From Wall Street to White-Glove Moves: How Corinne Morahan Built a Business by Eliminating Friction

Summary

00:00 - Introduction to Organization and Motivation

03:01 - Transition from Wall Street to Entrepreneurship

06:04 - The Journey of Home Organization

08:50 - Building a Business from Home Organization

12:06 - The Concierge Move Service

14:54 - Scaling the Business and Hiring an Operator

17:52 - Insights on Risk and Leadership

20:58 - Conclusion and Audience Engagement

Transcript

Jeff Holman (00:01.051)

Hello again and welcome back to the breakout CEO podcast. I'm your host Jeff Holman and I am here today with somebody who's going to help you get your, I don't know, your business, your life, your home, maybe everything organized and the way it should be. I've got Corinne Morahan with me. Corinne, it's so good to have you here.

Corinne Morahan (00:18.76)

I'm so happy to be here. Thanks so much for having me. I love what you're doing with this podcast and I'm excited for today's conversation.

Jeff Holman (00:25.777)

Well, thank you so much. Yeah, I'm loving it. It's great to talk with smart people about the insights that they're using and gaining and earning, we might call it, to run and grow their businesses. And you've done that quite a bit. get into, we'd love to hear about your background today. Love to hear about some of things you've built. You've got several layers to what you do and we wanna hear about all of them if we have time. And then the insights that you've either found or...

you know, reflected on and implemented or seen other people in some of your groups implement and see success from that. before we dive in though, you I always like to ask, so I think I read on your bio that you've got, you know, husband, a few kids and you're running a few businesses. Like what is it that keeps you motivated day to day?

Corinne Morahan (01:16.908)

That's a big question. okay, let's just dive right in. My husband and kids certainly are a huge motivation. And I think where that shows up for me is when I am the best version of myself, when I am lit up and know that I'm making an impact and I get to be firing on all cylinders, I can show up as an amazing partner, as an amazing mom. I have so much more patience.

Jeff Holman (01:19.426)

We're starting out easy, come on.

Corinne Morahan (01:46.444)

So I really do take my role as a CEO very seriously, not just for my clients and my team, but also for what that allows me to bring into my personal life.

Jeff Holman (01:58.833)

Is it part of who you are then? mean, that's kind of what I heard from that is this is a really integral part to who you are. Like is there a crossover? Is there separation? How do you manage that?

Corinne Morahan (02:11.15)

That's another great question. A lot of what I teach on is integration and balance in our lives. And when I first became an entrepreneur, well, to back up, I used to work on Wall Street. So I'm very much familiar with the idea of like, you live your work, there is no separation. And I got burnt out in that arena and then I left Wall Street altogether. And when I first started my business,

Jeff Holman (02:24.987)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (02:39.648)

I also found myself working nonstop. had no separation between business and my personal life, and I burnt out again. So now it's very important for me to have really strong boundaries. It's what I teach a lot of CEOs about. It doesn't mean there's separation though, because it is very hard when you are the CEO of a business that you've founded to have separation.

Jeff Holman (03:01.766)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (03:04.68)

Running my businesses is integral to who I am. There isn't a separation, but that doesn't mean there aren't boundaries to how I operate at home.

Jeff Holman (03:11.291)

Yeah.

Well, I want to, I want to hear just for context. want to hear what, what's the wall street life like? I mean, some of us have watched the movies. I haven't worked on wall street. went, I, know, I think the only experience I have with wall street really is a, an early morning run. I think it was six 30 in the morning or something. It might've been before wall street was even open that day. Cause it was really, it was, know, it was like quiet, quiet. Maybe it was a Saturday or Sunday. don't remember. I went running down there. I'm like, this is wall street. I pictured it being busier. So, but what's it really like when you're there?

Corinne Morahan (03:43.32)

So, you I worked there in the early 2000s before a lot of changes have come into place, but I loved it.

Jeff Holman (03:53.273)

You mean when there were, there, was, it was, was it Wild West-ish? Got it.

Corinne Morahan (03:58.006)

Wild, Wild West. It was a lot less appropriate than it is today, but I had a lot of fun. I mean, I had work ethic already, but you're around brilliant people that are working really hard. I love making money. And I found the sexiness of working on Wall Street and being around smart people and working at a fast pace. I found it very exciting.

I didn't find it super fulfilling. I didn't love the impact. I'm also not super interested in the markets. So there were times where I found the work itself boring, but I loved the environment that I was working in. I had some great managers that I worked alongside, and I think it really set the foundation for me to become an entrepreneur later in life. So I thought it was a lot of fun. I really did.

Jeff Holman (04:46.968)

Not 19 hours a day of boring work, huh?

