Did you know that there are a number of different certifications available to companies - certifications based on race, ethnicity, disability, identifying as LGBTQ?. There are a ton - but where to start? 

And if your company doesn’t qualify for a certification, have you struggled with diversifying your consultant or supplier base?

Listen in as I talk with Heather Cox, the  President and Co-Founder of Certify My Company which is a company that not only helps simplify the certification process, but they also assist corporations in diversifying their supplier base. 

Drink of the week:The Tightrope

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Julie Brown:

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Heather Cox

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Facebook

What do acro gymnastics, tightrope walking and juggling have to do

with certifying your company or sourcing from a diverse supply chain?

Absolutely fucking nothing except that Our guest today does all of that.

Welcome to episode 1 21.

This shit works.

I'm your host, Julie Brown, and today I am joined by Heather Cox,

president and co-founder of Certify My company, a company that not only helps

simplify the certification process for companies, they assist corporations

in diversifying their supplier base.

All good stuff.

Welcome to this Shit Works Your Weekly No Nonsense Guide to Networking your Way

to More friends, more adventures, and way more success with your host, Julie Brown.

Here we go.

Did you know that there are a number of different certifications

available to companies, certifications based on race, ethnicity,

disability, identifying as lgbtq?

There are a ton, but where to start?

I thought about getting my company certified as a women's business

enterprise, but I honestly haven't had the time to even think about

where to start that process.

And if you're a company doesn't qualify for a certification, have

you struggled with diversifying your consultant or supplier base?

I know a number of my clients have.

Good thing for us.

Heather Cox is here another guest where simply talking about what she

does for a living would be burying the lead on how fucking cool she is.

Heather serves on the national and regional forums for Women's Business

Enterprise Council West, as well as the chair of disability in Nevada,

and has held leadership roles with women's president's educational

organization, women's Business Enterprise National Council, and

the gay and lesbian chapter of.

Also the National Association of Women Business Owners and the

Advisory Board for Super Bowl.

I don't know Roman Nus.

Nobody.

Nobody does.

is XL one 11.

So without further ado, New York, New Jersey.

That one . Without further ado, let's get this conversation started.

Heather, welcome to the podcast.

Thank you so much fun we're gonna have here today.

This is gonna be fun.

I'm excited.

I failed to mention that when you are not kicking ass and taking names,

you enjoy weightlifting, wine tasting and baking cookies and cheese cake.

Well, I actually have been retired from the baking of my house now,

thank God, because my oldest daughter decided that she loves to bake.

So thank God I don't have to do that part anymore because I

tended to eat more than I baked.

Yeah, the batter is always better than the final product to me.

Yep, yep.

So we're able to outsource that to a different child, . Okay.

So right outta the gate, let's talk about what being certified

means and what the benefits are.

Perfect.

So being certified simply means that your company is owned, operated, and

controlled by a person or people within one of those five categories that you

mentioned, women ethnic minorities, L G B T, veteran or disability owned and

veteran can be veteran that's not service disabled or service disabled, or it can

be a veteran with just a disability.

So it means that you have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that that one of

those demographics owns, operates, and controls the way your business is.

Okay.

And then the benefits of it are numerous.

For starters, people always understand the business development part.

It's access to opportunities, to new opportunities.

It's also access to your current clients that can help you grow the

business you already have with them, because now they have an extra reason

to try to get you more business.

And there's actually people inside all these organizations called

Supplier Diversity Managers.

Their goal, their role is to increase opportunities and business with

qualified, capable, certified, diverse.

Let's say you are already doing business with Johnson and Johnson.

Well now you are certified and you can be like, Hey Robin, I'd love to do more work.

I think I could really do a bunch of work for this division of Johnson and Johnson.

And she's gonna be like, you know what?

You've done such a great job with this so far.

Let me introduce you to those people.

Okay.

Hello, warm introduction.

Amazing, right?

So how does the company determine whether they qualify for a certification?

The ownership is pretty clear.

Cut.

51% or more, do you own it or not?

Now it could be one person, two people, et cetera.

So if you own, it's like I own the company 50%.

I have a female business partner, the other 50%.

So we are a hundred percent let own.

But let's say for example, you own the company, but you're

like, I don't wanna work.

I just wanna own stuff.

I don't wanna work.

So you could be like, Hey Heather, will you run my company for me?

Totally fine.

Cause you own the company a hundred percent.

You're at least 51%, right?

And then that you hired me to run the company.

And as a female, as a woman, that means that we are now meeting that second

eligible requirement, which is operation.

Does a female or do females run the company on a daily basis?

And do they have the highest ranking title in the company

per the governing documents?

Oh, now that part gets a little tricky sometimes because I'm

gonna give you a little quiz.

I love to give this quiz and I do webinars.

Is in a corporation.

Okay.

That not an llc, but a corporation.

Yep.

I'm an S corp.

So for, you're an S corp.

Okay.

So that's actually a tax designation, not a legal designation.

Okay.

But per your corporation in the majority, 98% of templated bylaws, what

is the highest title in the company?

What would you say?

Uh, founder or president?

