Episode 33: Becoming a Change Manager – with Carol-Anne McConnellogue of CA Business Consults

Episode 33: Becoming a Change Manager - with Carol-Anne McConnellogue of CA Business Consults

Jeremy Cline 0:00
I'm Jeremy Cline and this is Change Work Life.

Hello and welcome to Change Work Life, the show that's all about beating the Sunday evening blues and enjoying Mondays again. This week's guest is Carolyn-Anne McConnellogue. In some ways, you'll find her story quite similar to some others that you've recently heard on the podcast. She had a good job, she started a family - and then suddenly everything changed. Carol-Anne's now got her own business as a change management consultant. And the story of just how she got there really is quite an interesting one. Here's the interview. Hello, Carol-Anne, welcome to the podcast.

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 0:48
Morning. Jeremy, nice to talk to you.

Jeremy Cline 0:51
Can you start by introducing yourself and telling us what it is that you do?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 0:54
Yes, certainly. So I am Carol-Anne McConnellogue, and I have my own business. I work for myself as a consultant - a business consultant - primarily in helping businesses to implement change. But I pick up projects for companies such as project management, implementing change projects that perhaps the firm has been wanting to do for some time, and don't have the resources to do etc. So yeah, a bit of an all-rounder, really. That's essentially what I do.

Jeremy Cline 1:25
When you say you change management, helping companies through change, what sort of changes do you help them with?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 1:30
If I use my most recent contract, I worked with a group of businesses - companies in Luton - and I managed a diverse bag of projects which was really interesting, from repurposing their staff intranet - I led that with a team of their staff, which was really rewarding, I was selling property for them, I oversaw the GDPR - they had issues with GDPR so I guided that to a successful conclusion. So a real mixed bag really of interesting projects. And I did some HR work with the HR manager and the general manager for one of their businesses, I kind of assisted and mentored a little bit by setting up some strategy and things like that. So it's a real mixed bag of stuff.

Jeremy Cline 2:20
So what's your role in all this? I mean, I'm sure that you're extremely talented, but to be an expert on GDPR, and an expert on a firm intranet, and an expert on HR issues and an expert on everything else. So what's your sort of day to day look like in terms of helping companies with this sort of thing?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 2:36
Well first I'm not an expert in any of those fields! [Laughs] What I think my talent is, is getting the best out of people. So those who have the experience in that field, so it's just guiding people - holding their hand almost - to fixing problems or to making improvements so it's more of a project lead, an expert in those fields, but I suppose it is just having that kind of impartial view as a consultant is quite a powerful position to be in because you're not in the company politics or you don't have to be massively attached to the business to be able to help the staff to drive forward the changes. So it's more of a hand-holding position that I have. And it's been very rewarding, actually, because I tend to bring the best out of people to get things done.

Jeremy Cline 3:26
What are the skills that you need for your particular job?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 3:29
I'm a very people-centric person. So I understand that we're not all the same. People are different, they have different characteristics. I think you have to be very patient and I think you have to recognise the skills that people have and build teams around you that complement each other. And I think that's the most valuable tool to have when you are working for different companies who have different personalities and different dynamics. I think if you're able to bring the best out in people and recognise their strengths and their weaknesses that really helps - and not being too bombastic about things and having a positive attitude. People feed off that. I'm a pretty glass is half full kind of person. So that helps.

Jeremy Cline 4:13
And is change manager something that you qualify into, or is it that you just kind of identify a bundle of skills that you've got that is suited for that kind of thing?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 4:23
Yeah, it's definitely the latter. It's definitely just experiences. I mean, if I'd picked this up 10 years ago, I would no way have been - I wouldn't have had the right to say that I'm a change manager. I believe that my journey to get here has absolutely helped me in being confident to be able to put myself forward as a change manager from all the mistakes I've made, all the learnings, all the positive stuff - and experience in business. So it's not something you go to university or college to learn to do. I think it's a kind of tag you can give yourself after you've had lots of life, career experiences.

