IAM092 – CEO Helps Organizations Overcome Technology & Customer Churn Challenges to Succeed

Nicole Maaguo is the Founder & CEO of Cultivate Ink, LLC a boutique tech firm that helps organizations overcome technology and customer churn challenges to reach new levels of success. Cultivate Ink accomplishes this by elevating strategic priorities and goal setting to help customers align investment with desired outcomes. Over the course of her career, Nicole has served non-profits, associations, software start-ups, and Fortune 100 companies. Nicole is also the creator of #ProjectBox, a subscription box of curated professional development for aspiring leaders. In her spare time, Nicole advances the customer success and women in tech movements as the Co-President of PulseLocal DC and as a contributor for MsTech.

• CEO Hack: Evaluate your PROTI – Personal Return on Time Invested / Protect the time you have
• CEO Nugget: Practicing everyday generosity
• CEO Defined: Visionary and helping to make the path for those around you, modeling your companies values and Chief customer advocate

Website: https://www.cultivateink.com/projectbox

Instagram: www.instagram.com/cultivateink_projectbox/ 
Facebook: www.facebook.com/cultivateink
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/nicolemaaguo/
PulseLocal DC: www.linkedin.com/groups/8282977
MsTech Blog: https://ms-tech.co/blog/

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Transcription:

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Intro 0:02

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

Gresham Harkless 0:27

Hello, Hello, Hello, this is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast and I have a very special guest on the show today I have Nicole Maaguo of Cultivate Ink, LLC. Nicole, it's awesome to have you on the show.

Nicole Maaguo 0:37

Thank you so much for inviting me, I really appreciate it.

Gresham Harkless 0:39

No problem, no problem. Now, what I wanted to do was just read a little bit more about Nicole so you can hear about all the awesome things that she's been able to do and accomplish. Nicole is the Founder & CEO of Cultivate Ink, LLC a boutique tech firm that helps organizations overcome technology and customer churn challenges to reach new levels of success. Cultivate Ink accomplishes this by elevating strategic priorities and goal setting to help customers align investment with desired outcomes.

Over the course of her career, Nicole has served non-profits, associations, software start-ups, and Fortune 100 companies. Nicole is also the creator of #ProjectBox, a subscription box of curated professional development for aspiring leaders. In her spare time, Nicole advances customer success and women in tech movements as the Co-President of PulseLocal DC and as a contributor for MsTech. Nicole, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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Nicole Maaguo 1:37

Bring it on. I'm excited.

Gresham Harkless 1:39

All right, let's do it. So the first question I had is if you could tell us a little bit more about your CEO story. And what led you to start your business?

Nicole Maaguo 1:45

Absolutely. I think part of me always had the entrepreneurial bug. I actually founded my first organization in third grade, it was a kid for saving the Earth Club, which was sponsored by Target at the time. And over the course of that, my life, I went on to found several other clubs in high school and then eventually meet-ups and other types of organizations, so that bug was always there within me. But I actually started out leaving college I had studied economics and International Affairs, and I studied abroad in Uganda, I became super passionate about microfinance and I worked in microfinance after graduating until I hit a ceiling and even though my thesis had on microfinance, and I had done all this field-based research in Uganda, I was told I needed investment banking experience in the US before I could move over into managing microfinance investments.

So I moved to San Francisco enterprising person would and I tried to, get that experience on my resume, I hit a lot of robots, especially applying to jobs in that field, and I started to feel like maybe I should change my name to coal as instead of going by Nicole because I was feeling a little bit of gender discrimination in the hiring process. I finally got a couple of job offers to go into Christmas but when we came back from the holidays in January, the formal written offering never came through and lo unbeknownst to me, there were bigger things and the environment turning at that time, I went ahead and married my fiancee who had moved to San Francisco with me, we found out we were expecting, decided to move back to the Midwest.

And within a couple of months of getting back to the Midwest, this was around the summer of 2007, we found out as did the rest of the nation that Bear Stearns was in really bad financial trouble. And the reason my job offers had dissipated was that the financial industry was starting to collapse in on itself.

It was devastating at the time, but it turned out to be an amazing thing for me because by not going into investment banking, I was open to going into software development and I took a job at Rotary International, which was back into my microfinance space thinking I would eventually get into grantmaking, but ended up in software development at Rotary International doing a lot of their custom builds.

And I just loved it, it really blended creativity and problem-solving for me in a way that other things hadn't. So that became my career path going forward. It led me to the software startups that I worked at later on and it really let me do things in ways I never would have thought possible. The last software company I was at, I was recruited into when I was eight months pregnant, and immediately jumped on the plane to fly to London for training before I was too far along in the pregnancy and couldn't fly anymore. And those are things that are just not really open to women a lot of times but because of the software industry, that was an opportunity for me. So my last software company, was purchased, it was acquired, and I decided, this is it, this is the time I've always known I wanted to eventually go do something on my own and this is a great opportunity to do that.