So no one's ever said found it before.

That's interesting.

It's actually president.

You're correct.

Okay.

But most people actually say ceo.

Okay.

Most people throw out ceo.

Cause that's like colloquially.

We think of that as like the head honcho in a company.

Yeah.

But the majority of template and bylaws, and I don't care if you

spent $6 or $600 an hour on attorney, they use the same templates.

Okay.

So they have, so president is the highest ranking title.

So a female would have the highest ranking title.

Okay.

The next.

Control per those same governing documents.

Do female have ultimate control of the voting?

Now, that's when it gets to the board of directors and how decisions are made.

Okay, so now replace female for any of the other demographics we talked about,

and if you're qualified and or if you even think you're qualified, right?

Yeah.

Then you should reach out because sometimes it's just

a matter of understanding the legalities of your documentation.

Okay?

What is the cost to getting certifi?

It's actually the cost.

If you go directly to the certified organizations, which people do mm-hmm.

, the cost is negligible.

It's, if you're under a million dollars, it's $350.

If you're one to 5 million, it's 5 50, 5 to 10 million, seven 50 and

above 10 million is around 1200.

Okay.

That's give or take, you know, $50 per, depending on the organization that where

you're located, but it's not a lot at all.

And is that every year you pay that every year to maintain that, that certification.

For most of them.

There's a couple, um, the L G B T one and the, and I'm just talking

about the private sector right now.

State certifications are a different animal and they often do not have a, uh,

application fee associated with them.

And that's one of the first things we do with most, with every client.

Which certification is going to be the best for you?

There are a plethora of options out there.

Oh, okay.

You could spend your whole life and your whole bank account getting certified.

I don't recommend it.

It's not the best tactic.

It's not strategic.

Yeah.

So let's figure out the best certification for you based on who your current clients

are and who your target clients are.

Okay, gotcha.

Didn't even think about national versus state.

Okay.

Yeah, so there's definitely different certification.

It's like saying, I need some tissues.

Well, do you.

The cotton.

Now, do you want the The Johnson.

The Johnson?

What brand do you want of that product?

Okay, so for corporations who don't fit into this certification

requirement for, you know, they don't fill their requirements.

Okay.

They're not a diverse own business, you're saying.

Right.

What are the benefits to them creating a supplier diversity program?

There's a couple ways that you could do it, right?

So you can either create, you can also partner with

diverse own businesses, right?

Because a lot of times companies can't fulfill an entire contractual

need for big organization.

Exactly.

You're taken on partners anyways.

Why not partner with a diverse business?

Yeah.

Cause then you get, as long as they're truly a partner to you and

not just a pastor, like they're truly.

Some of the work with you mm-hmm.

, then they can hold the agreement, which then gives you more access.

That can make you more beneficial to the, the final, the clients.

Mm-hmm.

. But if they, let's say they're a larger organization, they're 20

million, 30 million, 40 million or billion in revenue, then a supply

diversity program is good business practice because it's going to, it's

like, it's kinda like any other relat.

You wanna find as many similarities as you can with, with the person

in your relationship with.

So let's say like a construction company has a contract with, let's say cvs, right?

Yep.

Okay.

Diversity is very important to cvs.

They have a fantastic supplier diversity program.

Everyone in the company knows about it.

So if you wanna court them, It's a great opportunity to say,

we realize cvs, that it's very important to you, supplier diversity.

It's also really important to us that we created a supplier diversity program.

Cause we know it's very important to you and we wanna make sure

that we are the best partner to you that we can possibly be.

Yeah.

Not just a transactional vendor.

We wanna be a partner to your clients.

And so it's going to give you acc but the, you know, the standard benefits that

we talk about all the time, markets new.

Companies don't think about changing their vendors, their suppliers, if they

don't feel like something's broken.

Right?

Like, and I always give the analogy of the gym, like people don't just

when they wake up and go, I think I'm gonna start going to the gym today.

I feel like getting hot and sweaty and sore, that seems like a really good idea.

Most of the time they start because someone has said, The doctor's

like, oh, your cholesterol, your blood pressure's a little too high.

We really gotta work on that.

Or they're saying, yes.

They put on their pants and they're like, well, these fit last year and they

don't fit this year, whatever it is.

Or they're trying to play with their kids and they can't, they're trying to

walk with their dog and they're like, wow, I'm really pooped and my dog is

like dragging me along, whatever it is.

Usually they're like, wow, now I really gotta think about my diet and exercise.

Yeah, so that's when they joined the gym, but give it two.

Give it two months, and they're like, wow, I actually feel better actually.

Wow.

I'm actually excited to go to the gym three times a week, whatever it is, right?

But they would've never done it, and there wasn't like a

push to make it happen, right?

Mm-hmm.

. So once they start going though, they're like, wow, this is amazing.

I feel so much better.

Mm-hmm.

. But they needed that thing.

So that's kinda how supply procurement people are.

They don't always think about something's broken.

If it doesn't feel like there's nothing wrong with it, why are

you gonna search for a new.

A new one.