Corinne Morahan (04:49.675)

mean, listen, but I'm a 22-year-old. I've got an executive assistant. If you worked past seven, you could order dinner on the firm. If you worked past nine, you could take a black car home. This was before the times of Ubers. So it was exciting. You didn't mind working there. They did. And at the time, they actually encouraged you to date your coworkers because they figured if you were dating someone at work, then you would never want to leave. And I actually met my husband.

Jeff Holman (04:53.104)

Yep.

Jeff Holman (05:04.144)

They had progressive incentives?

Corinne Morahan (05:18.922)

So it all worked out. been married 19 years now. it was, it was a fun, it was a fun time.

Jeff Holman (05:19.915)

Congratulations.

I think you're the first person. And I've been a lawyer for many years, not always, you know, working with startups and a lot of that crosses over into the HR stuff. You're the first person who's ever said, my work encouraged us to date. I'm gonna have to process that offline.

Corinne Morahan (05:40.621)

Not anymore! That's what I said, it's early 2000s before everyone became appropriate, but it worked out for me.

Jeff Holman (05:49.201)

Well, that's awesome. Well, and not, but not everybody goes from, from, you know, wall street, you know, dedication to entrepreneurship. That's, that's a bit of a unique shift, isn't it?

Corinne Morahan (06:04.545)

So yeah, and as you know, as I was thinking about this podcast and some of the things I wanted to convey, a lot of things you hear online now for entrepreneurs is that a lot of people that start their own businesses always had an entrepreneurial spirit. And we've almost been painted a picture of like, if you haven't had that, that you can't make it as an entrepreneur, as a CEO. I did not have that at all. I very much enjoyed working.

Jeff Holman (06:17.946)

Mm-hmm.

Jeff Holman (06:29.464)

Wait, so if I asked you that typical question, what was your first experience selling something to the neighborhood or like, cause I get this question when I, when I guessed on podcasts and they're like, you know, you must've always been, and I'm like, I'm like my first sales like was like wrapping paper fundraiser, something or other that I have tried to forget. Cause it was a miserable experience. You probably have a better story than I do about that.

Corinne Morahan (06:57.293)

Okay, fair. I did set up a bookshop in my basement and tried to sell the books that we already owned to every member of my family. So I do remember wanting to sell, wanting to make money, having a cash register in my early life. So fine, that is fair.

Jeff Holman (07:07.45)

Hey

Jeff Holman (07:14.256)

Were you able to secure any real money from this? Nice.

Corinne Morahan (07:17.293)

think I made like 75 cents back in the, you know, that was a lot of money in the 80s and 90s. So it

Jeff Holman (07:23.092)

You're like, I just sold you this book and your mom's like, thank you. I'm to put it right back on the shelf where it was.

Corinne Morahan (07:27.361)

Right back on the bookshelf. Exactly. So fair. As a child, maybe I had that spirit. But when I graduated college, I was very much looking for a corporate job. I liked being on a team. I didn't feel like I needed to be the boss or in charge. That came for me much later in life as I felt like I had the skills to be able to do that.

Jeff Holman (07:48.836)

Well, so what, as you did this, how long were you on Wall Street, in that job or jobs like that?

Corinne Morahan (07:53.198)

So I worked on Wall Street and then I worked in real estate finance for several years. So all told, it was under 10 years that I spanned those two.

Jeff Holman (07:59.088)

Mm-hmm.

Jeff Holman (08:04.29)

Okay, but I mean, call it eight or 10 years, that's a lot of hours, but you put in 20 years worth of work in eight or 10 years, I imagine. So what was the point at which you said, hey, I'm gonna get crazy, I'm gonna go do something different. I'm gonna try a different path.

Corinne Morahan (08:11.585)

But this is true, yeah.

Corinne Morahan (08:21.783)

So I actually had switched careers before I started my own business because I did the whole making money thing and I thought, OK, I like making money, but I'm not satisfied. And then I got a master's in higher education thinking actually that I'd become a professor. And then I went back to graduate school as an adult. And then I realized how much I did not enjoy being in school as an adult. So I did work in the nonprofit sector for a few years, which

Jeff Holman (08:27.216)

Uh-huh.

Jeff Holman (08:45.456)

You

Corinne Morahan (08:50.517)

was very eye-opening. I much prefer private sector to public sector. And so I stayed in that for a few years. And then I actually started a consulting business, which I guess technically would have been my first business, but I didn't really think about it that way. It was just kind of something to do as I left nonprofit after I'd had my son. So what really started me on the journey of starting business was staring my 40th birthday in the eye and like,

Jeff Holman (09:11.685)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (09:19.553)

really asking myself what I wanted to do with my life. I had been married, I had my kids, I could not see going back into finance. And I got our house and our whole life organized and it changed everything for me. And that's when I had that aha moment that this is a business I could start and give this gift to other people.

And that has evolved into, started by getting people's homes organized to teaching them how to do it themselves, to then coaching other entrepreneurs on how to have work-life balance so that they can be more grounded and centered CEOs.