Jeremy Cline 5:02
Okay, so how do your clients know that they need someone like you that they need someone to help them with this process? And then how do they go on from that, to know that you are the person who can help them?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 5:16
That's quite interesting, actually, because I'm not 100% sure. There's no kind of right or wrong answer to this I don't think. How I have approached it since embarking on this - because this is relatively new for me, I've been a change consultant for just one year now - but I felt that I could tap into businesses that I had connected with from my prior experience as a recruitment consultant. I recognised quite quickly that actually businesses who I connected with and worked with to help them to recruit sometimes didn't actually need somebody permanent. They didn't need to have someone in a role five days a week, you know, eight hours a day, I recognised that there were certainly issues that they were having that could be fixed quite quickly, and I suppose you know, for me, it was very much a case of thinking actually, I could do that kind of stuff. So really coming back to your question, I've just tapped into those - kept my connections through LinkedIn and just through networking, and speaking with businesses to say, look, if you have any projects that you just want to get done, give me a shout. You know, let's talk about it. Let's see if there's something I can do. And so it's very kind of low level, I don't have an amazing website. I'm kind of tapped into those connections that I've built up over the last few years.

Jeremy Cline 6:35
Okay, so let's talk a bit about that. You mentioned before this interview that you started out in travel and tourism. So what were you're doing and how did you get into that?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 6:45
After school, I went to Eastbourne College to do a travel and tourism course. I knew I wanted to be in aviation. One of my uncles was a very successful airport person, and I did my first work experience at Gatwick airport with him. And I just got the bug, I just got it. And I just loved it. And I knew that's what I wanted to do. I didn't want to be an air hostess, I didn't want to be a hostie. I just wanted to be part of that whole kind of airport vibe thing. So I went to do my travel and tourism course and I was lucky enough to get my first job - proper job - was for a tour operator. And then I just kept going, I thought, right this it, I want to I want to work for an airline now. So I did that, I moved back to Scotland and joined Air UK, goodness me, as a check-in agent. And then from there, I just progressed and travelled through to you know, ticket desk, which was the next level up and then I became a duty manager and then airport manager and did a lot of travel, a lot of good work, which is why it brought me up to this neck of the woods. I ended up working for EasyJet. I joined EasyJet in 2000 as a ground operations manager. So yes, that's kind of a whistle stop tour of the travel and tourism stuff.

Jeremy Cline 8:00
What caused you to leave that industry?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 8:02
I got married and had my first child. I had my first daughter and and everything changes when you have children - everything. I did return to work within a year of having my first child, but it didn't take me long to realise actually, I don't think I can do all of this. I want to be home with my baby. And my work was pretty demanding. I wasn't a shift worker, but certainly there were projects and certain things, you know, things I was involved with, I wasn't able to give 100% - it was difficult, with the little one in nursery and such like. So I kind of - with my husband - decided actually I'm going to get off the bus for a little while. I'm going to have a break, and that's what I did. So I resigned and I was lucky actually because I did go back part-time, but it was still a pretty demanding job. Yeah I decided to get off that whole thing and stay at home, which I did, but I quickly became involved in a project in the village, which I live and became chair of the preschool and we got funding for a new building. So I project led that for five years. So that was almost like having a job!

Jeremy Cline 9:17
That was just a voluntary role?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 9:18
It was a voluntary position. Yeah. And so with some other parents in the village, we worked really hard. And it was worth every bit, because we were able to, you know, secure this funding and got this amazing new facility, which is going to be around for a long, long time, and people are enjoying now with their children. So that was excellent. So when that came to an end, I knew I had to do something else. I wanted to kind of get my brain working again and start working. My dream as a young girl was always to be my own boss - always be my own boss - which I think is quite a common thing that people have. So I did an Open University distance learning course. It was a really basic course on business studies, which was absolutely brilliant. And I kind of really enjoyed learning actually. I was never a great academic at school. It wasn't really my thing. I really got into the rhythm of learning new stuff. And I got, you know, the pressure of having to get a piece of work done by deadline. It was all kind of stressful at times, but it was exciting, and I loved it. And that gave me the confidence to really pursue my dream of being my own boss. So I started to apply for jobs, and very quickly got really disillusioned and really disappointed because I didn't have any project management qualifications as such. I kept being told by recruitment agencies Oh, no, you can't No, this is a full time role. You've got to work full time to get this kind of job. You've got to have project management, you've got to have six sigma, you gotta have PRINCE2, you've got to have all this stuff. And I was just actually really, really disappointed and I was surprised. I suppose I was a bit naive as well thinking I could just walk back into a really cool job that would give me great money, and on my terms.