And so by having these programs, it encourages people in your company to look

for new ideas, new vendors that could really change up the way things are done.

Yeah.

So say a company wants to diversify their supply chain.

In the beginning of our conversation, you mentioned you work with

supply diversity managers.

Do you help companies fill that role?

Like if they're like, we need to have an internal role, do you help companies

fill an internal role to manage that?

Yes.

We actually created a whole division of the company called, let's Talk

about partnering with, I partnered with two other certified diverse

business owners who had different core competencies than I did.

Mm-hmm.

, the three of us together have a holistic offering.

I couldn't do myself.

Not, not well as well at least.

Right.

It's called Supplier Diversity in a box.

Oh.

It's for companies that don't have a full desk to dedicate to creating

a supplier diversity program.

So we create one.

We give them like the consulting part of it, the data part of it, and the

certification understanding part of it.

Yes.

Perfect.

What's funny is I always like to have stories.

With who I'm interviewing and you, in your guest prep form, filled

out a couple of stories that I was like, I wanna know more about that.

And one of them was, you said stories, you have a former client, I don't know if

I'm gonna pronounce her name correctly.

Jaque, is that right, Jackie?

Yeah.

Oh, is it that how, okay.

So that's how you pronounce it.

Okay, perfect.

Jackie.

Yeah.

Yeah, Jackie.

So you said she watched the movie War Dogs and then got a

$5 million contact with the.

That wasn't exactly like the timeline for it, but yeah.

Okay.

So she like she watch the movie and then the contract rolled

it, but it was pretty close.

Right.

So she's actually a really funny story because she's one of those people who

was like, I don't need certification.

No one's ever asked me for it.

Why should I get it?

I don't want it.

And she'd been in a company for 20 years doing, she created, um, you know, when

you go to like a large apartment store and they have like their own brands?

Yes.

She makes those clothing for them.

Oh, ok.

So they're like in-house brands.

Right.

Okay.

And the pandemic.

And you know, there was not a whole lot of people ordering more clothes.

The stores were closing.

Like she had to close a bunch.

She had to lay off a bunch of people, but she still had her relationships

with some of her factories.

Yeah.

So she started making PPE products, different versions of PPE products.

Mm-hmm.

and Scrubs and all these different like medical stuff

that people were really needing.

Mm-hmm.

. And so Charter, she got a contract with Charter Communications and they

set for ppe and they were like, Hey, we wanna get you diversity certified.

You're a woman owned company.

And she.

I mean, I guess I'll do it.

No one's ever really mentioned it before.

Like, do I, I guess I'll do it cause you're asking for it.

They're like, yeah, we'd really like you to do it.

So she called.

So we worked with her, we got her certified and we did at the same time,

she was doing her women own certification.

We did the W O sb, which is the federal government Women Owned

Small Business certification.

Okay.

You can do it the same time that you do your W B E and I'm gonna throw

out a ton of acronyms, so if you need me to translate, just let me know.

I use them like they're a whole different language.

Most of the people who listen to this podcast.

Understand.

M B E W B E, DBE E.

Okay.

So Women Business Enterprise and, yeah, minority Business Enterprise.

So yeah, we submitted her application.

Everything's good to go.

So in the meantime, she's watching War Dogs as her brand new husband, and she's

like, I should start selling arms in the government with my WSB certification.

She's like joking around and she thinks she's hysterical.

She's cracking herself up.

Her new husband's.

All right, Jackie Whatev, right?

We think we're so funny.

Right?

And then she goes to work and she tells her coo, Hey, they were starts selling

guns, arms to the government for my wsb.

And he was like, actually, maybe not arms, but what about clothing or uniforms?

Mm-hmm.

. So she was like, yeah.

So she goes on to Sam do gov and she finds that they're having, Marines

are looking for practice uniforms.

A 5 million contract later for a certification she didn't

even wanna get to begin with.

Right?

Yeah.

So she came to Vegas.

I made her buy all the drinks.

Yes, I the contract and drinks are spending in

Vegas, , there's events in Vegas.

I'm like, these are on you Jackie . That's amazing.

Right.

So that just goes to show, you might not even think, what is

a certification gonna do to me?

Yeah.

For me, I wanna talk about another story that you teased

about a client, Allison, you.

Your client, Allison, like she sold 10, seven figure companies

so she knows what she's doing.

But you say she overlooked the one thing that launched her current company that

she hadn't even thought about doing in the other companies that she sold.

Yeah, so Allison runs an amazing organization called

Pinnacle Global Network.

They're a mastermind, they're a business coaching group for, you know,

most of the business coaching are for startups, like brand new companies.

Yes.

Hers is for people who wanna go from six to seven figures or

seven to eight figures, et cetera.

Yeah.

So she's works with larger.

More like solidified companies, I guess you can say.

Mm-hmm.

. Right.

So she, um, had always, you know, she was a very successful business history mm-hmm.

, and people kept saying to her, Allison, you should get certified.

And she was like, I don't sell to corporations, I don't sell to them.

Like, why should I get certified?

And we're like, and everyone kept saying to her, but what

about the other business owners?

She was like, Ugh, I don't know.