Jeff Holman (09:58.201)

What do you mean by I'm curious? Because I'm an organized person in my own way. you saw outside the screen, you'd be like, okay, maybe he knows where everything's at. And I do mostly. But when you say you got your home organized, like tell me the context around that. Because I picture somebody who just says, okay, I, you know, and I'll say it how I think it is. You you've made a lot of money. You've got a family. You've got kids. Your husband's, I'm sure, busy.

And you're like, I just want everything to be in order. you go from, I'm just going to imagine it was a slight amount of chaos, not a lot, slight amount of chaos to pristine, clean, everything's put away. Like, did you go, what does that look like? Cause I haven't been down that path personally.

Corinne Morahan (10:45.589)

Yeah. So it was very similar to how you describe it. It was very methodical going room by room through my house, getting rid of anything that we didn't use, we didn't want, we didn't love. I started realizing, you know, I've had this career, I have this husband too I adore, have...

Jeff Holman (11:04.517)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (11:06.849)

these kids, we live in a beautiful home and I'm not feeling satisfied. And I didn't know where to start to find that satisfaction. And so really where I started was stripping away all the things that were weighing me down. We live in such a consumerist society, which I have no problem with. I love beautiful things, but when we buy things because we think it's gonna make us happy and then it doesn't, and then we're left with just stuff. So I started by really getting rid of things. And then I started creating systems.

to eliminate every single friction point in our lives. Like any friction point with my kids, any fight or resentment I had with my husband, how could we systematize the way we do everything in our homes? From the simplest things like my kids leaving their laundry on the floor, right? It not making it into the laundry basket to meal planning and prep and getting dinner on the table every night. Like how could we look at every single thing that was not working perfectly in our home?

and how could we make it work more efficiently? And we did that and then I realized, okay, wow, I really like this home and we're getting along really well. And now I've freed up my mental energy, but also actual time to do whatever it is that I wanna do. For me, it ended up being starting a business because I love to work, but really it could be whatever you want when you...

go through this process and you free yourself up, what do you want? You want more time with your family, you want more time to golf, you want more time to watch reality TV, whatever it is, but really having the time and energy to do it guilt free.

Jeff Holman (12:42.99)

Yeah, so this I don't know if this is foreshadowing or if this is a result of your prior experience, but what you described, I for a moment there, I lost track of you're talking about your family and your home life. Or if you were talking about your business, because this is what every every scaling CEO has to go through this process of cleaning house, right? Like like we've been through the chaos. We've figured out our business model enough. We know our customers well enough. And then it's if you're really going to scale at some point, you have to say.

I gotta get rid of distractions, I gotta clean out and there's, you know, there's like, there's like actual like literal layers to that and there are symbolic layers to that. Did you have this skill set like from being on Wall Street or working in the nonprofit sector? how did, or did you come at this strictly from like a homemaker, parent, you know, spouse perspective where you're like, I just.

I just want this to be clean because the way you described it is the way many CEOs would describe what they did to get their business running. But you're talking about your home.

Corinne Morahan (13:48.396)

Yep. Yes. So I had the organization skillset and the systems thinking. I think what adds the next layer to it in your house, but then also like you're saying in scaling a business is the prioritization piece and stripping away the tasks or even the roles that you have that aren't moving the needle for you, that aren't impacting the bottom line or aren't impacting the client experience. And that piece

Jeff Holman (13:56.154)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (14:17.773)

came later as I had really honed the skill of systematizing. Once you actually have everything in place and you realize like you can become so efficient that you can get a million things done with a super lean team, but should you be doing all those things? And I think once I got so systematized with the business and I realized we're doing a lot of things that aren't moving the needle for us revenue wise or like they're just not moving the business forward, we can keep doing them with low lift, but why are we doing that?

That is a skill that I really gained later as I became a more seasoned CEO.

Jeff Holman (14:54.692)

Yeah, that makes sense. I wanna dig on this just one more question, I think, because I think some people might take away more from this part of it than when we start talking in terms of business, right? When you did this process, I imagine you had to throw something away. You had to give some things to charity. What were one or two of the things that you saw and you're like, have to...

I have to organize, I'm just gonna say organize this, I have to organize this. And there was like a struggle with it. Like you're like, but I don't want to get rid of this, but I should get rid of this. You know what saying? What were one of those two things that really made you stop and pause?

Corinne Morahan (15:22.903)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (15:31.598)

Yeah, I do. so, you know, for me, personally, I, I think the hardest things were sentimental items that I had gotten from family members, because there's guilt attached to it. And then I really started coming up with these mantras. And as I coached a thousand, literally a thousand people through this process in my membership, and even more than that, with our in person clients, I came up with some mantras that have really helped

with every pain point that people come up against when they're getting rid of things. So one, there's a financial stress that people think about. And it's like the money's already been spent. By you keeping it, you're not bringing any more value to it. You can't get the money back. There is also the realization that there is a cost to keeping things.