Jeremy Cline 11:06
You said, 'I had an aspiration to be my own boss,' you do the OU business course and then you start applying for jobs. What's the thinking there if your aspiration is to be your own boss?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 11:15
To be honest, during that period of time I'd just finished the project with the pre-school, I'd done my OU course, I needed to earn some money, best thing to do is get back into a job and pick up my skills - I'd had a bit of a gap - and then planned to see where that takes me with a view to start in my own business. I had this kind of consultancy thing in the back of my mind as being my own boss. I think the thing for me was having spent that five years in that kind of voluntary role, I was surrounded by amazing people, amazing talent, you know. I had accountants - I think every playground has them, lawyers, accountants, HR managers, marketeers. And I just thought, gosh you know, there's so many great people here, if I can get into a company, I can work for a company, I can bring this talent in or if I can work for lots of different companies, I can tap into all this great talent because they're all saying the same thing. 'Oh, I'm really fed up, I can't get a job, I can't get a part time role' - that was kind of my thinking. I didn't have a master plan at that point, Jeremy, for sure. I knew that I had to get something, and if that was working for someone for a period of time whilst I kind of got to the end result which was to work for my myself then that was kind of my plan.

Jeremy Cline 12:30
Okay, so after banging your head against a wall for a little while, what was the breakthrough?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 12:34
The breakthrough for me was researching. I started to research consultants and part-time work and I was googling everything and reading and I came across a recruitment issue. So I was exasperated by recruitment consultants who were just telling me I had to have all these qualifications to stand a chance of getting back into some kind of project work or operational work and I had to work full time. And I came across a company who specialised in part time and flexible recruitment. And so my ears pricked up and I just got quite excited. Carried on reading - they were quite a local company - and at the bottom they said they have franchise opportunities. So I got on the phone straight away to the founder, Deborah, and we had a really massively long call and I said, you haven't got anyone round here. I said this is great, North Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire is a great area. There's so much talent, so many businesses, and that was it. That's where my journey in recruitment began. It was just a one-off, saw them online and just picked up the phone straight away, because it resonated so much with me.

Jeremy Cline 13:47
So having been looking for flexible roles, part time roles, ideally project management roles, and you came across this agency which specialised in that - how did that lead to going into business with them buying the franchise rather than using their services to find a role that was suitable for you?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 14:06
Because it almost opened up new doors for me. It wasn't just that they resonated with my situation as a professional who wanted to work part time and have that flexibility around the family, but it also ticked the box for me to be my own boss, to have my own business. It was a kind of a win-win really for me, because I was an example of the kind of candidates that the agency represented. I was a mum, who still had much to offer to businesses and wanted to work - and they were going to be the kind of people that I would be representing. So that was a massive attraction to me. The conversation was great with Deborah at the time. I was really massively excited. And I wanted to pursue the opportunity, which I did. I did invite somebody to join me, we did it as a kind of joint venture - so I had a business partner to begin with, which worked brilliantly for a number of years, then we just decided it wasn't working for different reasons and then I bought them out so I ran the business solely myself for the last three years that I had it. But it was absolutely the right thing to do in the beginning because we embarked on this really exciting journey together. You know, she was a fellow mum, we were newbies. We were new business owners, we were both new to recruitment. I've never done recruitment in my life. It was a total change from running a station - an airport with baggage handlers and cargo departments and operations and check-in staff and all that good stuff. It was an enormous change from that type of work. So to have someone with me, shoulder to shoulder, was brilliant. We had a great time. It was a really exciting time.

