just want to make sure that all of you know that my team and I are always here for our clients and our audience, our listeners. So feel free to continue sending any questions into hello at melissaswink.com. They will be funneled over to me. Happy to.

respond to any thoughts or questions that you have on this episode or any other episodes that we've released. If there's an aha that came up for you or if you're like, hey, I really enjoyed this person, where can I connect with them or I had an idea for this or hey, you know what, I'm struggling with this aspect of delegation, do you have any pointers for me? Anything at all. We are here to help in whatever way that we can. And certainly,

You know, if you also would like the freedom and flexibility to grow and scale your business or organization through the help of our VA team, I will still be absolutely available for consults. These are zero pressure conversations. It's just a chance for us to get to know each other a little bit. And I like to learn a little bit more about your company or organization. What does your team look like? What are some of the things that are just being put on the back burner? What's slipping through the cracks?

What is your overall vision? Like where would you like to be? Like here's kind of the messy beginning and here's how we want to have everything like neat and organized and running smoothly in the future and how can we help you with that? And then I just share a little bit more about how our team works and send you a proposal for services if we think that it might be a fit and we can help. it's again, very, very...

low pressure. It's a great conversation. I always enjoy meeting other business owners. Even if it doesn't turn out that we're a fit to work together, it's always great to have these conversations. I'm always happy again to provide any insight that I can in order for things to run more efficiently or for potential clients to be able to continue to grow through building a team. we will be certainly available for questions that come up.

Client support will continue to go on and just continue to grow and strengthen between the new things that I'm learning and are very capable team members. They've all got this. I feel incredibly grateful for having the team behind me and also for the opportunity to participate in the program. So thanks so much for hanging out with me today and hearing about some life updates and this exciting journey that I am about to start on. And I will be back.

With an episode in two weeks of Make Space for More, we have another fantastic guest that you are going to enjoy hearing from. So have a wonderful day. Please continue to keep in touch with us. We'd love to hear from you along the way through your entrepreneurial journey as well. Thank you so much. Have a wonderful day. Bye-bye.