As entrepreneurs continue to fuel the growth of registered businesses around the world, our team here at Equa aims to foster a one-stop, world-class destination for the management of documents, banking, and compliance.
By focusing on business creation and agreement simplification, Equa aims to significantly reduce the time and money demands associated with launching and managing an enterprise.
At Equa we strongly support trailblazing business leaders who demonstrate a visionary spirit in their entrepreneurial pursuits. Accordingly, we would like to introduce you to Denver businesswoman Keo Frazier who agreed to be our first EquaPROFILE feature interview.
Ms. Frazier is the co-founder of Fractional Executive, a startup firm that endeavors to help small businesses with tight resources propel their strategies and initiatives forward without having to sacrifice or hire a full-time strategic executive. Supported by a collaborative group of women business partners, FE will provide strategy, planning, and execution tactics services to businesses, utilizing easy-to-use systems and templates.
Below, Frazier offers a few thoughts about today’s ever-changing entrepreneurial environment.
On Launching Fractional Executive
In recent months, I began noticing that a lot of people were reaching out to me in the hopes that I could assist them with marketing and strategic planning, things that often require a higher-level executive. But often they can’t afford to hire someone on a permanent basis for their organization. So with Fractional Executive, they can receive all of the benefits they would otherwise have with a full-time executive without the long-term commitment.
On Her Current Work
I’ve been going into companies helping them with very high-level things while being integrated into their team. Once I finish what they need me to do, I step away and then come back to re-evaluate.
On Target Market
We target small companies, sort of the small to growing companies, those companies that really can’t afford to pay someone for a high-level leadership role but they still need some important things done strategically. That’s where it started and where we’re heading.
On Startup Companies
It’s painful to watch business leaders piecemeal their organizations together, whether it be their marketing stuff or their operations. I see a lot of that occurring with different companies and industries.
On Why Focus Is Important
In my view, it’s important to be a master of one thing versus a jack of all trades. Those who pursue the latter often end up doing most of it poorly because things constantly fall outside of their area of expertise. So when starting a company and running it, the smartest CEO’s who are good in a particular area like, say, being a visionary or strategist, focus on that.
On Doing Too Much, Too Soon
I find that small companies think they can do it all and they end up struggling in the first couple of years when the reality is they can’t do it all and, most importantly, can’t do it all well. Fractional Executive was started in part to encourage founders to pursue becoming a master of one thing while allowing other people to pick up the rest.
On Why Business Systems Are Essential
If you don’t have systems in place, things can quickly become a mess with your business. Then you have to frequently go back in and fix things. I see so many companies still behaving like a two-person shop versus a 20 person company. And in a realm like finance or accounting, they tend to do things as if they were a 1–2 person shop versus a full-on small business.
On Compliance Requirements
Compliance is huge. It’s imperative for business leaders to ensure that they’re in line with not only what their industry requires but what the government requires. Because at the end of the day, there’s nothing worse than not having everything in order when you’re audited.
On the Importance of Documentation
When you haven’t been maintaining good documentation, it can make things very hard on your business. Sadly, it often takes going through and failing an audit for things to really sink in. So as a business owner, I believe you CANNOT be in compliance. Because if you get audited, you could possibly end up losing the business you’ve built because you didn’t take care of your stuff upfront.
On Women Business Owners
I know many women are struggling with this whole glass ceiling idea. But let me say this. What if there wasn’t a ceiling? And what if we looked at things as though there wasn’t anyone there to hinder us. Of course, I’m not denying that the barriers exist. But what if we could push past the idea of being held back and cut the fear out. What if we as women we got out of our own way?
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