Consulting Rainmakers Podcast

Craig della Penna is the Managing Partner and Founder of Aesop Partners.Craig della Penna started his consulting career at the Boston Consulting Group, where he rose to principal, before leaving in 2011 to join Green Peak Partners as its fifth consultant. Over the next seven years he helped grow the firm and led its organizational due diligence group, which grew five times while he was there. He then founded Aesop Partners, named after Aesop's Fables, the first book his dad read to him, with a client who offered to be his anchor tenant, and today advises private equity firms on leadership decisions from diligence to hiring. He is the co-creator of the Cipher framework and author of Cipher, and his team built HireBest, a software platform that uses AI to help companies design roles and run structured interviews. In this conversation, Craig explains why getting clear on the job matters more than interview skill, why so many investors still skip a hard look at the leadership they are buying, and why the promise of AI runs ahead of what it delivers today.Expect to learn how one client trained 500 hiring managers and saw a 50% drop in first-year failures, how a CFO covered for a weak finance team so well that his investors never saw it, what private equity firms pay for in diligence and what they leave out, why Aesop took a hundred versions before trusting AI with client reports, what nobody tells you about running your own firm, and why structure and intentional thought beat gut feel when selecting talent, and much more…-0:00 Cold open1:05 Welcome1:24 From BCG To Founding Aesop Partners6:29 The Cipher Framework9:41 Where Private Equity Hiring Goes Wrong12:15 The Leadership Diligence Most Deals Skip14:13 The Promise And Reality Of AI18:21 What Running Your Own Firm Really Takes20:49 There Is A Science To Selecting Talent21:48 Aesop's Fables Applied To Business23:10 Where To Find Craig della Penna-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Craig della Penna:https://www.linkedin.com/in/cdpWebsite: https://www.aesoppartners.com/HireBest: https://www.hirebest.ai/-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Sarah Rawlings is the Founder of The Invisible Agency.Sarah Rawlings has worked in communications and marketing for more than 35 years, in-house at architecture practices, in agencies including London Communications Agency, and on government work such as the UK's presence at MIPIM for the Department for International Trade. She studied business at Sheffield Hallam University and wrote her dissertation on marketing for architects, at a time when it was still a new discipline. About two and a half years ago she founded The Invisible Agency, a coalition of freelance communications experts specialising in the built environment, which builds a team around each client and project while running with agency systems and processes. In this conversation, Sarah explains why a coalition can bring the right expert in at every stage without the overhead of a fixed retainer, why companies are less quick to cut comms in a downturn than they used to be, and why the thing a client is proudest of is not always the story the market wants to hear.Expect to learn why you cannot afford to disappear when times get tough, the difference between a great initiative and a story a journalist will run, why PR is far more than getting into the press, why the best advisors spend more time saying no than yes, how comms should support the business strategy, and why Sarah would rather seize the moment than chase a grand vision, and much more…-0:00 Cold open1:06 Welcome1:17 Building The Invisible Agency3:57 Why A Coalition Beats A Generalist Firm7:19 Marketing Is No Longer Cut First In A Recession10:53 Your Big News Is Not Always A Story13:34 Getting Out From Behind The Desk16:14 PR Is More Than Press18:16 Comms Must Support The Business Strategy22:10 The Future Of The Invisible Agency23:54 Where To Find Sarah Rawlings-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Sarah Rawlings:https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-rawlings-9688523Website: https://www.theinvisibleagency.co.uk/-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Dr. Renee Thornton is the Founder & CEO of Pathfinder Resilience.Dr. Renee Thornton is a U.S. Navy and Army veteran with a Ph.D. in Crisis Intervention who has worked in leadership and organizational development since launching her first company, Metamorphosis Consulting, in 2002. She went on to lead training and research at The Command Post, teach at Indiana University's Kelley School of Business, and in 2020 founded Pathfinder Resilience, where she works with executives who want to build high-performing, people-centric workforce cultures, partnering with no more than a dozen leaders a year. She also hosts The Architecture Files on YouTube, where she is known as the People Architect. In this conversation, Renee explains why executives inherit cultures someone else designed, why the stereotypes about Gen Z say more about the generations who raised them, and why the people who will thrive next to AI are the ones who make