Jeff Holman (16:12.387)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (16:26.049)

The cost in keeping things is the stress it's causing you is the space it's taking up in your house. We think of it as that there's no cost to keeping the thing. There's the money that we're wasting, but there actually is a really big cost. There are those people that think about if you get rid of things, they're going in a landfill. So instead we've made our homes the landfill. It's like, don't want to put it in a landfill, so I'm going to keep it in here, but then you're living in chaos and clutter. So it's really anchoring into the why behind why you're doing this.

Jeff Holman (16:26.063)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (16:55.821)

which makes it a lot easier. For some people, it's sentimental items. For other people, it's those things that were expensive or that are harder to replace. So it really can be different for all of us, but just, you know, I always go back to the saying, if you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always gotten. And there is a pain to making change, but that pain is often so worth it in the end. And it's less painful than staying stuck in this reality that you're not satisfied with.

Jeff Holman (17:24.025)

Yeah, I love that you're explaining this clearly and simply without using the buzzwords. You you just described sunk cost fallacies. You just described opportunity costs. And I've met a lot of people who don't even know how to explain that. You just explained that you know what it is. You just were explaining it for an audience that isn't necessarily looking for the buzzwords. They're looking for the meaning, right? So I love that. I also love that you called the, you know, we're making our homes the landfill sometimes like that.

That's probably a phrase you use often because it's a pretty striking phrase. So is there something, I wanna come back to my question though. What was that one thing where you're like, this thing, like there is a sunk cost or an opportunity cost issue with this and I just, I have to let it go. Because that comes up in life and in business.

Corinne Morahan (18:13.517)

And in business, it's true. getting, yeah, I had a set of China from my grandmother who I adored. It was a beautiful set of China. It was red and gold, but I was never going to use it. And you think about the guilt at getting rid of something, but people don't want you to hold on to things of theirs if it's not going to bring you joy. Like if my grandmother knew it was stressing me out, she'd be happier that I got rid of it. I don't regret it at all.

Jeff Holman (18:37.837)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (18:42.399)

It was absolutely the right decision, but that was a hard one. I was sad to pass that along.

Jeff Holman (18:46.372)

Yeah.

I can totally imagine that. know there's a, I'm not even sure what the piece is, a buffet I think it's called upstairs that has in my home that has some china in it. We do use it occasionally. I don't want to say that it's exactly the same, but I know there's lot of sentimental value to it. I can't even imagine asking my wife to say, you your grandma's china. I think I know what we should do with that. That's outside of my realm. So.

Corinne Morahan (18:56.045)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (19:15.533)

But I also say even if you use it once a year, it's worth keeping. It's those things that you're literally never gonna use that you've just gotta pass along to someone who will love them more than you.

Jeff Holman (19:26.797)

No, that's fantastic. And thank you for accommodating my pressing on that question. So I have one distracting question, and I have to ask it, it's totally unrelated. Your background, is that a picture? Because it's kind of a beautiful background. can't see the full painting. Okay. Maybe the framing, I just see the pink and the whites. There might be other stuff outside of it, but it's a great background. Love it. So.

Corinne Morahan (19:29.729)

Yes.

Corinne Morahan (19:39.445)

It's a painting. Yes.

Corinne Morahan (19:49.675)

Yes, no, it's a painting and this is it's really what I've become known for and all the all the coaching calls that I'm on and when I go live on Instagram, I think people recognize the pink behind me. So this is an actual real life table behind me. This is it's not a green screen. Yeah, yeah.

Jeff Holman (20:05.101)

That is branding right there. Awesome. Well, thank you. Well, so let's move on to your business then that you're running now. So you started out by translating your home organization into teaching other people to organize. Was that teaching them to coach other people or was that actually teaching them as the people doing the organizing? What did that look like?

Corinne Morahan (20:29.312)

But it actually started before doing either of those things, both of which I do, but it actually started as a local boutique in-person organizing business. So I would go into people's homes and help them actually get organized. And I still run a team that does it. It's evolved through the years. We are now a boutique firm that serves Boston's elite. And when I say elite, know, Boston's elite business owners, the professional athletes, we have multiple.

Jeff Holman (20:41.101)

Okay.