Jeremy Cline 15:53
Why did you think that you could do it not having had any experience in recruitment before?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 16:00
[Laughs] I just knew, I just knew. I think you have a confidence. I think I said it earlier, if you'd have put me in that position 10 years ago, I wouldn't have had the confidence. But having gone through the career that I had, taken the career path that I had and all the experiences that gave me, leading the project with the community, the preschool - I felt I could do it. Yeah. My Open University course as I said, was very valuable. So I had a bit of an understanding about what you needed to know - understand your money, your budget, there was the marketing aspects, the HR aspect. I'd been involved in recruitment naturally in my previous roles, because everyone is, aren't they. You know, you recruit people, you advertise for staff, you interview people - so I had some idea, but certainly not the level of recruitment consultant. But we were very lucky, we had a lot of good support from the franchisors. So whilst we were quite autonomous in how we ran the business, we were very true to the ethos of the business and we were very close to the founders and the other franchisees. It was the best of both worlds in some respects because while we were business owners, we were in charge of our own time and how we delivered the workshops that we did, etc. But we were very true to the model. And we still felt like we were part of a bit of a team. So it was a nice situation to have actually.

Jeremy Cline 17:19
I don't know very much about franchising, but I do get the impression that it tends to be quite process driven and if you join a franchise, they give you processes and things that they expect you to do and follow. Was that the case here, and was there to start lots of training in terms of what they were expecting of you, being a recruitment consultant for them, what you were expected to do - all that sort of stuff?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 17:43
Yeah. And I had heard that too. In the early stages before committing to buying a franchise - I read many articles and had some advice from family 'Oh careful', because there are franchises who have that I suppose reputation where you don't have the autonomy that you think you're gonna have - you're totally governed by them. This was certainly very different. This was really different. It wasn't like buying a McDonalds or a Dominos. I think that first phone call that I had with the founder went on for over an hour. I remember it clearly and thinking, I really like her. We quickly met and she was like me, she had a successful business in the corporate world before her and her husband had exactly the same experience as I did, which was frustration at being surrounded by amazing talent. And everyone was saying the same thing as they were I'm sure in every playground - you know, I've trained to be a solicitor, I've trained to be this, I've trained to be an accountant - and having children has just put a kibosh to that. I can't go back to work because I can't find a job that will give me the hours I need. They kind of birthed their product on the back of that, which was exactly the situation that I found myself in. They were fine that I had no recruitment experience. I think what was important to them was that I could represent the candidates and I did have an element of business acumen obviously with my experience and previous experience - so yeah, it was a good match. It's funny actually, because I used to hold back saying that I'd bought a franchise - and I didn't always say that. I often said, Oh I have my own recruitment business. And then if asked, I'd say yeah, well, I am part of a network of other agencies that do the same thing. But yeah, there is a bit of a thing about franchises I think, a preconceived conception about 'they're all the same'. But actually they're not - this one certainly wasn't.

Jeremy Cline 19:36
But it wasn't that you were particularly attracted to going into a franchise, it was just this specific thing came up that appealed?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 19:44
Absolutely. No, I had not even thought about a franchise up until - it was just a series of events. I explained earlier it was just coming away from doing the project in the village and then doing my course and then doing some research and then it just all happened one thing after another. That's the way things go sometimes. So it felt really natural, it felt like the right thing to do. But certainly I wasn't pursuing franchises as an option. But it just so happened that it was there on the day I was doing some research.

Jeremy Cline 20:17
So you said that you've been doing your change consultancy now for about a year. Let's talk about the transition out of that. Are you out of the franchise now?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 20:28
Yeah, I parted ways last February, actually. So yeah, it is a year. I made my mind up actually earlier than that obviously. It was not something I just did - woke up one morning and decided to do - it was something that I had considered for some time. I knew I wanted to change direction a little bit. I wanted to really get into business, I wanted to - whilst I loved the recruitment aspect - you know, I learned so much and it gave me a lot of brilliant contacts and I've met some amazing people made some fantastic connections between candidate and professional businesses, but I just was missing something - I like doing stuff. I like making things happen. And I was missing that. So I thought, okay, maybe now's the time to see if I can make it as a consultant. It was time for change. I shared my plans with the franchisors before, gave them plenty of time and they tried to talk me out of it - well not talk me out of it, but they wanted to make sure I was certain about my choice and decision. But yeah, I was definitely. It was time. So we had a nice transitional period, and I hung up the keys last year.