themselves invaluable to other humans.Expect to learn why Gen Z can become your most loyal and highest performing employees, what serving in the military taught her about leadership, why she teaches executives to scout talent instead of recruiting it, why only about 4% of people in any industry are uniquely qualified to succeed in it, which careers AI will not replace, and how to protect yourself from being replaced, and much more…-0:00 Cold open1:03 Welcome1:41 Building People-Centric Cultures3:01 The Lie About Gen Z6:00 What The Military Taught Her About Leadership7:42 Leading In High-Stress Professions10:37 We Scout, We Don't Recruit12:51 Only 4% Are Built For It17:04 Will AI Take Your Job19:53 How To Outsmart AI21:27 Where To Find Dr. Renee Thornton-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Dr. Renee Thornton:https://www.linkedin.com/in/renee-thorntonWebsite: https://pathfinderresilience.com-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Colin Howes is the Founder & CEO of Series-X.Colin Howes started out running an ethical hacking business, which he sold in 2003, then spent years at Microsoft before leaving around 2012 to work as a fractional consultant, long before "fractional" became a LinkedIn label. Since then he has worked as a fractional CRO for startups and coached around 450 people through more than 1,200 hours of sessions, most of them senior people leaving 25 or 30 year corporate careers. Out of that work came Series-X, which puts senior operators into small and mid-sized businesses to find where AI, APIs and automation can improve their workflows, AdvisorPro, and his book The Fractional Founder. In this conversation, Colin explains why so many corporate leavers struggle to sell themselves, what being fractional really means, and why he believes the job market shift is already here.Expect to learn why letting go of your job title is the first step out of corporate, how to productize yourself so selling feels less personal, why nobody cares about your expertise until you solve their pain, how the shift to agentic AI changed what a small team can build, why AI is a convenient scapegoat for layoffs, and why Colin thinks everyone will have to be fractional, and much more…-0:00 Cold open1:06 Welcome1:30 From 450 Coaching Clients To Series-X4:18 Leaving The Corporate Machine7:22 What Fractional Really Means10:04 AI And The Shift To Agentic13:45 Letting Go Of Your Job Title18:17 The Fractional Founder20:31 Nobody Cares Until You Solve Their Pain23:10 The Future Of Employment25:46 Standing Out From AI Written Resumes-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Colin Howes:https://www.linkedin.com/in/colinhowes1/Website: https://www.series-x.ai/-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Brendan Daly is the Founder and Managing Director of Daly Ventures.Brendan Daly is an engineer and AI adoption advisor, a former Director of Technology at National General Insurance (Allstate) and a three-time UiPath MVP. He set up Daly Ventures in Ireland eleven years ago out of necessity: after helping found DayBlink Consulting in Washington DC, he was waiting on a green card and could not work for the firm he had helped build, so he started his own consulting practice. Repeat work for insurance clients led to a full-time role setting up their AI and automation program, where he scaled real-time AI coaching for contact center agents from 30 people to 2,500 within six months. Today Daly Ventures advises leaders on AI strategy, adoption and automation, and runs a small venture studio supporting early-stage startups. In this conversation, Brendan explains why buying the technology is the easy part of AI adoption, how an AI meant to shorten calls ended up making them longer and opening up sales, and how he picks which AI use cases to build first.Expect to learn why change management decides whether AI gets deployed enterprise-wide, why giving people access to the tools and permission to experiment matters, how AI and speech to text replaced random spot-checks of ten calls with a ranked view of every call, how a one or two day workshop turns scattered ideas into a prioritized backlog, why the best AI ideas often come from the people closest to customers, how a few quick wins justify bigger AI investments, and much more…-0:00 Cold open1:02 Welcome1:20 Starting Daly Ventures Out Of Necessity2:41 Why He Has No Elevator Pitch5:48 Where AI Adoption Really Starts8:22 The Biggest Surprise Of Running A Firm10:04 The AI That Made Calls Longer15:14 Choosing The Highest ROI Use Case21:45 Quick Wins Before Big Investments23:20 What Is Next For Daly Ventures24:38 Where To Find Brendan Daly-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Brendan Daly:https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanrdalyWebsite: https://dalyventures.com/-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Danielle Beckcom is the Founder & CEO of TADA Hotel Consulting.Danielle Beckcom started at a hotel front desk at 20 years old in College Station, Texas, moved into sales soon after, and has now spent 30 years in hotel sales, working with brands from extended stay and