Gresham Harkless 4:42

Awesome. Awesome, awesome. Well, that definitely sounds like a roller coaster. So I'm sorry to hear that. You went through all of that, but it seems like you were pushed in the right direction. Is that correct to say?

Nicole Maaguo 4:54

Absolutely. Anytime things look like they're going wrong at the moment. It's just because you can't see the bigger picture What's meant for you? And I totally feel like that's what happened with my career and my life.

Gresham Harkless 5:04

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. And that's a good reminder for everybody that might be, going through the downs that there is always light at the end of the tunnel, and just might be redirecting you towards something that's even better. So I appreciate you sharing that with us. And I wanted to drill down a little bit deeper and hear a little bit more about what you're doing with Cultivate Ink and how you're helping out these tech companies.

Nicole Maaguo 5:23

Yeah, absolutely. Well, how we help our clients really depends on which type of client I'm working with because right now we have two main types of clients. So the first is businesses or other organizations that are looking for help overcoming technology challenges, specifically in regards to software or multi-system websites. So a lot of times these clients have outgrown their current solutions, or their needs have evolved, and they're looking for a partner to come in and help them that might mean helping them transform the challenge into an opportunity, such as overseeing the development of a new software, product or app, or it could mean helping enhance a current product or a website to better serve their goals.

For our other clientele which is largely aspiring female leaders. We have that monthly subscription box and it delivers curated leadership lessons to help ambitious women unlock the leader within themselves, and help overcome any impostor syndrome, they might be feeling and self-doubt. Each lesson includes a must-read book for them a skill mastery workbook to help them really internalize the lesson and then some additional gifts designed to enhance habit development and help keep them motivated and inspired.

Gresham Harkless 6:22

Nice. I love that. And obviously, getting the opportunity to get that every single month I am sure definitely helps out as far as building the confidence not just to go and do, what you're destined to do or hoping to do as a leader, but also to understand exactly how to do it.

Nicole Maaguo 6:37

Absolutely. And it helps them take their personal development and personal growth and just put it on autopilot because they know every month, a new great lesson is gonna appear in the mail.

Gresham Harkless 6:46

There you go. There you go. I love that. So now I wanted to ask you for your secret sauce it might be just for you or it might be both for your organization but what do you feel separates you or differentiates you?

Nicole Maaguo 6:57

I think what really sets Cultivate Ink aside is the customer success mentality, it really permeates every aspect of the company and the services that we offer. A lot of companies will make sure that the software they deliver meets the basic requirements needed to complete the project. But we'll come alongside our clients and start truly understanding their strategic priorities and then we'll use those priorities to inform the project from day one all the way through day done to make sure we're setting goals and we're meeting the client's vision, it's getting realized and it's not just another item getting checked off the list.

There are really no silver bullets in software development. But there are companies out there like Cultivate Ink, that put you at the heart of the technology solution that's delivered.

Gresham Harkless 7:33

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. And that's the most important thing like you said, be at the heart, because, helps make sure that you're reaching your goals as an organization. Because at the end of the day, when you peel back the onion, that's what, these organizations are trying to do and try to leverage as much of those platforms in order to do that, but having organizations that lean on like yourself, your organization, definitely, I'm sure to help out with that.

Nicole Maaguo 7:54

Yeah, definitely. And people sometimes forget that technology is supposed to serve them, not the other way around. So we make sure that those prioritizations are clear.

Gresham Harkless 8:02

Yeah, well, thank you for that reminder, too, because sometimes I feel that way, as well. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit and ask you for what I call a CEO hack. And this might be a resource, like an app, a book, or a habit that you have that makes you more effective and efficient as a CEO.

Nicole Maaguo 8:17

Yeah, so I know, CEOs are always looking for ROI. But I think one important thing is to start developing your PROTI. And I call that your personal return on time invested, it's easy to look at other people's work and see opportunities for business process improvement. But when you look at your own work, it's so close to yours that it's hard to see those areas where you could be improving.

So anytime you do something repeatedly, maybe more than three or four times a month, I like to try to scrutinize the process that I'm using and see if there are ways that I can automate it, I can streamline it, or I could offload it to others completely. I feel like as a CEO, my time is the most valuable thing I have and if I don't use it carefully, I'm not gonna get any more of it. So I try to invest in activities today that will help me free up time in the future and I don't stop at work, I try to apply the same process to household management at home.