Jeremy Cline 21:35
Did that involve selling the franchise to someone or it being purchased back or do you just sort of drop out of it?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 21:41
I was happy to do that. I think I could have made more I suppose. But it was fine. My work there was done. 'Here we are, have it!' Sadly I wasn't able to hand it over to somebody, because that would have been brilliant. Because over six years, six and a half years I had the business I built up an amazing portfolio bank of talent. I had over 3,000 candidates who had registered with me in the North Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire areas, and also some fantastic clients, brilliant businesses as well. And if I had my own way I would have handed it nicely over to somebody - it went back into the pot basically, it went back to the franchisors. So there's nobody actively doing what I was doing. They are doing it but from their central head office, which is fine and I still get lots of interesting rules come through from them. So it really was a case of 'Okay, bye, thank you. It's been a blast.'

Jeremy Cline 22:36
And the transition itself - was it day one was your last day at the franchise and day two you started doing thing, or how much were you lining yourself up for starting your new business as you exited the franchise?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 22:50
Well, interestingly, I was very fortunate because I did literally walk into contracts straight away on the back of my experience at Ten2Two. So I had a client who I'd placed a good number of people with who came to me and asked if I may have somebody who could fulfil - she had a big list of projects that she was working on, or she wanted somebody to take over from her because she was just so swamped. And that was great. I was like, 'Oh, actually, you know what, I think I could do this for you, do you want to have a chat?' So I went and spoke to them, explained that I was finishing up at the recruitment agency and launching as a freelance consultant, and there was nothing on the list of projects that I felt I couldn't do. And I said, 'do you want to want to give me a go?' and she said, 'Oh, my goodness, that'd be brilliant'. And we knew each other because I've worked with her before. So she knew what she was kind of getting. She knew the service that I'd given her and that's how it happened and I was extremely lucky to walk into that. And that was extended for three months, and then it was extended to the end of last year. I wanted to rebrand myself. So I had given that thought. I was talking to some connections and businesses that I knew about websites and thinking about how I would market myself. And I changed my profile on LinkedIn and began that process of not reinventing myself but relaunching myself I suppose in this new capacity. I was very lucky to walk immediately into an exciting contract.

Jeremy Cline 24:16
And so a year in what has surprised you most about what you're doing now?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 24:22
I forgot how much I really like working with people. Whilst having the recruitment business I touched a lot of people, I interviewed lots of people, I delivered workshops, I went to businesses to speak to them about their requirements, I was dealing with people all the time. But when you are working for yourself or you're working remotely at home, it can be quite isolating. And whilst I could deal with that, and I actually learned to do that - it's not an easy thing to do working from home. And I often said this to candidates who are applying for roles which involved homeworking. You know, I think everyone has this kind of idea that working from home is great. 'It's brilliant, yeah, working from home.' It's a discipline. It's a really important discipline to have. And it's not easy. I had learned to work from home. I faffed about in the beginning, I think, in all honesty, but then I thought, goodness, I really have got to work from home. I can't just keep stopping and taking the dogs out for a walk or putting the washing on or popping up the shop to get a paper or whatever. But I missed that team environment. So the last year for me - whilst I was a contractor, so I wasn't on the payroll, I suppose - I wasn't a member of staff, I enjoyed that being in that position because I had the best of both worlds. I had the team environment, worked in an office with lovely, great people. And that camaraderie was really nice, but I wasn't involved in the office politics. I didn't get involved in that kind of staffy stuff. I was able to stand back from that and just observe and I really liked the aspect of working for myself in that capacity.