Like I don't sell the corporations.

I'm like, we get that.

But what about the 20,000 certified business women and business

owners that are in WeBank?

So she happened, there happened to be a local, a regional

event near where she was.

So her friend and mentee named Robin invited her to come.

She's like, just come it's hour of your night.

Just come.

Yeah.

She came and she's like, I'm an idiot.

. I was like, what?

She said to herself, yeah, she's looking around.

She's like, everybody in this room was a potential client for me.

Yeah.

And she did, and her numbers skyrocketed.

And then, She really worked the WeBank system and now she runs

their podcast, women Who Own It.

Mm-hmm.

and she interviews, so she gets to market herself on a weekly basis or monthly

basis when they do the women who own IT podcasts and talk about what she does.

Yeah.

And Right.

That's an unbelievable platform.

You're in front of Uber successful women business owners and everybody

else who finds that podcast.

Yeah.

So many little things.

So many . You have to work it.

You have to know what to do.

That's the problem.

That's the problem is you have to know what to do.

Is that once you get certified, people are like, I'm certified.

Where's my radi?

Where are the contracts not radiating from the sky?

Right.

You have to, it's not a magic wand.

It's a tool.

It's not a magic wand.

It's a tool.

That's a great, is that an analogy?

Is that a metaphor?

I don't know.

I don't know my words.

I don't know what that is.

It's a, it's a, this, none of that.

I don't know what it was.

Analogy, metaphors like most people who have a domain name.

I bought my domain name through godad.

Yeah.

And you said you have a story about mine.

Go Daddy and Mommy.

Oh, I see.

I know what you're saying.

I'm like, wait, wait, what?

Oh, so yeah, so Go Daddy.

During the pandemic, they interviewed me, they were interviewed, somebody

who knew me and they said to her, we need an entrepreneur that's

dealing with working home with kids.

And she's like, oh, I got one for yo, I got one.

Because I have five kids, they're now age 13 to five.

At the time, the youngest, their twins were three and my

oldest was, whatever, two 11.

I do the math in my head there.

And so we were doing this interview about what it's like

and if I have tips and trick.

Like I was the expert in this, but I was like, as of those things, right?

Yeah.

Fake it until you make it with your kids.

. Like here's the schedule, we're gonna do whatever it is.

And there, and so he asked me and I was so disappointed actually, that

this didn't make the final cut.

Cause I thought it was like the best thing I said in the entire interview.

But they said, um, so were you like sitting on the floor a lot more now

with your kids playing games and I.

Not really that kind of mommy . I'm more of like the, but I, but I tell you

what I did do with my kids, my oldest daughter never really seen me work.

Cause I always go to an office or she was at school when I was working

at home at the time she was 11.

Right.

And she loves mommy's help being mommy's helper, babysitting.

Yeah.

And she saw me on the phone calling people, like hustling.

That was, we do as business owners.

Mm-hmm.

Ands, sh.

Mm-hmm.

and she.

Picking up her phone and calling all of her clients and texting 'em,

saying, this is when I'm available.

I got CPR certified.

This is my rate.

Let me know when you'd like me to babysit for you.

And I was like, oh my goodness.

Like she really saw how I was running the company and she picked up on it

and she started doing that for her own.

And so she'll do that now.

She'll be like, I need to make a flyer to post on the women's group.

Can you post it so that they can go in there and whatever it is.

So she really saw the hustling part of it.

Yeah, and I was like so proud of her.

I was like so proud of myself that that's what I, so I don't sit

on the ground and play Barbie's.

I'm sorry I'm not that kind of mom, but I gave a lot of really good life skills.

. Yeah, no, I, it's funny how the pandemic just opened up, just all these different

conversations about what we do and how we do it and understanding, you know,

there's the Bring your daughter to Workday was every single day during the pandemic.

Exactly, exactly.

Right.

She just saw like a different side of things and she saw how I interacted

with clients and before she had really only heard me telling stories about it.

Yeah.

But at the dinner table or whatever it is.

Yeah.

But now she saw it.

Mm-hmm.

, which was a completely different experience for her.

Yeah.

I love that.

She was like, I'm CPR certified, this is my rate.

It's more expensive.

Differentiator.

There are differentiators out there.

Exactly.

Totally.

I know baby Heim like, like I would, like, I would've put all that on it.

. I know.

It was so impressive.

I was like, yes, now my job is done here.

Thank you.

Next onto the next kid to fix them . I know.

Let me figure out the next one.

Yeah.

I just wanna talk about the acro gymnastics, the tightrope

wagging, the juggling.

Like how is that in your history and in like, Were you in the circus?

I saw, I did.

I was in the circus.

I actually put that on my bio because I'm always like, it tells me two things.

One, it's a good conversation starter with people, and also it tells

me if they actually read the bio.

So they don't ask me about it.

I'm like, they didn't read it.

Yeah.

There's no way they read that.

They have no questions about that.

Right.

So I grew up in a little tiny town in southern California called Redlands.

It's the place you stop in to pee on the way to all the cool

places in Southern California.

