Let me give some context on the company and a bit of background. First of all, I’m just so excited to be here and having this conversation right now. I started the business in 2019, and the fact that we’re growing the way that we are, I can’t even tell you how meaningful that is for me and how exciting that is for me, because I always wanted to build something bigger than just me, and we’re really doing that.

Prior to Mukala, I did a mix of things. I was in the Peace Corps, that were lived in Zambia, right out of Undergrad. The name Mukala is actually the word for “village” in the tribal language I learned when I was living there. I was a college football coach for a year, I went and worked in finance for a couple of years, and then, when I got out of business school, I really started on this path of working on the people side of business. That was ten years ago in 2012, and I did it at a company called Bridgewater Associates, which is a big hedge fund. Then I went to a boutique consulting firm called Green Peak and I spun out of there in 2019 and started Mukala.

I always talk about my career and other people’s careers; I always think about it’s a concept called the Hedgehog Concept from an author named Jim Collins. He wrote a book called “Good to Great.” It’s the idea that the best businesses or people in your career, you want to gravitate to things that align with your talents. Like, “What can you be world-class at align with your aspirations? What’s the kind of work you really want to do that’s meaningful to you and align with the market realities? Like, what can you get paid to do?” I think over time I’ve been fortunate where my career has really moved closer and closer to that overlap of those three circles in the Venn diagram. That Hedgehog and Mukala is a great version of that for me.

So, we’re three and a half, more than three and a half years in. We’ve got great client relationships. We’ve really narrowed the focus of the work that we do, deliberately narrowed it down. We have a core offering and a couple that branch off that, which is really exciting. Just to give you a sense of the work that we do here, it’s leadership development. We spend almost all our time with C-Suite leaders and senior private equity investors. So, we help them to assess the leadership teams of the businesses and work with them as executive coaches. We do team building. We advise on future hires to really help develop the leadership capabilities that exist in those businesses. It’s really exciting work. We get to learn about new businesses and work with new teams all the time.

We defined our “Seven Things,” for lack of a better word, to describe the culture and how we are with one another. That’s what I think culture really is: What’s your social contract with the people you work with?

As a quick overview of what they are, number one is Get Better Every Day. We apply that to ourselves and the work we’re doing with our clients and our stakeholders. We’re helping them get better as individuals and teams and then also the business. Mukala is an enterprise. We’re always trying to improve that. Every project we have a post project hot wash where we dissect what went well, what could be better, and next time we update. It’s just a continuous baked in part of working here and I think it’s really energizing.

We have another one Do the Right Thing, which is something my mother used to say to me when I was a kid. It’s about operating with integrity and consistency and making sure those two words mean a lot to us. We want our clients to feel that across all touch points with Mukala- integrity and consistency in the way we deliver our work, the way we engage with them and sometimes that means making harder decisions, but that’s important for us.

We have another one called Take a Stand. Have the courage and conviction to put your ideas out there. That’s the kind of place we are internally—we’re very transparent with each other, but also with our client work. We want to make sure we’re making a statement and putting a stake in the ground and giving our clients something to react to, not just being this kind of soft and fuzzy partner.

The fourth one is Be a Great Listener. It’s hugely important and it transcends a lot of what we do. We want to listen to each other as interviewers. For the work we’re delivering, you’ve got to be really a great listener. Be still, hear what people are saying, get curious, and ask another question. It’s a really meaningful thing you can do as coaches. That’s a huge, huge, huge skill as well.

Be Transparent is another one.

Tell the Truth and See What Happens.

Our Sixth one is Prioritize Action. This is a startup. You’ve got to get in here and roll your sleeves up. I’d much rather you do something you shouldn’t have done than you do nothing. Doing nothing thing is just a non-option here, right? So, let’s move fast and maybe we’ll make some mistakes along the way. But, sitting on our hands, is just not an option right now and it’s not the kind of place you want to build.

Then the last one is Collaborate for Success. Ask for help, work as a team, and win together.

There’s a bit about our culture.