Jeff Holman (20:53.262)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (20:58.764)

teams around here, we are the go-to firm to help organize our clients' homes and as a byproduct, organize their lives. Because when your home is organized, your life is organized, your stress levels come down. So that still is the bread and butter of what we do. And I really revolutionized the industry by offering concierge move services. We had a client

I had a client when I was still a one woman show asking if I could basically manage her entire move from a brownstone downtown into a beautiful state in the suburbs. And I had, was just a voice in the back of my head that was like, say yes. I don't know how the heck we're going to do it, but just say yes. And I did. And then I had a few months to hire a team to come up with processes to do this. And I

Jeff Holman (21:47.662)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (21:57.553)

knocked it out of the park for the first time around. And now this has become our signature offering. We charge a massive price point for it. I'm always happy to share numbers. The minimum is around 50,000 up to $85,000 for a weekend move in. I will bring my whole team will move you out of your home into your new home. That doesn't include the cost of movers. We work with a moving company. So it's an absolutely

Jeff Holman (22:08.9)

Yeah.

Jeff Holman (22:14.243)

Okay.

Corinne Morahan (22:24.792)

luxury service that we offer our clients. So from the client perspective, it's life changing, they get to go away for a weekend, they leave their old house, they come home to their new house, there's not a moving box on site, everything is perfectly placed.

Jeff Holman (22:27.235)

Yeah.

Jeff Holman (22:37.775)

So you guys show up, do the packing and everything, or you bring a team to do the packing? Uh-huh.

Corinne Morahan (22:40.778)

We bring in a white glove moving company that does the packing. We oversee all of it. And then over a weekend, we will unbox, unpack, and meticulously, perfectly organize and label everything. We'll make sure their fridge is stocked, the linens are laundered. They move into their new home.

And there's literally nothing to do. My team will meet them there for their weekend away. We'll unpack their bags. We'll start their laundry. Like they leave their old house. They come to their new house. They can go to work in the morning and every picture is hung. Every TV is hung. So it's an amazing service for our clients and it's a massive revenue and profit driver for my business. And I've coached other organizers to do the same. I've like through bringing the service in they've

broken seven figures in annual revenue because of this one service. So it's really changed the landscape in a lot of ways.

Jeff Holman (23:39.748)

Yeah.

Jeff Holman (23:44.292)

That's fantastic. And so, when you first said that, I'm like, okay, so she puts the gloves on, she puts on the jeans and she goes, she's moving stuff. But no, you hire the movers and they do the packing, they do the unpacking, but you're there supervising, you're more like the general contractor of the move. Is that right?

Corinne Morahan (23:59.489)

Well, the movers, they're the brawn. They actually box up and they do the physical moving of furniture. But then I bring in a team of eight to 10 organizers. And we are the ones that do the unboxing, the putting everything away, the setting up the systems in every space, and buying all the organizing products, all the hangers and all the containers for the drawers, labeling everything and setting up.

Jeff Holman (24:07.235)

Yeah.

Jeff Holman (24:16.011)

Okay.

Corinne Morahan (24:27.932)

system for how they're gonna live in their home so that it feels like a dream home. So many people buy their dream home and then it just becomes another pain point because there's so much to do. Yeah, exactly.

Jeff Holman (24:36.207)

It's a three year move to actually unbox everything. Well, so do you end up with, I suspect that you end up in some situations where you're like, hey, welcome back. You're the Joanna Gaines or whoever saying, I've got this pristine space for you now. By the way, we've got this one area that we bought a new piece of furniture for you or you need something here that we recommend. And then you've got another space where you're like, we have,

six boxes left over or 60 but and we're just like hey like you need to get rid of this none of that

Corinne Morahan (25:10.636)

No, nothing, It's when I tell you it's perfection, Jeff, there's nothing for them to do.

Jeff Holman (25:18.605)

Well, you don't like make a recommendation like, we opened this box and we're like, that probably should go. So you're not making that determination during the move.

Corinne Morahan (25:26.454)

So we will work with them prior to the move to help them declutter any of the things we don't think should come into their new home. So we try to do that.

Jeff Holman (25:33.135)

So you've done that decluttering and that space planning beforehand. I mean, that makes sense. If it's white glove service, it's an expensive service, you're doing it right. So that's all done beforehand. you don't, got it.

Corinne Morahan (25:45.697)

That's, and in the moment, if we realize we were just doing a move in in a penthouse in Boston last week, we realized one of the kids bedrooms didn't have enough furniture for his all his little tchotchkes, like his trophies and whatnot. So we went out and bought a bookcase right then and there. don't ask the, we don't bother the client with a question like that. They want it done and we know their aesthetic. And so we go do it and we execute. so that they don't have to make the decision. They just get to enjoy.

Jeff Holman (25:59.012)

Mm-hmm.

Jeff Holman (26:08.804)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (26:14.944)

the decisions that we've made for

Jeff Holman (26:17.551)

Have you ever though ended up throwing something out when the client hadn't already decluttered it and you're like, hey, I mean, you have to name names, but there's gotta be something you're like open a box and you're like, hey, just they're not gonna miss that. Just get rid of it.