Jeremy Cline 26:03
Do you have a five year plan, or even a 10 year plan? Where do you think this might take you?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 26:10
I love learning new stuff. And one of the many things that was brilliant about having the recruitment business was it made me realise how interesting different sectors in business are. You take it for granted - you work for an airline, for example, or in aviation. That's kind of all you see. Some of my clients made such a diverse bunch of companies from companies that made barcodes to go on food packaging, to making components for computers, the IT sector, different marketing consultancies, marketing agencies - it's just so fascinating. So for me, I would like to continue to work within business. And it doesn't matter what sector it's in, because I think every sector is interesting, it's fascinating. But ultimately, they all have the same issues! They have the same people issues. Regardless of what you produce or what you're selling, you need an HR department, you need a marketing department or at least a marketing plan, or you need someone to look after the premises. So all of those core activities in the business are pretty much the same. I would like to just continue moving around and working for different businesses continuing to learn, gaining experience and making a difference I suppose - making things happen for businesses. That's what I like to do.

Jeremy Cline 27:31
Awesome. Sounds fantastic. In terms of your journey and what you've learned, does any particular one resource or anything stand out? Something that you'd recommend to people, a book that you've recommended or a quote that's kept you going or something along the starting your own business lines - anything you found particularly useful?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 27:51
The most valuable nuggets I kind of gained were from people actually. When I first started the business, one of the most critical, really important aspects of marketing is networking. And I didn't even know networking existed before I started the business. And it's really important and there's networking on lots and lots of different levels. But networking properly is a really good thing to be able to do. And recognising standing in a room with like minded people or businesses who are all there for the same reason is great, and there are some people who do the hard sell - but actually, for me, it was tapping into people who are really clever, really knowledgeable and happy to share their knowledge as well. So if you're in that arena, or you get the opportunity to network - really get as much out of it as you can. I remember someone saying to me, in the very beginning - be a farmer, not a hunter. Take from people what you can, don't go in there and try and hunt the right people and be almost an aggressive networker. Get as much out of people as you can. So that for me was a really important learning. And just read. There's so many great books out there, but depending on what your thing is - whether you're you want to go into public speaking or whether you want to be a great marketeer - there's books for everything. TED Talks is a good book, the founder of the TED Talks I would certainly recommend if you're interested in being able to kind of build your confidence up in speaking publicly or to just look into where that all came from is very interesting.

Jeremy Cline 29:31
Fantastic. And where can people find you?

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 29:34
You can find me on a Google search probably. LinkedIn, I have a LinkedIn profile. I don't have an all-singing all-dancing website. It's in kind of construction at the moment because I'm not doing that kind of hard sell. But what I am able to do is to connect with people via LinkedIn. That's probably the best place to get me. I'm also happy to speak to people or offer support in job hunting and interview techniques. CV writing, all that good stuff. So I'm happy to still offer that because that was a real learning for me as well - what works, what doesn't work when you're applying for work.

Jeremy Cline 30:11
Excellent, good stuff. Well, Carol-Anne, thank you very much.

Carol-Anne McConnellogue 30:15
You're welcome. Thank you for having me Jeremy.

Jeremy Cline 30:18
One of the things that actually excited me the most about the interview with Carol-Anne was her description of Ten2Two, the recruitment agency of which she'd bought a franchise. I actually hadn't had any idea that there was an agency which helped professionals like lawyers and accountants and so on, find flexible work in this way. And I think the fact that it's out there, it's just such a great resource and so needed. It was also very obvious the impact networking has had on Carol-Anne's career path and her ability to set up her own business. The benefits of networking has become quite a recurring theme on the podcast and I've mentioned before that I plan to do an episode dedicated to networking. Well, I'm pleased to say that I found a great guest to talk on the subject and the interview with him will be coming out later this year. So If you want to hear that episode and make sure that you don't miss it, then subscribe to the show. Either you can do that on the device that you're listening to this podcast on, or if you go to changeworklife.com/subscribe, you'll find the links there to subscribe to the show. Next week's show is for anyone who thinks that they're an introvert and worries that it might be holding them back, because that's exactly what we're going to talk about. Can't wait to see you then. Cheers. Bye.