And so, In Redlands though, there was, um, a youth circus.

It'd been there for years.

It's probably been like 60 years now, but it was years since I was

there, when I was even part of it.

And when we moved to Redlands, I was four, my sister was two.

And when we were like five and four or five and three, my parents took us to

the circus and I was like, this amazing.

And it was kids, it was a youth circus.

It was kids.

Yeah.

It wasn't just like the profe, right.

It was all these kids.

And I was like, those costumes are sparked.

Yeah.

They have beautiful makeup on.

I wanna do it right.

So my parents were like, what?

My dad's like, my dad's an engineer, super like engineer square brain, right?

And he was like, you wanna be in the circus?

I'm like, yeah, I do.

So he like signed us up and I did it till I was 18 years old,

until I graduated high school.

I did everything from like tightrope to un cycle, to juggling, to exercise.

And I'm telling you though, it really did change how I work with people

because I was always the base of pyramid.

You do not have a pyramid if I don't show up.

We always did a lot of passing and juggling.

There's nobody to pass to if I don't show up.

Right.

So it really did help with like understanding how you can't just be about

you, it has to be for the whole team.

And so there was a lot of that involved in it.

And just understanding that you have to kinda get outta your own way.

I, I cried every single practice for one of the classes I was in.

It was an aerial act and I do not love heights.

It's not my favorite.

Mm-hmm.

. I don't like heights at all.

And.

My mom, this is where I got my non nurturing gene from, is my mother.

Cause they, at the time, this was before everybody gets an award, right?

Yeah.

They were like, well, she's gonna have to do the tricks or she's out,

we're cutting her and she's not gonna be part of this, this performance.

My mom's like, you better get up there and do it if you wanna be in the show.

Right.

There's no like goling.

No.

She was like, better get your shit together or you're

not gonna be in the show.

. And I did, and I was in the show.

Somehow I've magically got over my fear just to be able to do the performance,

but Right, we get in our own way.

A lot of things, I think, whether it be we don't wanna outsource our

certification process or whether.

Be like, like we're too afraid to put something out there.

One thing that Allison told the story about her, she says a lot,

which I've kind of taken heart.

She says, you're not embarrassed by the first, um, like

version of what you put out.

You didn't put it out soon enough.

Yeah.

Because we oftentimes wait so long to make it perfect that we're in our own way.

Yeah.

And we just got it out there.

People might have feedback for us.

Yeah.

But we're never gonna get it Perfect anyway.

So just put it out there.

Yeah.

Right.

And do what you can do with it.

See what they think about it.

Yeah.

Perfection is the enemy of done.

I've heard.

Before, cause we do wait and that's a coping mechanism because if we put

it out there, then we have to own it and then we have to take action on it.

So the coping mechanism is to procrastinate and say you're not ready.

And it's not perfect yet, so.

Right.

Yeah.

I'm pretty sure there's a lot of people listening right now who are like, yes, I

want all of the benefits of certification.

Yes.

I need someone to help me work, walk through this process.

What is the process for working with you?

Well, first I just wanna mention that we only talked about the

business development benefits.

We didn't even talk about the company, our leadership development benefits.

Oh, okay.

Which are, in my mind some of the greatest benefits of being certified.

So I'll give you an example that through my disability in, so we're

dual certified as women owned and disability owned business enterprise.

Okay.

Which is the one that is the most unknown.

And so we can go into that if we have time.

Yeah.

Nope, we have time.

What falls under disability owned.

So that's where, so that's what gives people, like people forget about it.

So women owned is obviously your women ethnic minority is black,

Hispanic, Asian Indian, Asian Pacific, and Native American.

Mm-hmm.

veteran means that you have a DD two 14 that says you're officially an,

um, an other than honorable or is cannot be dishonorable discharged.

Okay.

Right.

And so some of 'em like.

Not the Coast Guard, but like the reserves, it's like 20 years.

Like there's some different caveats to that, but Okay.

And then there's lgbt.

You have to be a member of the LGBTQ community.

Okay.

And then the last is disability.

You know, this is the one that's most unknown.

It's for if people have a diagnosis that the a d has identified as a

disability and if it is not managed correctly, can infringe on your

ability to run your business.

So what do I mean by that?

So the ADA has, has identified everything.

Thyroid conditions to sleep apnea, to diabetes, to asthma, okay.

To adhd, anxiety, depression.

Anything though, why do I, what do I mean by manage this?

Right?

So if you have a sleep apnea, you have to sleep with a C Pap machine.

Yes.

Cause if you don't, you can't function the next day cuz you haven't slept, you

don't have enough oxygen in your system.

Okay?

If you have a thyroid condition and you don't take your medication by day three.

You are lethargic.

Yep.

And you get sick.

All these things happen to you, which means it very much

harder to run your business.

Yeah.

The people will say, And I've had people with one arm who are like, it doesn't

hinder me from running my business.

I'm like, I understand that.

That's why you're a successful entrepreneur cuz you didn't let it.

Yeah.

But nonetheless, you have one arm which does make things like typing slower.

Right?

It's whatever else you're doing.

Right.