Corinne Morahan (26:25.13)

No,

Corinne Morahan (26:30.602)

Listen, we've made that mistake in the past. We don't do it anymore. I have gotten rid of things that we should not have. So truly, we don't get rid of anything without the client's permission.

Jeff Holman (26:34.895)

okay.

Jeff Holman (26:40.153)

Got it. Okay, okay. I know if you moved my house, well, it'd be different. I'd have to do a lot of decluttering probably, which would be good for my house and good for my soul, I imagine. well, tell me more about your business then. What does your business look like today? What evolutions have you made? is there a moment, and maybe your breakout moment was realizing that you can offer this, accepting this.

Corinne Morahan (26:54.044)

Exactly.

Jeff Holman (27:10.081)

opportunity to move somebody. But are there other other moments in your business where you really kind of said, Hey, like I'm going and I'm up against this reality. I'm on this plateau and you know, maybe if we do this or do that, you iterate through things and you kind of achieve a breakthrough. there any, any other moments in the journey of your business that look like that?

Corinne Morahan (27:31.998)

Yeah, there have been a few. the offering this, the concierge move services was a big one. And then in, so a few years after I started the business, I always knew that I wanted this business to be more global and I wanted to make a bigger impact, but I realized I needed to gain some skillsets and actually become an expert in organizing before I could grow it. in.

Jeff Holman (27:51.931)

Well, can I interrupt there? That's a really interesting comment because, you know, you're doing a like geographically localized business. It's moving, it's organizing, right? But you had the vision to take it global. That seems like there's maybe a, I don't know, like a leap to make there. What would that look like?

Corinne Morahan (28:13.292)

I think the leap came before I started the business because I had a desire to build a brand more than I had a desire to build a local business. And my brain immediately went to, you've got to start with the tangible. I can be a visionary for sure, but I always come back to the concrete and the strategy. So I couldn't wrap my head around what does this mean to be a global brand, but I could wrap my head around there's something out there.

Jeff Holman (28:23.406)

Okay.

Corinne Morahan (28:41.184)

Let's just start here. Let's build this local brand. And then I had the idea at the end of 2019 to build the first of its kind online organizing membership, which would teach people how to essentially DIY what I was doing for my clients. So I didn't know anything about the digital landscape at the time. I was hardly on social media and I...

Jeff Holman (28:43.108)

Yeah.

Jeff Holman (29:00.131)

Okay.

Jeff Holman (29:04.069)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (29:07.83)

challenged myself with going live on my Facebook page every day for 30 days to start getting a following and to really do this marketing blitz and it just really caught on and From there. I started doing free online boot camps and then paid online boot camps And then I had this idea in January of 2020 to launch an online organizing membership and we opened doors and within the first seven days we had

Jeff Holman (29:15.374)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (29:37.749)

members sign up. And I have since had members literally all over the world in every country imaginable. And so that massively grew my brand and the business. And three months later, the entire world shut down. And so people needed a place to go and a place to do things. And everyone was stuck in their homes. And so that timing was obviously serendipitous, but it really helped build the business.

Jeff Holman (29:39.042)

Awesome.

Jeff Holman (29:43.716)

That's very cool.

Jeff Holman (29:55.408)

you

Jeff Holman (30:04.474)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (30:07.424)

But once the world opened back up, I'm now running essentially two different business lines. And that's when I started feeling burnt out. So another really pivotal moment was making the decision to hire a full-time operator to run the in-person organizing business. And I remember I had a mentor.

who at the time was scaling her FinTech to a billion dollar valuation. She did it and she exited it at a billion dollar valuation. But I remember her telling me like, you need a full-time operator. And I was like, how am I ever gonna be in a position to be able to pay someone a six figure plus salary to run this? Like I couldn't wrap my head around that I was gonna be able to get there. And then two years later I did. And I had made sure that I had enough money in the business put away.

Jeff Holman (30:33.486)

Mm-hmm. Awesome.

Jeff Holman (30:44.282)

Right.

Corinne Morahan (30:55.958)

to be able to pay all of my team for at least a year or two. I don't know if that's more of like a, know, not to get stereotypical and gendered, but as a female CEO, super important to me. All the people that work for me are women. I wanted to make sure that I could pay them. That was like a big stress point for me. So once I had the money, I hired someone, she left her business to come run my business full time.

Jeff Holman (31:13.68)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (31:23.518)

And that changed everything for us because it allowed us to really grow in scale. mean, our revenues increased over 200 % after we brought her in. It allowed me to build out more of my coaching program, which I'd already done. I had started coaching entrepreneurs during the shutdown because there were so many other organizers that were running businesses that were strictly in person.