economy to select service and resorts. Her roles have included Sr. Regional Director of Field Sales at Extended Stay America, supporting 21 hotels across Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana, and Regional Director of Sales at Crestline Hotels & Resorts. In October 2018 she founded TADA Hotel Consulting, which provides remote and hybrid sales support to hotel owners, management companies and brands, and only hires sellers with at least 10 years of hotel sales experience. In this conversation, Danielle explains why hotel sales does not have to happen behind a desk on property, why rushing to fill the sales seat after COVID has hurt hotels, and what it took to build the company without a college degree.Expect to learn how TADA answers the "you don't know my market" objection, why every hotel has a client if you know who to look for, how AI is taking research and admin work off her sellers, what COVID taught a young company, how mid-market national accounts add revenue a brand's national sales team misses, and why trust is the hardest part of leading a remote team, and much more…-0:00 Cold open1:02 Welcome1:13 From The Front Desk To Founder2:41 What Remote Hotel Sales Really Means5:08 Why Rushing To Fill The Sales Seat Fails8:37 How AI Is Changing Hotel Sales10:10 What COVID Taught A Young Company12:59 Lessons From 21 Extended Stay Hotels14:55 What Makes TADA Different19:01 If You Have A Dream, Chase It21:00 Where To Find Danielle Beckcom-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Danielle Beckcom:https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniellebeckcomWebsite: https://www.tadahotelconsulting.com/-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Morgan Padgett is the CEO of Simply the Best! Bookkeeping & Business Solutions.Morgan Padgett has worked in accounting since graduating from UTA with a degree in Business and Psychology in 2012. She ran her own boutique in 2013 and 2014, then spent about three and a half years as office manager and bookkeeper at a roofing company, where she met the woman who is now her operations manager. When the general contractor she worked for next closed its doors in 2021 because the owner fell ill, she chose not to go back to an eight to five and started Simply the Best! Bookkeeping & Business Solutions instead. Five and a half years later the women owned, women run firm works as a back office in a box for roofing, construction and service trade businesses: bookkeeping, payroll, AP and AR, plus the admin side most owners never expect, from pulling permits and invoicing to calling insurance companies and soft collections, with one dedicated person on each account. In this conversation, Morgan explains why trades businesses wait too long to get the right people in place, what makes construction bookkeeping different, and what she learned the hard way about trying to do it all herself.Expect to learn why roofing companies usually call for help at year end or before the April tax deadline, why job costing matters when people are paid commission off a project, why Morgan hired an operations manager to manage the team, why this was a harder year for small businesses in Texas, why she would get her processes out of her head sooner, and why the more involved an owner is now, the harder it is to get them out of the business later, and much more…-0:00 Cold open1:01 Welcome1:17 Why She Started Her Own Firm2:57 A Back Office In A Box4:03 The Biggest Mistake Roofing Companies Make5:38 What Most Owners Do Not Realize Is Included6:30 Why Construction Needs Job Costing7:31 I Cannot Do It All By Myself8:26 A Hard Year For Small Businesses9:45 What She Would Do Differently10:52 Advice For Construction Business Owners11:37 Where To Find Morgan Padgett-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Morgan Padgett:https://www.linkedin.com/in/simplythebestbookkeeping/Website: https://simplythebestbookkeeping.com/-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Fred Soller is the co-founder and managing principal of Big Wheel Performance, an operator-led firm in Atlanta that builds capital-efficient, investor-ready revenue engines for B2B companies.Fred spent years in technology sales leadership at SAP and Oracle before leaving SAP in 2020 to start a consulting company. His first client, a small Atlanta software company, gave him equity and made him its full-time chief revenue officer, and a $400 million private equity backed global IT services company then hired him as its CRO. In August 2023 he decided he had been successful and wanted to be significant, reopened his firm and co-founded Big Wheel Performance with Bill Ryan. Today it has about seven operating partners and has worked with twenty five to thirty clients. In this conversation, Fred explains why most companies that say they are ready to scale are not, why a new CRO, more salespeople or another tool rarely fixes stagnant sales, and why AI only accelerates the process you already have.Expect to learn what a revenue engine really is, why CRO tenure averages 17 to 19 months, the difference between good pipeline and heroic pipeline, why founders should ask "should we" before "can we", how a client went from no new logos to 10 to 12 enterprise logos a year, where AI genuinely saves time in go to market, why industry experience is the last thing to hire a CRO for, and much more…-0:00 Cold open1:03 Intro1:30 From SAP And Oracle To Big Wheel Performance3:25 Why Most Companies Are Not Ready To Scale7:03 What A Revenue Engine Really Is9:04 The Quick Fixes That Never Work12:48 The Iceberg Under Struggling Sales15:48 Why AI Only Accelerates What You Already Have19:28 From No New Logos To 10 A Year22:22 What Makes A Good CRO25:32 Where AI Takes Go To Market Next28:04 How To Reach Fred-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Fred Soller:https://www.linkedin.com/in/fredsollerWebsite: https://bigwheelperformance.com-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Joe Zacks is the co-founder and managing partner of Aardwolf Global Solutions, a strategic intelligence and advisory firm in McLean, Virginia, built by recently retired senior CIA officers.Joe served for more than 42 years in US national security. He was commissioned in the US Army in 1983 and spent 21 years on active duty as a Field Artillery officer, then 21 years at the CIA in the Directorate of Operations, where he served as a Chief of Station, as Chief of Operations of the Counterterrorism Mission Center and, in his final assignment, as Deputy Assistant Director of the CIA for Counterterrorism. After retiring he co-founded Aardwolf with Michael Morell, the former Deputy Director of the CIA, and he is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council. In this conversation, Joe explains what a private intelligence firm really does for investors and law firms, why AI is powerful but never foolproof, and why a respectable title from your old career will not win you a single client.Expect to learn how geopolitical advisory and private intelligence differ, why sources on the ground go further than AI-driven due diligence, why critical thinking still decides whether an AI answer is right, what clients get wrong because of Hollywood, how CIA problem solving carries into business, why a competitive market means you are always hunting for the next contract, what it takes to bootstrap a firm, and much more…-0:00 Cold open0:29 Intro0:44 From 42 Years In Government To Co-Founding Aardwolf2:33 Geopolitical Advisory And Private Intelligence4:50 Where AI Helps And Why It Is Not Foolproof6:49 What Hollywood Gets Wrong About Intelligence Work9:45 How CIA Problem Solving Carries Into Business11:26 A Healthy But Very Competitive Market12:45 Building A Bootstrapped Firm14:36 Why Your Old Title Will Not Win Clients15:28 How An Engagement With Aardwolf Starts16:32 One Takeaway For Startup Founders-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Joe Zacks:https://www.linkedin.com/in/joe-zacks-2352066Website: https://www.aardwolfglobal.com-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]

Toby Cowx is the CEO and founding partner of Hyperion Business Solutions, a platform that gives SMEs access to fractional executives across finance, operations, HR, technology and more.Toby spent more than twenty years as a commercial banker with Canadian and US banks, including RBC, CIBC, Scotiabank and Wells Fargo. When the banks moved to box ticking lending, he left, partnered with an accounting firm and a law firm, and ran HGA Finance, helping companies deal with their banks, solve credit issues and raise capital in Canada, the US and as far afield as Bogotá. Seeing the same clients come back for capital every eighteen to twenty four months led him to start Hyperion two years ago, to fix the problems inside the business instead of only funding them. In 2017 he also started the Raising Spirits charity event in Calgary, run entirely by volunteers, which has raised more than $600,000 for children's mental health. In this conversation, Toby explains why ego's not your amigo when you ask a lender for credit, why he is cautious about AI and the flood of newly certified AI consultants, and how fractional executives can raise what an owner's business sells for.Expect to learn why banks moved to in the box lending, what lenders look for in a capital raise, why cash flow is still king, how a First Nations partnership won mask RFPs during COVID, how a volunteer charity earns its sponsors' trust, how to use AI without leaking private information, why fraud so often starts at the C suite, how Hyperion stands behind the CFOs it places, and much more…-0:00 Cold open0:32 Intro1:43 Why Banks Moved To Box Ticking Lending4:10 What Really Matters In A Capital Raise5:28 Ego's Not Your Amigo7:56 COVID Masks And A First Nations Partnership10:07 Raising Spirits And Earning Sponsors' Trust13:26 Why He Is Cautious About AI15:39 Six Figure Losses And No Regrets17:20 The Rise Of Fractional Executives21:38 Where To Find Toby Cowx-🔗 Guest & ResourcesConnect with Toby Cowx:https://www.linkedin.com/in/tobycowxWebsite: https://hyperionbusinesssolutions.com-Get in touch:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikulaszach/Apply to be a guest: https://consultingrainmakers.com/Email: [email protected]