And so that is the disability owned business enterprise certification.

And it's one of my favorites.

I get a ton out of it.

One of them being this Toyota mentorship program that I, I

applied for and I was selected for.

So they match you up with one of their executives.

So I was.

Step with the CIO of Toyota North America.

Now, first of all, if you sell to the Fortune 100, having access to the

C-suite is an invaluable opportunity to get their feedback on stuff, right?

Mm-hmm.

. You can't even hire somebody that's currently in this needs

probably to consult with you.

They don't have the time to bandwidth or you can afford it, whatever it is.

And so her feedback and her working with me was so mind blowing on like stuff

that she probably thought was so simple.

Now, she did say to me, I'm not an entrepreneur, Heather, I cannot

tell you how to run your company.

Mm-hmm.

like, you can teach me that all day, but I can't teach you that what I

can teach you or things that I'm good at, process is a good thing

for her, which I struggled with.

Yeah.

And so she was able to help me kind of walk through the process and when to.

Like how much things cost us so we can make sure we're

spend costing things correctly.

But then she also said, I would say to her, I was like, Holly

companies will tell me all the time, Heather, you're so amazing.

You're so, so fantastic.

I mean, we're not gonna hire you, but you're fantastic.

I'm like, okay, Holly, where's the gap there?

Like, yeah, somebody's missing.

I'm like, what?

I'm saying what they need to hear.

And so we worked on my messaging.

We created a whole video just for my corporate clients to send to them.

Wow.

That she said, and she.

That wouldn't speak to me.

What the first one I did.

Right.

She's like, you need to tell me this.

I'm like, you need to know that I, that's so simple.

She's like, for you, for you.

We don't know that and so you need to, and I was like, oh my goodness.

It was like such simple things, but it was mind blowing in a sense that it changed.

It changed the trajectory of our work with corporate America.

Mm-hmm.

. That to me is just as valuable as the business development

benefits of a company.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Right.

Or just I was able to take part in.

The Tuck Business School, which is the Dartmouth Business School.

Okay.

They, um, I got a scholarship through one of my certifications to go.

It's a $5,000 class and I got a scholarship to go.

I actually got two scholarships.

I'm just waiting for the second one to be able to do it when they back in person,

which it just started back in person, so I have to apply for the second one.

Mm-hmm.

because like, but not to me like get an executive MBA and

having someone else pay for it.

Yes.

Like those are unbelievable benefits that so many people just don't talk.

And you can help people unearth, understand that and find those benefits.

Okay.

Yes.

So once you're certified, so first of all, our other company, diversity Masterminds,

which is the second logo back here.

Mm-hmm.

, we aggregate a lot of those opportunities so people sign up for

that listserv, that that's whatever, they'll get those sent to them as well.

But yeah, we help them understand that exactly how they can take

advantage of the certification.

Because there's other things besides just getting business.

Totally.

There's so many things, right?

There's even like partnerships, like how I found my partners for, for both Diversity

Masterminds and Supplier Diversity in a Box was from the conferences for my

other certified diverse businesses.

I mean, just think about the resources that you have access

to once you're certified.

I know once I had an issue with the corporate procurement, And we

didn't mess up, but it was like a miscommunication thing necessarily.

But I like called a resource of mine, another supply diversity manager

and like, help me, help me fix this.

I don't wanna lose this contract.

Right.

And they did.

They helped me with the verbiage I needed and I saved the contract.

And five years later, they're one of our biggest accounts.

Yeah.

Okay.

So how many different offerings does your company have?

So, certify, my company does certifications.

Yeah.

But now that could.

Private sector, it could be the public sector, it could

be a lot of different options.

The only ones we don't do are eight A and hub them.

Okay.

We have partners we can send you over to people like that that know how to do that,

but we also do like those registrations.

So once you're certified, you have to fill out the registration portals.

So we offer a service for registration portals.

We do re-certifications annually for our clients.

And we do consulting about supplier diversity programming.

Okay.

And training.

We do a lot of training for corporations.

So the majority of our work is corporations actually hiring us

to work with their suppliers that are already in their supply chain.

Okay.

To make sure that anyone who should be certified is, but then we also have,

you know, we do educational programming, speaking at events about the different

benefits of certification, mostly for entrepreneurial organizations.

Mm.

We'll do internal trainings cuz sometimes like the supplier diversity manager's,

like I've told my team so many times, like I don't know why they're not listening.

And I always equate it to like, if I tell my husband something,

he's like that stuff, whatever.

So when also the same idea, he's like, you know, mark had the most genius idea ever.

I'm like, oh that sounds so familiar.

That idea.

It's funny cuz I get hired by major corporations who have business

developers in place, but they're like, we just need an outside voice because

they don't listen to us anymore.

It's so crazy.

Right?

But it's the same thing, right?

Mm-hmm.

. So what we'll do now, and they'll be like, I said that, I'm like, I'm sure

you said it verbatim, if not even better than I said it, but mm-hmm.

I'm an outside voice.

I'm not, there's nothing for me, nothing in it for me.

Yep.

For them to do better.

Yep.