Jeff Holman (31:48.558)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (31:48.649)

And I'm a big believer in diversifying our revenue streams. And so really started teaching them how to do that and what that looks like. So I was already doing it. And that's really where my passion lies. So I was able to concentrate more on that while I had this full-time operator growing and running our local business. that was stressful. And it required a huge leap of faith. And I wanted to have this buffer and this cushion. But had I not done that, I know I would have

either burnt out to the point of burning down both of my businesses, or I would have just been playing much smaller than I knew that we had the potential for.

Jeff Holman (32:27.759)

Yeah, I want to come back to the burnout moment and the hiring the operator in just a moment. you mentioned early on the launch, I think a lot of people, and this is the origins of scaling, right? Like I'm going to launch, I'm going to be online for 30 days and lo and behold, people showed up. What was the number one thing you did there?

If someone is in that same position, I mean, and I'm gonna take away one of your options, it might be your go-to. What's the one thing you did, Jeff? I just committed and I started. Like you gotta get started. I'm gonna take that one off the table. Like tactically speaking, once you...

Corinne Morahan (33:01.526)

No, I'm gonna say something more annoying, which is times have changed. It was a very different landscape in 2020 than it is now. So I could tell you what I did, but it's different now. The landscape is much noisier and you're competing against much more. So what I did then, I don't think would work as well now anyway. think now you really have to have a personal brand. It's something that

Jeff Holman (33:17.325)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (33:30.768)

I have been focusing more and more on because people want a person. They want you. They want someone that they can connect with more and more as the landscape has gotten louder. I do think that was a piece of the success in the beginning, but I think there was just, there was buzz. There was excitement. There was the promise of something new. It was novel. That is very hard to recreate in a world now that's so noisy. So...

Jeff Holman (33:52.761)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (33:59.316)

I think my advice now is really focusing on your personal brand and getting people to connect with you and getting them excited and really understanding that you have a vision for them greater than they have for themselves and you can help them bring that to life, whether it's working closely one-on-one or it's joining a larger program. But I do think people want that personal connection now in a way that wasn't as important five years ago.

Jeff Holman (34:23.939)

Yeah.

Jeff Holman (34:28.171)

I think you're absolutely right. And so I'm going to translate this into a different, you got to your pink painting in front of them. right? You can't, like a lot of people think about their brand and they're like, these are my core values. And it's like, that's all valuable. That's all good. But a brand is really an outward thing, not an inward thing. And if they don't see your pink painting on the wall, how do they know what your core values are? Right? So being out there is...

Corinne Morahan (34:35.722)

Exactly right.

Corinne Morahan (34:57.152)

Well said. Yeah.

Jeff Holman (34:59.614)

So when you hired this, what was your decision making process? mean, was it really just funding when you hired your full time operator? Like I just have to save up money and once I have enough, I'll pull the trigger or was it a more layered conversation?

Corinne Morahan (35:16.438)

think it's always more layered than that because you, think the biggest or one of the biggest fears that a lot of CEOs have is, this person going to do it as well as me? Are they go like, I'm burnt out and so I'm going to drop the ball eventually, but that's different than someone coming in and doing it differently than I am. And are my clients going to be okay if I'm not there? You you really build yourself up.

as being so important to the brand. And then you think like, are the clients going to be upset if I'm not the one there? And is this person going to be able to deliver the quality that I have in my mind? And you do have to let some of that go and realize that you're bringing someone in who probably has strengths in areas that you don't. And certainly that was the case. The operator that I brought in, first of all, the fact that it's not her business allowed her to

hold the stress in a healthier way than I was able to because she's not internalizing it because it's not her business, right? It doesn't feel like a personal stab in the heart anytime something doesn't go pers- you know, perfectly well. So that was helpful. And there were areas where she was so much stronger than me. And there were areas where she wasn't. And in some of those places, I had to just step back and say like, okay, you're running this business line now. I'm stepping out or

Jeff Holman (36:13.071)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (36:39.347)

work collaboratively with her to say, okay, how can we make this even better? But I do think that is a really hard piece of bringing in someone to run things is they're not you. They're not going to do it exactly the way you're going to do it. And you've got to be okay with not micromanaging it. Because if you micromanage it, there's literally no point.

Jeff Holman (36:49.592)

Yeah.

Jeff Holman (36:58.329)

Yeah, and every team is a little different, right? Different personalities mesh in different ways, complement in different ways. What was the quality that you were looking for if there was one driver? it just an organization business and you want somebody who's organized? what was that one factor, maybe the if factor or whatever that drove you to hire this person?

Corinne Morahan (37:23.285)

So I think we're dealing with people, right? So I needed someone that was a good people person, but I also wanted someone who really understood the numbers. And that can sometimes be a hard combination to find. And I found someone who really seemed like a unicorn. Like she was a good people person. She understood systems thinking and how to, you know,

Jeff Holman (37:28.238)

Mm-hmm.