So we recently got a Eufy RoboVac and now it cleans the house, and the floors for us twice a day. That's one less thing that anybody in my house has to do. So I think it's really important to protect the time you have so that you can spend it with your family on your personal development on your mindset and the only way you're going to do that is by saving time and other aspects of your work and home life.

Gresham Harkless 9:21

Yeah, I love that. And I love that perspective. Because I really like the Eufy Vac, all those little minutes add up. And they're not only just minutes, but it's things that you have to worry about, oh, I didn't vacuum or I didn't do XY and Z. But as you said if you're doing it three or four times, a week or month or a day or whatever. Those might be things that you can automate and take off your plate so to speak, so you can focus on higher-level things.

Nicole Maaguo 9:46

Exactly. Or even just having the time to go for a run in the afternoon if that's something you enjoy.

Gresham Harkless 9:51

Exactly, exactly. Awesome. And now I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO nugget and this might be a word of wisdom or piece of advice or something that you might tell your younger business self.

Nicole Maaguo 10:02

Yeah, so I think that for me, and this is really a core value of our company as well, it comes down to practicing everyday generosity. As a CEO, you have a fiduciary responsibility to set high-value contracts and I'm not talking about abandoning the need to get your company a good deal. I'm really talking about targeted random acts of kindness and directing those toward your employees, your partners, and your clients. Corporate gifting and corporate compassion, I think need to make a bit of a revival, people focus on sending out branded trinkets to clients during the holiday.

But instead, they should really be focusing on sending a pair of baby booties to the client that just had their first kid or sending a partner a handwritten note to let them know how much you appreciate the partnership. You can be generous with your team by throwing them a party if they hit a major milestone or just be approachable if one of your employees needs to talk. I think that generosity is really important to help you stay humble. It'll help you stay grateful. It can prevent analysis paralysis, and it will enable you to serve those around you until they reach success. Because it really is the little things that matter.

Gresham Harkless 10:58

Yeah. And people start to pay attention to those little things and always mess up the quote. But people don't know how much you care until they show them how much you care, always mess that up. But it's just at the end of the day, those little small things that people do that extend beyond, just the trinket, the branded trinkets that go so much farther to let you remind you, your organization that people within your organization, also your clients that you do actually care.

Nicole Maaguo 11:20

Exactly. And it's one of those things that sometimes being generous, your time can be the most generous thing you have to offer because we are all pressed for it. So it doesn't always have to cost a lot of money. It's really the thought that matters.

Gresham Harkless 11:33

Very, very true. Awesome, awesome, awesome. And now I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of being a CEO and we're hoping to have different, quote-unquote, CEOs on this show. So I wanted to ask you specifically, what being a CEO means to you.

Nicole Maaguo 11:46

I think first and foremost, the CEO needs to be the company's visionary and define the road ahead. I've been at software startups where the CEO had brought the company out but then started to let other people drive the vision and it doesn't really work very well after a certain point in time. So as the CEO, I think you really have to be forcing yourself to stay on that visionary road and help to illuminate the path for everyone around you, I think you need to be the one that's defining and modeling the company values, it's great to say that you encourage employees to take a vacation, but if they never see you taking a vacation, they're not going to feel like they're capable of following that. And I think most importantly, the CEO always has to be the chief customer advocate, again, where the bottom line is concerned, if employees don't see you doing what's in the customer's best interest, they're not going to model that behavior.

Gresham Harkless 12:35

Exactly, exactly. Make sure that you're being a leader, and that you're practicing what you preach. And, whether you know it or not everyone's paying attention, especially if you have that quote-unquote, CEO title, or that leadership role, you are manifesting whatever it is that you say. So whatever you do, people are going to be listening to and paying attention to. So I think that's a phenomenal definition.

Nicole Maaguo 12:54

Thank you.

Gresham Harkless 12:54

No problem. And Nicole, I truly appreciate you for taking some time out of your schedule. What I wanted to do is pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there was anything additional, you want to let our readers and our listeners know about you and your business and also, of course, how to subscribe to the project box.

Nicole Maaguo 13:08

Yeah, I would just say, for anyone out there, you're gonna hit roadblocks. It's not about the roadblock. It's about how you persevere and overcome it, life is always going to throw those in your way and the people that really succeed in business and in life, in general, are the ones that are able to take those and try to find the perspective out of them so that they can keep moving forward. If you want to get in touch with me, the easiest way to do that is through Instagram, my Instagram is @cultivateink_projectbox, or you can find us online at www.cultivateink.com. And if you're in the DC area, we would always love to have you at one of our pulse local events and you can find information about that on our website.

Gresham Harkless 13:55

Awesome, Awesome, awesome. Thank you so much again, Nicole. I appreciate everything that you're doing. And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

Nicole Maaguo 14:01

Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

Outro 14:04

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co

I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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