So that way they think it's a genius idea.

And then the Diversity Mastermind is also something that you offer.

Yes.

Diversity Masterminds teaches you how to leverage that

powerful tool of certification.

Okay.

And I kept hearing people going like, I'm not gonna re-certify.

I got nothing out of it.

And I was like, what?

How is that possible?

Right.

And then I'm like, did you do this?

Did you do that?

No, I didn't know I could.

I didn't know I should.

I was like, all right, there's another gap here of what you think

you can do, or what you should do versus what you actually should do.

And so we created a course and one, we have an OnDemand version.

It's just videos, and we have a live cohort.

Okay.

That we do quarterly and people can sign up and we can teach them

how to use their certification.

Time after time, people will tell us they learned more in the first

hour of the course than they did in, in five years of being certified.

Do you have to be certified in order to take the Mastermind?

Yes.

You do.

Okay.

Because you won't, you won't get anything out of it.

You can watch the videos, but then you're not gonna log into the

different portals to see different things that we're telling you to do.

Pull information out.

Okay, perfect.

But you don't have to be the owner.

You can be the salesperson in the company to take it.

Okay.

And so how can people find.

You and get in touch with you.

So we go to certify my company.com.

Mm-hmm emails, Heather certify my company.com.

And just let us know that you wanna reach out and either myself or someone on my

team will let you, will get back to you.

Um, usually it's me, their initial call.

Cause I wanna make sure you're getting the right certification, as I mentioned.

Mm-hmm.

people will call and be like, I want the state of New Jersey.

I'm like, why?

They're like, cause I wanna sell the target.

I'm like, target doesn't care about the state of New Jersey.

That gives you WeBank or our NMSDC certified, whatever it is.

Right.

Okay, perfect.

So I'm gonna put a link to that.

Can I put a link to your email, the notes as well, or all over,

like social media as well?

Instagram is probably the preferred.

Instagram, LinkedIn, which is just at Certify my co.

Okay.

That's all the social handles, but we put like in information out there.

Like congratulatory messages out there.

We like to put products out there, like Screwball was just, screwball is one of

our clients, screwball whiskey, and they just on the Today Show, I love Screwball.

That's a peanut butter, right?

The WeBank and Disability and certified?

No, they're peanut butter.

Peanut butter whiskey.

I love them more.

Yeah, whiskey.

I know.

Yeah, that's my go-to in the winter.

My husband prefers just.

Like whiskey, and I'm like, no, I need the peanut butter one.

. What's good in coffee?

We use like col, we use it like in coffee and stuff.

Yep.

But I have a great woman owned Burman company.

If you're a whiskey person.

Yes.

And she's in Boston.

Where, what is it?

Is it?

It's called Boston Harbor Distillery.

Boston Harbor Distillers, yes.

I've been there a number of times.

I love Rhonda.

She's amazing.

Yeah.

Rhonda is my friend, Frances.

One of my friend Francesca's best friends.

Oh yeah.

Amazing.

Yeah, I love her.

I met her at a Woman of the Mind and Spirit event.

We were like kindred spirits.

I love her.

Cuz she'll like, it's a good day for whiskey.

I'm like, isn't every day.

Every day is a good way.

It's . So her, her backstory was, she was part of Sam Adams.

Sam Adams, right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

No, that's funny that you know Rhonda.

Yeah, I've, I've met her a handful of times.

Yeah, yeah.

No.

So there's so many amazing, amazing products out there that

people just don't know about.

And it's really funny cuz like whenever we go to Target with the kids, Who's

buying the women own logo, right?

So you're like, we're all running around Target trying to make

a game out it looking for it.

So it's been really fun to do that.

Yeah.

And there's no excuse to not look for, for women owned business, disability

owned business, minority owned business, like again, You have to look for 'em.

You have to know who they are.

So yeah, that's great.

Well, and the truth is, like I, you know, WeBank did something really smart.

Let me see if I have this one here.

So you can see on this product right here, can you see the Women Own logo?

It's on there.

Yep.

Oh, yes, yes, yes.

I can see that.

Yep.

Nope, I can see it.

Yeah, so that's the one that was created with Walmart and WeBank together.

And the reason they did it, and you might know this so I apologize if I'm telling

something you already know, but they did a study about seven years ago and they.

Walmart knew that women control about 83 to 85% of all consumer decisions.

Exactly.

And they know that women control like one point something or no, maybe

it's like $5 trillion in domestic.

Cuz it's a big number.

I think it's like 5 trillion, 3 trillion.

It's a lot of money.

It's a lot of trillions.

It's a lot of trillions.

So, and so, I'm paraphrasing, so don't Google these exact words,

but they were like, we want more of that money in our pocket.

How are we gonna get it?

And so they were asked a bunch of their customers, like they

asked like Nationwide, you know, some, a lot of questions.

And one of the questions was if you went in to buy shampoo, for example,

again paraphrasing, but you were more likely to buy one if you could

easily identify it as women owned.

Okay.

And I will let you guess what percentage said they'd be more likely to buy it.

A hundred.

It was 90%, but pretty close.