Corinne Morahan (37:51.332)

really strong project management. I every project we take on, you have to have really strong project management skills and people skills, and then be able to look at every project and look at the profit margin. you know, she would do a weekly KPI analysis for me, like, are we compared to all of our goals that we've set on a weekly basis? How are we tracking? And that...

trying to find someone who would be able to do all that in my mind was going to be impossible and

Jeff Holman (38:27.647)

especially when you set a budget, you're always like, this budget is not enough, right? So.

Corinne Morahan (38:31.923)

Yeah, but the thing that I've also found for anyone who's in this position is the transparency of the financials when you're paying someone I think is really helpful because you know her compensation she she had a six figure salary, but also was tied to There was also performance bonuses and for her to be able to see like here's the money we're bringing in Here's how profitable this job is. Here's how much I as the ceo am making off of this i'm a big believer in that level of

Jeff Holman (38:49.827)

Mm-hmm.

Jeff Holman (38:57.976)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (39:01.483)

transparency. And you know, think we can get scared at our numbers. I feel like can be the most vulnerable thing of running a business and having the, the strength and the confidence to have someone look at that and be involved in it is, I think is really helpful.

Jeff Holman (39:08.047)

You

Jeff Holman (39:14.925)

Yeah.

Jeff Holman (39:21.997)

Yeah, no, I've had some conversations recently where I think, I don't know if I would have said it the same way that you just articulated it, but what you said was great because I think it highlights that transparency is an aspect of culture in and of itself, right? But transparency.

I think is what allows culture to exist because you, without transparency, you're hiding the core of the business, but with transparency, you're exposing it and it's dangerous, right? It feels scary, but that's how somebody can really buy in. How do you get somebody to buy into something that they can't see the core of, right? So transparency, think is, anyway, maybe a topic for another day, but, well, this has been great.

Corinne Morahan (40:05.236)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jeff Holman (40:08.943)

Corinne and I really appreciate the time because I know you're busy and you're doing fantastic things and I I'm wondering if I should have paid you for this you know hour of time to come and organize with me if that would have but then the audience wouldn't have gotten the benefit of it too so But what what's something that you would leave for our audience that just as maybe one or two insights or tips or

Corinne Morahan (40:25.855)

This is true.

Jeff Holman (40:35.605)

know, recommendations, either from an organizing perspective or from a simple CEO perspective, what's something you would share with them to think about in their journey?

Corinne Morahan (40:46.763)

think when I see a lot of people talking about CEOs, there's so much conversation around you have to be a risk taker. And as someone who considers myself relatively risk averse, you can start questioning if you will be a good entrepreneur and a good CEO if you are a bit risk averse. And I have realized as I've built my confidence as a CEO that you have to take calculated risks, but it's okay for them to be calculated.

You don't have to totally throw caution to the wind. You have to invest in your business. You have to invest in yourself. You have to be willing to make big bold moves. You have to always be growing or there's another competitor that's going to come up or you're going to just stagnate to the point of your business not going where you want it to. So you do have to take risks and be bold, but those can be calculated risks. If you don't see yourself

Jeff Holman (41:16.793)

Yeah.

Corinne Morahan (41:44.645)

as the profile of a typical CEO, I would just urge you to reconsider where are your strengths as a CEO and how can you lean into those and alternatively, where do you need to push the boundaries a bit more to elevate yourself into the level of CEO that you wanna be.

Jeff Holman (42:04.515)

Yeah, I love that. again, a whole, there's probably a series on risks and risk assessment and de-risking. I love that. So, well, thank you so much. Is there anything you'd like to share if our audience wants to get ahold of you, wants to, you know, I know you do some coaching type programs, if they wanna participate in that, if they wanna be a part of your community, where would they go? How would they do that?

Corinne Morahan (42:29.407)

Yeah, the best place is to connect with me on Instagram, actually, at Corinne Morahan. I am for the most part in my DMs. Sometimes my assistant is in there, but that's the best place to connect with me. I am always talking about my programs and offerings on Instagram. So that's a good place to start. From there, I can lead you over to my organizing Instagram if that's of interest as well, but I'm always happy to connect in the DMs.

Jeff Holman (42:53.871)

Awesome, very good. Well, and your Instagram, what's your handle? What's your username?

Corinne Morahan (42:58.375)

It's at Corinne Morahan, C-O-R-I-N-N-E-M-O-R-A-H-A-N. It's a mouthful, but that's where you'll find me.

Jeff Holman (43:05.967)

Awesome, awesome. Thank you for sharing that. And thanks again for being on the podcast. It's been a real pleasure having you today. Yes, of course. And for our audience, thanks for joining us again for one more week of the Breakout CEO Podcast. We're glad you're here and hope you took away a few insights that you can leverage into your own business. And we'll see you next week.

Corinne Morahan (43:11.401)

Thanks for having me, Zap. This has been fun.

Jeff Holman (43:29.068)

Awesome, Karen. Thank

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