Yeah.

So they were like, what that, A lot of money.

So they helped create this logo.

So that's a reasonable logo.

And just to let you know, there's a, a magazine called

Wine UM Intelligence Magazine.

Okay.

And you've heard about this study.

So did you know that this is pre pandemic?

So it's probably gone up since then, but 70% of all wine purchases

are made by women in the us.

I can a hundred percent believe that.

I think it's more now post, you know, as we're like moving on a pandemic.

I think that went up a lot over the last two years.

Wine intelligence wanted to know if the same statistic

held true for wine drinkers.

They asked the women wine drinkers like, if you wanted to buy a bottle of wine,

would you be more likely to buy it?

If you could tell it was women owned.

And so what percentage do you think said yes?

90% ? 90%?

Yeah.

You know, there's a retail logo and so there's just like understand

now the other organizations have.

Not done retail logos, but a lot of times they'll say things like,

there's a chip company called Nana's Chips out here in the southwest.

Mm-hmm.

, they're the best tortilla chips you'll ever have in your life, by the way.

So if, if that's your trigger, don't buy them.

Cause you'll eat the whole bag.

They're so good.

But they're minority owned.

They're Nmsdc certified.

Yeah.

So they don't have the logo in there, but it does say we're

a minority-owned company.

Yes.

On their brand.

So you can look around, but you can definitely find them.

But you know, it's.

We all wanna know money's going, has that logo on it.

So, um, Senor, who's it?

El Jo.

Oh, there's a great women owned one too, in Chicago.

Okay.

In Spra tequila in, oh my god.

It is truly sip bowl just on ice.

Yeah.

That's how I like it.

With a, yeah, with a squeeze of line.

Yeah.

It's amazing.

But it's truly a sip of buzz, fear and tequila.

Okay.

I'm gonna look that up.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So good.

I know people are always like, do you have other products that aren't booze, Heather?

I'm like, I do.

I promise.

I promise.

I have other products that are not booze, but they just happen to.

But resonates with a lot of people . Right.

Especially during the pandemic.

So you can go and you're spending your money.

Like we wanna know what are we doing with our money?

We've all heard the, if you buy from a large company, just

buy the CEO a second house.

Yeah.

But I'll tell you like my kids are like, no, I get to go to dance lessons

cuz people are hiring my mommy more.

Right?

Yeah.

Like you really, it really does impact your community.

It so it really does.

You can be shopping or you can shop intentionally.

Yes.

Which one are you gonna do?

Yep.

Mm-hmm.

, I'm writing this down cuz that is a great way to.

I'm gonna put it back in my wrap up.

So I'm gonna put links to everything.

I'm gonna wrap this up with all the amazing things that you've said.

This was so much fun.

Thank you for being here.

I'm so glad we got to connect and you have to tell me how you know about in spirit.

Tequila.

I think you're gonna like it.

I'm gonna have to find it and I, and you know me.

I will find it.

thank you again.

My pleasure.

Thank you.

So, two tracks of thought here as I wrap up this amazing interview.

First, If you're eligible for a certification, get it.

If you don't know if you're eligible for a certification, reach out to

Heather and work with her to see what is available to you and what you qualify for.

Here's no downside to that.

Second, diversifying your supplier chain doesn't mean just diversifying the color

or the kind of people you work with.

It means diversifying your thought.

A diverse way of looking at problem solving, a diverse way of

thinking about your business and how you can serve your clients.

There is no downside to this either.

I know a lot of you who listen to this podcast are eligible for a certification

in one form or another, so if you have been thinking about it, maybe now is the

time to jump in and take action on it.

Like the stories Heather told you have no idea what that certification

could do for your business growth.

To tip our hat to Heather's love of the circus and her

tight rope walking abilities.

The drink of the week is drum roll, please.

The tight rope.

Here's what you're gonna need.

One and a half ounce of mezcal, one and a half ounce of rye,

one quarter ounce F tomorrow.

No.

One quarter ounce of cinnamon syrup, homemade.

You know how to make this.

You make the simple syrup and you put some cinnamon sticks in it and you steep

it and then you take cinnamon sticks out and then fall you got cinnamon syrup,

uh, couple dashes of chocolate bidders and a couple dashes of Angus store vs.

And if you have it spreads of grape for oil, what you're gonna do is you're

going to put everything into a cocktail.

You know, one of those crafts, you're with ice, you're gonna stir it, stir it, stir.

So this one's gonna shake.

You're gonna stir, stir, stir, stir, stir, stir, stir until it all comes together.

And then you're gonna strain that over one of those big rocks in an

old fashioned glass, and then garnish with that spritz of grape float oil.

All right, friends, that's it for this week.

If you like what you heard today, please leave, review

and subscribe to the podcast.

Also, remember, you can find me on LinkedIn, Julie Brown bd.

Just shoot me a note and let me know where you found me.

You can also find me on Instagram, Julie Brown bd, and that's it.

Until next week.

Teams.

Hey, thanks for taking the time to listen.

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And remember, you can unapologetically be who you authentically are

and still be wildly successful.

That's a fact.